Internet Explorer is past its use-by date

Are you still using Internet Explorer to browse the web? If you are, you are in the majority, but Microsoft's market share is steadily shrinking because people are slowly drifting away from the browser that is bundled with Windows and are choosing an alternative like Chrome, Safari, Firefox or Opera. Why?

One reason is the speed difference between IE and Chrome and Safari. If you have IE, go to one of the JavaScript speed tests like SunSpider and run the benchmark. IE8, which is faster than IE7, has a score of 8500ms, but if you try this with Safari you'll get a score of about 775ms. Chrome has a similar score to Safari. They aren't just slightly faster, they are increadibly fast and code that takes Internet Explorer several seconds to execute takes Safari and Chrome milliseconds. Don't take my word for it, run the test yourself.

There are other speed tests, but the results are the same - IE is dog slow. This is one reason why people are switching browsers. Unfortunately, the internet is very congested and the amount of traffic in the pipes and people on popular websites nullifies the effect of the enormous speed advantage of Safari and Chrome. With a dodgy internet connection, ISP throttling and overburdened web surver IE can almost keep up with Safari and Chrome. This means that people stick with IE even though it's so slow - they don't notice because the internet's slow anyway.

Another reason why you should switch from IE to another browser is that sometimes it just doesn't work. seriously, it cannot display some web pages. For example, go and check out Norton Utilitiesat the Symantec website. Internet Explorer 8 makes a complete mess of it and fails to display it. It's perfect in every other web browser. This page isn't a one-off and when you've had a few of these you'll probably think that there's something wrong with your PC, Windows, your internet connection, or the website. It's none of those, it's IE8 that just can't work with the latest web standards.

If you are still using IE, go and get Safari. Chrome is fast, but doesn't have as many features.)

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Apple Mac OS X Snow Leopard for $29

At the recent developers converence Apple revealed that the next version of its OS X operating system will be released in September and it will cost $29. (No matter what the exchange rate, it'll probably be £29 here in the UK.) The reason for the September release is probably to beat Microsoft Windows 7 and it's hardly surprising, but why is it so cheap? It is normally more like $129.

Pricing it at $29 is very unusual for Apple, a company this is not known for selling cheap products, so what are the reasons behind it? Basically, it wants to move everyone from a 32-bit operating system to a 64-bit one on Intel hardware. By supporting only one hardware architechture - Intel - instead of two - Intel and PowerPC - in the long term it will save time, effort and money, which is important in the current economic climate.

Apple has rewritten and recompiled OS X and the built in applications like Safari and Mail for 64-bit Intel processors. This is because they can handle data more efficiently, which means better performance. Removing the support for older Macs with PowerPC architechture means that there is less code. The end result is that Snow Leopard is half the size and twice as fast as Leopard. This is briliant news for everyone using newer Intel Macs, but bad news for everyone else.

The reason why it is only $29 is two fold. First Apple wants to encourage as many users as possible to a 64-bit operating system, and second, it's taken so much time and effort to rewrite the OS that there's not much that is actually new. There won't be a huge number of new features, so charging full price probably isn't an option, despite the speed boost and space saving.

Next year you can expect to see rewritten and recompiled 64-bit editions of Apple software like iLife and iWork.

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Why Windows starts so slowly

How long does your PC take to boot up? Two minutes, three, longer? Why can't Microsoft make it start faster? Actually, it isn't Windows that is at fault because if you format the hard disk drive and install a fresh copy of Windows on it, it will boot up very quickly indeed. The problem isn't the operating system, it's the software that is installed afterwards that makes it so slow. (Microsoft may be partially to blame because Windows allows or even encourages programming practices that slow down the boot up.)

It's amazing how much gets installed into memory when you switch on and half of it won't be used. For example, I run iTunes once a week to update my iPod, yet an iTunes Helper, an Apple Mobile Device driver and an iPod Service is loaded every time Windows starts up. They run 24/7 even though iTunes is run once a week. Why can't these things be loaded when they are needed instead of slowing down the boot process and consuming memory and processing power?
iTunes is just one example and it isn't the worst by any means. Looking at what's loaded on my computer it is clear that Roxio is a particularly bad offender. The company makes some useful software, but does it have to be loaded all the time? Surely it doesn't need to be loaded unless it is being used?

If you have a Blackberry mobile phone and have installed the software to sync it with your PC you'll have a Media Manager supplied by Roxio. This runs RoxWatchTray9, RoxMediaDB9, Roxio Hard Drive Watcher 9, Roxio UPnP Renderer 9, and Roxio Upnp Server 9 every time you start Windows. It doesn't matter whether you want to plug in your Blackberry or not, it all gets run every time Windows starts. Why can't these things be run when you want to plug in your Blackberry? They don't need to be running 24/7.

