Turning off IE
March 6th, 2009 | by kfinney |Now according to the msdn blog, IE, among other features can be turned off in Windows 7. This is a big step for Microsoft due to the fact that IE has been packaged as the browser of choice for Windows. This gives users some actual flexibility and choice! What? Choice in Windows?
I personally use Firefox as my browser of choice but, it should be noted that certain websites and developers still require you to use IE. I don’t like to call people out but, Netflix play now feature only works with Internet Explorer. So while removing the browser all together may not be a great idea, the choice and flexibility to do so, is a step in the right direction. IE Tab, is a handy little add-on for Firefox that allows you to switch between the two browsers while still maintaining your other tabs in Firefox. It should also go without saying that this add-on has it’s bugs and sometimes it will crash Firefox. Hey, nothings perfect but, this level of choice works best for me and with Firefox, you just reload it and restore your session. BRILLIANT!
Among other features, are things like Windows Media Center, Media Player, etc. I must commend Microsoft on their effort to keep the customer happy and finally offer some choice. I know, this feature is available in current Vista offerings but, they have decided to expand the list. Looking at the list now, yeah, I would probably get rid of Media Player, games, and maybe a couple others. WIth VLC Media Player and the CCCP, you can play pretty much anything out there anyway. It should be noted though, that VLC does not use the CCCP in any way. The Pack comes with Zoom Player and Windows Media Player Classic. Once again, I would probably keep IE just because of the different sites I visit and some still not wanting to code for anything but, IE.
All in all, this is a step in the right direction and hopefully Microsoft continues to take customer input to tailor Windows to it’s prime audience. Now, if we could just get some more device drivers to work with Vista, and in turn Windows 7 since they use the same code base, to work Microsoft may just have a decent platform.
