Microsoft Internet Explorer 9 with HTML5 Support – Wont work on XP

Microsoft [MSFT] have made Internet Explorer 9 available for download as a developer preview. (download available at ietestdrive.com)

Internet Explorer 9 is expected to support HTML5 and have a new JavaScript engine that MS have codenamed Chakra. Also support for CSS3 and SVG2 is said to be included.

What Microsoft want to achieve with Internet Explorer 9 (or IE9) is a faster browsing experience that gives a better user experience which will be welcomed by anybody. Hopefully security is also on their to-do list for the browser along with better compatibility with websites which often render incorrectly when compared to firefox for example.

In a speed test performed (ACID3 test) IE9 achieved 55/100 which is more than double what IE8 achieved (20/100) but no where near the likes of Chrome, Opera and Safari which each achieve 100/100.

What we have heard is that this new version of Microsoft Internet Explorer 9 will only be compatible with Windows Vista SP2 and up meaning those running older XP machines will be out of luck.

It will be interesting to see if MS can bring back the market share they once had on the browser front.

Via: ZDNet

Speak Your Mind