I have Roxio Creator Ultimate on another PC for burning CDs and DVDs, a task I perform perhaps once a week or once every couple of weeks. To use this software though, the following files are loaded automatically with Windows every time it starts whether I need it or not: CPMonitor, RoxTrayWatch, Roxio Upnp Server 11, RoxLiveShare11, RoxWatch11, PxHelp20, Sahdla32, Saibla32, saibsvc, and SaibVda32.

That's 10 programs just from one software application I installed. Now this is OK if you have just one a application on your PC, but who has just one? We have many applications, so when you multiple this by the number of apps you have the number of files loaded on startup can be quite large. And you probably won't need most of it. Not today. Maybe next week or whenever you run the associated application next, but it still gets loaded. It consumes memory, time, and processing power. Why?

Software developers: Stop loading all this crap into Windows every time it starts! When a program is run it can load all the files it needs, but don't run stuff when it's not being used.

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Want a cheap Mac? Visit the refurb store!

The intense competition between suppliers of Windows PCs drives the prices ever lower, and some people would also say that the quality suffers too. After all, you get what you pay for.

Apple doesn't sell cheap computers and it steers well clear of the bottom end of the market and instead it prefers to produce a small number of high quality premium priced products. Does this mean that there is no such thing as a cheap Mac? No it doesn't because you can get significant discounts on Apple hardware if you know where to look. You can save tens or even hundreds of pounds on new kit, but few people know how.

When Apple refreshes it's product line and launches new hardware, have you ever wondered what happens to all the stock of the current kit? One day the Apple stores are selling plastic cased MacBooks and the next day they have brand new all-aluminium bodied ones. Where have all the old models gone? And when the desktop iMacs were recently replaced, where did all the existing ones go? Of course, Apple will try to run down stocks in the run up to the launch of a new product, but you can't run stocks down to zero and there will always be some old models lying around in warehouses. What hapens to them? The answer might be that they are sold off at the Refurb Store, an online supplier of Mac kit at discounted prices.

According to the FAQ at the site, everything sold at the Refurb Store is pre-owned, in other words, second hand. However, some people that have bought from the store have reported that they have received items in their original packaging that has never been opened and never used. It's brand new. It seems likely that old stock is sold off at the Refurb Store. The pre-owned kit the store refers to might be the demo models that have been on display in Apple stores. Although the kit has been switched on all day every day and occasionally prodded by potential purchasers, it will have hardly been used. The Macs will have been idling in a mimimal usage power-saving mode most of the time.

When you buy from the Refurb Store you could be lucky and get new kit, but it could be an ex-demo model. Don't worry about ex-demo models because they have been wiped clean, the latest version of OS X has been installed, and it's been repackaged. Everything sold comes direct from Apple. It's just like new and it comes with the same warranty as new kit too.

You'll find more than just Macs at the Refurb Store and there are iPods too. The items on sale change quite frequently and if the Mac you want isn't available today it might be there tomorrow, but you have to be quick because there are often limited numbers available and you'll need to snap it up before anyone else. You should either subscribe to the RSS feed or install the widget and keep it on your desktop. You'll also need to select your country because the products and prices are specific to your location.

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Windows 7's XP Mode

An interesting feature of the soon-to-be-released Windows 7 is the inclusion of Windows XP Mode. This is basically a virtual machine running Windows XP and it's provided to enable you to run applications in Windows 7 that cannot be run normally. There aren't actually that many XP programs that won't run in in Vista, but if you do have one and it's prevented you from upgrading, you can upgrade to Windows 7 safe in the knowledge that you can still run them using the Windows XP Mode feature.

Unfortunately, not everyone will be able to use XP Mode in Windows 7 because there are some specific system requirements. For a start it is only for Windows 7 Professional, Windows 7 Ultimate, and Windows 7 Enterprise. (The most popular version, at least among consumers, is likely to be Windows 7 Home Premium.) In addition to this it requires a CPU with the Intel Virtualization Technology or AMD-V feature turned on and enabled in the system BIOS.

Some people (Apple Mac fanatics are the worst) have criticised Microsoft and are saying that they've shot themselves in the foot with this feature because no-one knows whether the processor in their PC has Intel Virtualization Technology or AMD-V. They say that many Windows 7 users won't be able to use it and therefore the feature is pointless. Of course, some people won't be able to use it, but there are good alternatives. XP Mode is actually Windows Virtual PC, which is a new version of the old Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 utility. Virtual PC 2007 has been given away free for ages by Microsoft. It runs Windows XP just fine and the hardware requirements are minimal - an x64-based or an x86-based computer with a 400 MHz or faster (1 GHz recommended) processor with L2 cache. So anyone can run XP using Virtual PC 2007, provided, of course, you have a Windows CD to install it from.

