Internet Explorer 9 (IE9)

Just a month after Microsoft presented a Release Candidate of the new, completely rebuilt Internet Explorer 9, the company has delivered the final version at this year's SXSW. IE9 is the result of an enormous effort by Microsoft's browser development team (detailed on the IEBlog), and benefited from more beta tester feedback than any previous product from the company. It's a huge advance from the Internet Explorers of the past in terms of speed, trimmed down interface, and HTML5 support. The new browser is available for download at beautyoftheweb.com, but only for users of Windows 7 and Vista. For users of those OSes, it's a highly recommended upgrade, and in time, if graphics-intensive sites become the norm, it may be the best choice of all.

Among all current browsers, Internet Explorer 9 gives the most space to the webpage, with a drastically cropped top-window frame that takes up just 63 pixels, compared with Chrome's 89. Microsoft has also built in the unique new Tracking Protection, which gives users more control than Chrome and Firefox's solutions to this privacy issue. In some performance measures, particularly graphics manipulation tasks, IE9 outperforms all comers. On two out of three JavaScript benchmarks, however, it's bested by both Chrome and Firefox 4. Finally, IE9 tweaks tabs, search, and its unique pinned site capability that places site icons in the Taskbar.
Setup
If you're running the IE9 RC, there's no need to uninstall it: IE9 will replace it, and will become your only version of IE. There are already language versions in Chinese traditional and simplified, French, Spanish, Japanese, Korean, and German in addition to English, with many more presumably to follow. But remember, IE9 only runs on the most recent flavors of Microsoft's operating system—Windows 7 and Vista—and there are separate installers for the two and separate versions for 32-bit and 64-bit editions. After downloading the correct installer, running it takes longer than installing Chrome, Firefox, or Opera (Free, 4 stars), and, also unlike those, it requires a reboot and OS updates.

Once it's installed, you don't have to run through a wizard making choices about search suggestions and other things as you did for IE8 (a simple task all too often not completed), it's just ready to browse—another nice simplification. The first page you'll see in your new browser is the "welcome to a more beautiful web" site, which explains some of IE9's more-prominent new features. It also links to sites that demonstrate these, like Hi5, Rotten Tomatoes, and a game site called Pirates Love Daisies." All good fun, while showing some nifty new Web technologies off.