Internet Explorer Usage Falls Again

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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While still holding on to a sizable overall lead, Internet Explorer has seen its lead slip from a high of 75% in 2008 to its present share of 53% in June. The onslaught from the rapid updating Chrome and Firefox browsers seem to be taking a toll on the frontrunner.

Unless Microsoft can reverse the ongoing trend, Internet Explorer's global market share will fall below 50 percent sometime in the next 12-18 months.
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well, if they didnt limit is 9 to vista and above only. I believed it would have went up more.
 
This was long coming. The staleness of IE6 opened the door for FF, and being generally behind in features, performance and security since FF has opened up opportunities for other browser makers.

I happen to really like Chrome, but it's hard to argue that IE8/9 is a good option for most on Windows vs any other modern browser. I like IE9, but it's only real feature is "MS is kinda finally catching up." Except for Safari, all major Windows browsers have decent hardware acceleration nowadays. That was pretty much IE's main attraction. Development is so slow it gave almost all competitors time to catch up with that feature.

And this steady decline wouldn't happen without eroding corporate desktop usage. That is probably more terrifying to MS overall than simply losing IE share. :p
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XP is nearly 10 years ago and the last major update (SP2) was released 7 years ago (SP3 contained minor updates* and a roll-up of security fixes). XP doesn't have the security or acceleration features necessary for IE9 (note that FF4/5 on XP only does final compositing acceleration, no text rendering acceleration is available and Chrome blacklists old drivers and has limited acceleration support on XP).

Table 2 describes some of the more significant changes in Windows XP SP3. With few exceptions, Microsoft is not adding Windows Vista features to Windows XP through SP3. As noted earlier, one exception is the addition of NAP to Windows XP to help organizations running Windows XP to take advantage of new features in Windows Server 2008. For a list of Knowledge Base articles that Windows XP SP3 addresses, see Knowledge Base article 936929.

Table 2. New and Enhanced Functionality

Network
"Black Hole" Router Detection
Windows XP SP3 includes improvements to black hole router detection (detecting routers that are silently discarding packets), turning it on by default.

Network Access Protection (NAP)
NAP is a policy enforcement platform built into Windows Vista, Windows Server 2008, and Windows XP SP3 with which you can better protect network assets by enforcing compliance with system health requirements. Using NAP, you can create customized health policies to validate computer health before allowing access or communication; automatically update compliant computers to ensure ongoing compliance; and optionally confine noncompliant computers to a restricted network until they become compliant. For more information about NAP, see Network Access Protection: Frequently Asked Questions.

Security
Descriptive Security Options User Interface
The Security Options control panel in Windows XP SP3 now has more descriptive text to explain settings and prevent incorrect settings configuration. Figure 1 shows an example of this new functionality.

Enhanced security for Administrator and Service policy entries
In System Center Essentials for Windows XP SP3, Administrator and Service entries will be present by default on any new instance of policy. Additionally, the user interface for the Impersonate Client After Authentication user right will not be able to remove these settings.

Microsoft Kernel Mode Cryptographic Module
Microsoft Kernel Mode Cryptographic Module (Fips.sys) is a FIPS 140-1 Level 1–compliant, general purpose, software-based, cryptographic module in the kernel mode level of the Windows operating system. It runs as a kernel mode export driver (a kernel-mode DLL) and encapsulates several different cryptographic algorithms in an easy-to-use cryptographic module accessible by other kernel mode drivers. It can be linked to other kernel mode services to permit the use of FIPS 140-1 Level 1–compliant cryptography. For more information, see the Microsoft Kernel Mode
Functionality Description Cryptographic Module.

Set up
Windows Product Activation
As in Windows Server 2003 SP2 and Windows Vista, users can now complete operating system installation without providing a product key during a full, integrated installation of Windows XP SP3. The operating system will prompt the user for a product key later as part of Genuine Advantage. As with previous service packs, no product key is requested or required when installing Windows XP SP3 using the update package available through Microsoft Update. Note The Windows Product Activation changes in Windows XP SP3 are not related to the Windows Vista Key Management Service (KMS). This update affects only new operating system installations from integrated source media. This update affects the installation media only and is not a change to how activation works in Windows XP.
There has to be a cut off date for support and it's been extended multiple times already. Even if XP wasn't dead, it would be dead before the next "just support this one last app" situation occurred again.
 
IE9 has good speed but poor compatibility compared to something like Chrome and Firefox.

I've mentioned already in another post here on [H] that IE9 still has issues with certain websites.
- MSNBC.com : Paragraphs start at halfway down the page. Use compatibility mode to fix it.

- Autos at MSN.com : Attempting to enter comments causes the web page to crash. After two attempts, IE 9 just gives up loading the page. LOL

- Adobe Flash : Crashes if more than 6 tabs are open that contain flash videos such as Youtube or another Flash-heavy site. Might be a Flash issue.

- Minecraft Wiki : Bullets and lists appear incorrectly without compatibility mode.

- Newegg.com : Has issues with connecting to SSL secured pages such as your account or submitting orders. This is an on-and-off issue that I've had since IE 8 regardless of OS version-- Vista or 7. Oddly enough, it works in Windows XP. o_O

- Youtube.com : Comments and comment pages do not advance when clicking on page numbers and submitting comments do not work. Compatibility mode must be enabled to fix it.