Windows Virtual PC is the 2009 edition of Virtual PC 2007 and naturally it makes use of the advanced virtualisation features of modern microprocessors. You can use it to run various versions of Windows in Windows 7 and it's not limited to just XP. However, for those people that don't have the right version of Windows 7 or the right hardware, there is always the older 2007 edition or VirtualBox. VirtualBox runs on Windows, Linux and Mac OS X and you can run any version of Windows on any operating system. XP in vista, Vista in XP, 7 in Vista, Vista in 7, and Windows 7 on an Apple Mac or Linux machine. It's a great program and it's free. So don't worry about XP Mode because there are lots of other options available.

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Download Windows 7

Windows 7 is almost here and it is in the final stages of beta testing. This can't last much more than a few months, so we are probably looking at an autumn release. Autumn and Christmas are traditionally peak times for computer sales and Microsoft would gain the most benefit from launching Windows 7 in the second half of the year.

Some people have said that Windows 7 has been rushed out because Vista was such a disaster. It has hardly been rushed and by the time is it released Vista will be three years old! Yes, it was released to businesses and OEMs in autumn 2006 and to consumers a couple of months later in January 2007. That's not rushing things and it seems pretty normal. Compare it to Windows 95, 98, ME release dates or Windows 2000 and XP. It only seems rushed because there was such a long break between XP and Vista. And Vista is hardly a disaster. It's actually very good now that PCs are bigger and faster and there have been service packs to fix bugs and enhance features.

Windows 7 is much better than Vista though and you can try it for yourself - for free. Anyone with a fast broadband connection, a DVD-writer and a couple of hours to spare can get Windows 7 up and running on their PC. You'll find the download link here.

If you don't want to wipe your hard disk drive and replace the contents with Windows 7, go and get either VirtualBox or Virtual PC. These are excellent tools and you can run Windows 7 in a window on the desktop using XP or Vista.

Actually, now that we mention VirtualBox and Virtual PC, it's interesting that Microft is supplying Windows XP as a virtual machine to run in Windows 7. This means that you can run all your XP applications in Windows 7. Most will work natively, of course, but problem programs can be run in the XP virtual machine.

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Apple should be more like Dell

Last week Apple updated its desktop computers and new iMacs were launched. Initial reactions were not good, at least here in the UK and the two main problems were the lack of innovation (same old box, just a few updated components) and the price. When Macworld reported on the new Macs it received a lot of negative comments.

The exchange rate has made products from overseas more expensive becase a year ago you could get $2 for each UK pound, but now it's around $1.40 and that's a big difference. Apple kit never was very cheap, but now it is even more expensive and the cheapest iMac is £949 ($1,317). The best part of £1,000 is a lot to pay for a computer in the current economic conditions and not many people have that sort of money to spend on a luxury. Yes, it's a luxury. A computer is a necessity, but a Mac is an up-market luxury item.

I have no objections to companies selling high priced kit, but when there is only one supplier, there is no alternative, and only a small range to choose from, then it does become irritating and off-putting. There are only four Mac desktops to choose from - the Mini, 20in and 24in iMacs, and a Mac Pro, all with some minor configuration options and none of which are very cheap. It's market share of desktop computers will surely shrink because the market for top-end kit is shrinking thanks to the recession, and that's a shame.

If only Apple was more like Dell. Go to the Dell site and you can find PCs that cost £3,500 ($4,800) and that's just for a base configuration. Add a few optional extras and the price is even more! But it doesn't matter because at the other end of the range are PCs that cost as little as £200 ($277). Go to Dell and no matter what hardware you want and no matter how much or little you have to spend, you'll find something you'll like. Go to Apple and you've a choice of four high priced desktops.

Imagine if Apple made shoes. It would make four sizes and expect everyone to squeeze their feet into one or other of them. A lot of people would find that they just don't fit.

You want a laptop with a 17in screen? Apple has just one and it's £2,000 (about $3,000). 

Apple needs to be more like Dell and provide a wide range of computers. There should be more computers at more price points, from small, cheap and portable netbooks to big desktops. There should also be more configuration options too. Squeezing the components into small cases as with the Mini and iMacs may produce attractive designs, but they limit the components you can use. With a Windows PC you can take out the video card and replace it with another faster model to boost the performance in a matter of minutes, an option that's not available with Minis and iMacs.

I do like Macs and the latest models are excellent, but they'll only be attractive to a small number of people - ones that can afford the high price tag and whose requirements exactly fit one of the small number of models that are on offer.

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