Why IE is the best browser around!

[David Harrison]

OK, so everyone around here (including me) is always proclaiming IE's sucky-ness. I'm not going to cycle through why it sucks again though, quite the opposite in fact. I want IE users to come in and tell us all why IE is a cut above the rest.

So this goes out to anyone who has used IE, tried another browser, then gone back to IE. You must have had some experience with another browser because if you haven't then you have nothing to use as a benchmark.

What was so good about IE that made you want to switch back?

[Ben Rogers]

Well, I love Firefox, but I'd like to say IE is much better when it comes to dealing with multimedia. I have to use IE to view music videos on Launch, download zip files here, or watch Master Runs of Merqury City (of course I wish I could use FF for these things, but...)

[rhsunderground]

i use IE for teh flash files.

[Ben Rogers]

Originally posted by rhsunderground
i use IE for teh flash files.

But FF handles Flash just fine...

[Neczy]

I only use IE to do windows updates and check for crossbrowser compatability on my websites.

[pawky]

i just recently switched to firefox (and love it ) but before i didnt really know of the others. I do use ie for launch yahoo though because it doesnt work well on firefox. that's about all though :P

[Jona]

Originally posted by Neczy
I only use IE to do windows updates and check for crossbrowser compatability on my websites.

Same. I originally was an IE-user, and enjoyed it a lot. In fact, when first beginning JavaScript, I had a "killNetscape()" function, which wouldn't load a web site for Netscape users. Then I learned more, and realized that Mozilla/Netscape was actually a better browser. I never made the switch, because IE loaded more quickly and just seemed much faster to me. Much simpler and smaller. I finally was convinced, after a post was made by Khalid Ali (just a few weeks after he changed his name from khalidali63), to switch to Mozilla (not Firebird). It took too long to load, in my opinion, and I didn't want it always running in the background. Frustrated with it, I switched back to IE. Then I began learning CSS (previously I had only practiced JavaScript and HTML) and xHTML, which is when I made the switch to Firebird 0.7. I've never switched back since I loaded Firebird the first time. It took a few seconds longer to load than IE, but with all its features it is so much more powerful and useful than IE, it's just not worth trying to save the three or so seconds.

[Abhoth]

In the old days...;-) I was a Netscape fanatic. Up until the 4.6/4.7 days... switched over to IE at that point.

Was the best thing I ever did... I cannot begin to tell you how much I learned about how not to do things! A year and a bit ago I moved it back over to Mozilla w/MultiZilla for enhanced tabbed functionality...

IE is relegated to cross browser checking, Windows updates and for those few sites I use that have designed using IE proprietary crap.

But, keep this in mind... just a few weeks back I had occasion to speak with the owner of a web site. Selling a particular product... blah blah blah.
He needed some changes made... upon examination, his horizontal navigation flat out doesn't work in Netscape, Mozilla... 0 navigation abilities. Opera hoses the formatting up but it's still there. IE shows it all good.
When I brought this to his attention his only comment was... "Nobody's complained about it." ... oh my! Likely that it's because they can't contact you because your site does not work at all for them and they think you're an idiot... but it's amazing.
Business owners don't seem to care much about these things.

We'll see what the new and improved IE holds.....

[David Harrison]

Originally posted by Abhoth
We'll see what the new and improved IE holds.....

I'm guessing more proprietary junk and a half-arsed attempt to fix a few security holes. My expectations are low but they'll find a way to disappoint me, I know it.

Yeah, I did pretty much what you did Jona, IE --> Firebird --> IE --> start learning CSS --> OH MY GOD!!! --> Firebird, I never had a killNetscape() function though.

[steelersfan88]

I'd like to know the purpose of this thread. Is it for:

1) Let users tell why they like it so you can tell them why FF is better at the same thing.
2) or is it really Let users tell why they like it, then claim how few reasons there are.

... I'll be back

[MstrBob]

Me, myself, I'm just plain curious as to why people who try other browsers go back to IE. Not even Mozilla/Firefox, but even things like Opera and Safari. I know this yuppie who got a Mac, tried Safari, but decided IE for Mac was better x.x

Actually, when I finally realized "Hey! There are browsers other than IE!" I tried Mozilla. I liked the tabbed browsing and shiny buttons, but I was iffy. Then I downloaded Firefox, and I was blown away. Especially the developer tool bar. I've also downloaded Opera to see what its like. Opera at least supports the standards, and it's html buttons and input fields look cooler. But I've did a test, and on my computer at least, FireFox 0.8 (and now 0.9) loaded a lot faster than IE. And this isn't with Firefox in the background. I used selective startup so that the only thing running on startup is Systray and Explorer (which are necessary). First I loaded IE, then Firefox. Hands down, Firefox loaded faster. Opera and IE has the same load rate. But really, especially with non-tech savvy people, speed has a lot to do with it, along with plain ignorance of other browser, methinks. But I'm really curious...

[Neczy]

I like Firefox best...then Opera, but Opera is really bad with going to forum websites, as it caches everything so you have to refresh to see an updated forum.

[DaveSW]

Please don't start WW3 (again)

[rhsunderground]

Originally posted by DaveSW
Please don't start WW3 (again)

i thought it was W3C?

[DaveSW]

my mistake