Most feedback on forums and in newsletters so far are of problems with the last Release Candidate (RC). The IE7 installs I’ve experienced have ranged from a single reboot for the last RC to two reboots when I installed the production version. Mozilla’s competitor browser Firefox has never needed a reboot. IE7 does work as advertised though and once people move to the new browser there should be fewer problems and less security holes.

Overall IE7 is a huge step forward from Microsoft, combining security fixes, tabbed browsing, a new UI, speed increases and a host of rendering improvements. But is it good enough to combat the hordes or techy folk who have embraced Mozilla’s Firefox browser? The latest 2.0 version of Firefox makes it’s own improvements and in my experience remains faster and most importantly handles standards based code better.

Nice work Microsoft, but you’re not quite there yet.