- Reddit : With and without compatibility mode, you cannot expand excerpts or Youtube videos. IE 9 cannot do it. (Click the '+' next to a Reddit link and see if it expands or not. I have yet to see it work properly in IE 9.)
​
So, yeah, good speed especially on Silverlight pages like Microsoft.com but poor compatibility on certain websites.
 
I can't wait until IE is dead completely. It has been the bane of my existence (I'm a web designer) for the past 10 years, they still haven't been able to get it right. There are simply far superior browsers out there, they're faster and more compatible with updates at a much quicker pace.
 
Why limit yourself to one browser, I have yet to find one that does everything perfectly on every site. IE and Firefox have been my staples for awhile.
 
Oh noes! The race to be the winner in giving away software for free is really heating up!

I run Chrome and IE. They complement each other well.

IMHO all the IE hate is just overblown fanboyism. What's next, jokes about AOL users? How quaintly '90s.
 
The only reason IE hasn't lost more market share is just due to the sheer number of lazy developer groups that make their stuff IE only. I know i deal with a number of these companies and it is just massively frustrating. I generally encourage my users to use FF, Chrome and only flip on IE for the few sites that it is absolutely required. I get a ton of extremely good feedback from those that convert, not to mention a boat load less infected machines.

If MS could fix the constant compatibility issues, security issues and just make IE consistently work as well as FF/Chrome. I would really have little issue with it. Unfortunately the fact is, it remains a glaringly higher maintenance security issue on my network then anything else. I personally only support about 500 PC's, I pity admins who have to support more then me.
 
AARGH! said:
Why limit yourself to one browser, I have yet to find one that does everything perfectly on every site. IE and Firefox have been my staples for awhile.
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I've used both for quite sometime and laugh when people say to get rid of ie. Stop the hate!
 
my motivation to go back and try IE9 is close to zero. a "customer" lost is really hard to get back. to me "internet explorer" still reeks of ancient poo that was IE6. they should really consider to re-name their browser. it's not like it's a well regarded brand or something...

also, I'm glad they don't support xp with their new browser. people will still run this crap in 10 years because "it does all i need and only needs 256 MB ram" or whatever.
 
AARGH! said:
Why limit yourself to one browser, I have yet to find one that does everything perfectly on every site. IE and Firefox have been my staples for awhile.
Click to expand...

Would be nice if there was only one browser standard. I've been trying to make interactive sites in HTML5 but keep falling back on flash because browser cross compatibility is too much fo a headache, especially once things start getting complex. You're dealing with three different languages (html, css, javascript) and each browser (IE, Firefox, Chrome, Desktop Safari, iPod Safari, iPad Safari, iPhone Safari, Froyo Browser) can interpret each of them differently.
 
I think not allowing IE9 on XP was a mistake.

Bottom line is that there are plenty of people with computers that are still fully capable, especially if those people primarily use their computer for casual web surfing. Their computer with XP could have been purchased as recently as 2007 or even 2008. The implication here is that they should upgrade their computer for seemingly trivial reasons.

I am milking along an old laptop still, a Pentium-M 1.7Ghz with 2GB ram, 80gb hard drive, and a Mobility Radeon 9200 powering a 15.4" widescreen LCD. The laptop is nearing it's 8th birthday but due to upgrades and generally just taking good care of my stuff it's still in prime working condition. I can't put Vista or Windows 7 on it though because it's videocard is only DirectX 8.1 and there are no WDDM drivers available for it. It's possible to force install XP drivers but that breaks all hardware acceleration, etc and I don't feel it's worth it. It's still fast enough that I can play a 1080p x264 movie (just barely with CoreAVC) and I can even play World of Warcraft on low settings. But I guess I'm going to junk it now because I can't use IE9? lol
 
IMO all three (okay four) major browsers do an acceptable job of following web standards now and the major differences between them are UI preferences and little extra features, like Chrome's web store and IE's accelerators.

It's amazing how far browser development has come since IE6. Just as Windows has improved ever since Apple stepped up their game, IE has improved in the face of Firefox and Chrome. Competition is a wonderful thing.

Has Microsoft finally "caught up?" Who cares? I've heard that for every version since IE7: "IE(n-1) sucked, but IE(n) is really good." I've also heard "but it doesn't support [draft W3C feature] that other browsers do just fine through nonstandard extensions, so it's not a modern browser."
 
From what i've seen from sites/etc I work on is firefox is plummeting at a much faster rate, being devoured by chrome. IE has stayed pretty much steady at 60% since from when I can remember. All of these "most used web browser" things tend to vary hugely based on source/sample size.
 
The lack of security and standards for IE6 pissed too many people off.

IE7 has lackluster performance and plugin availability for customization.

IE8 I really didn't see a big change.

IE9 on benchmarks apparently has killer performance, but there are still a crapton of computers with Windows XP, and its not compatible with MacOS and just about everyone I know with a Mac prefers Firefox over Safari, would probably want to install IE as well for added compatibility for corporate applications (Citrix / Web Portals / etc), but alas no option.

So they are just screwing themselves there.
 
Basically the same setup I have. But my "cup of tea" browser is FF and IE9 is basically for a handful of sites incompatible with FF (only on SSL connections).
 
What really irate me more is the "pain" an XP user has to go through just to update from IE6 to IE8! I gave up and just let IE6 stay and downloaded FF5 instead and it was nothing but a few mouse clicks and it was all done. Did I mentioned killer speed and tab pinning abilities?
 
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