Make sure you use IE9 32bit and NOT 64bit

Hi all,

As topic says. The reason for this, ALSO for windows 7 64bit users!

Is that a lot of the reasons and features that makes IE9 as fast as firefox, safari, chrome or at least close to is due to things that still HAVE NO 64BIT versions! which means IE9 64bit is using old files.

IE9 vs Chrome 10 vs Firefox 4 RC vs Opera 11.01 vs Safari 5 - The BIG browser benchmark! | ZDNet

Flick through this and you will see what that means.

Cheers.

 

IE9 64bit is NOT a fast browser.. no matter how much love you want to give it... it's crap! that's just the reality. the 32bit is just fine. But compared to everything else out there.. the 64bit is just not good enough to even borther.

 

Wow, I just ran the benchmarks found here:
Browser Benchmark Center

64 bit is surprisingly low performer.

 

Chrome is kicking every other benchmark in the butt.
Im surprised that peoples still advice FireFox. Its slow, its a resource hog, it feels "laggy" and too much mechanical.

and im talking as an ex firefox user. I used to use FF since its very first version, but i was pissed in the time about how slow and crawling it began to act.
Then i switched to Chrome. Turns out that all my plugins are in chrome as well, as more and more developers are turning to it, and its fast, stable, reliable, its features are awesome once you get used to it.
and for sure, ILL NEVER GO BACK!
Ie9 still interesting tho, but i see that its really similar to chrome than firefox.

 

Well duh... There is not, and never has been, any reason to use a 64-bit browser. Why would anybody even consider it? Most plugins are only available in 32bit anyway.

 

I downloaded the 32-bit version of IE9 for my 64-bit W7 laptop but Windows 7 will not let me install the 32-bit version on my 64-bit system. It gives the message "This version of setup does not support your Windows system type" when I try to install it and will not allow the install to proceed. Is there any way around this in order to make W7 64-bit allow the installation of IE9 32-bit?

 

The 64-bit file that you download means that it is for Windows 7 64-bit. It includes both 32-bit and 64-bit editions of IE9.


After you install the package, on your Start Menu there will be at least the items:
Internet Explorer
Internet Explorer (64-bit)

The non-labeled one will be 32-bit.

 

Thanks, I'll try that. Since both versions of IE9 will be installed, will the 32-bit version of IE9 be the default IE browser or will the 64-bit version be the default since my OS is 64-bit?

 

32 bit - according to the Ars Technica review I read this morning, it is apparently not possible to set the 64 bit version as your default browser.

(disclaimer: haven't tried it out myself yet, as my work machine is Windows XP)

 

It's possible to partially set 64bit as the default browser. You've got to have another browser, like FF, that you can set to default, launch ie9x64 then make it the default again from there. Certain things will naturally default to the x86 version anyway though.

If you want to really make 64bit version the default, navigate to Program Files folder and copy the IE folder to clipboard. Then, go to Program Files x86 and rename the IE folder there to something else. Copy from clipboard and now the 64bit version will launch everytime the system thinks it's going for the 32bit one.

 

You're correct; the 32-bit version of IE9 ended up being the default browser after my 64-bit IE9 download and install. I have no interest in using IE9 64-bit (due to its sluggishness) so I'm not even going to try to set the 64-bit version as default.

 

as said when you open ie it uses 32 bit ie 9 anyway on win 7 64bit
so its not really a problem

 

A point to take into account is that sometimes when people see "64-bit" they will jump onto it because they assume that it is better than the 32-bit version, but in this case and in some others (like video codecs) it is not necessarily the case.

 

I've been using the RC version of IE9 64-bit for over a month now (using final version now) i haven't witnessed the "sluggishness" some speak of, irregardless of what a few artificial benchmarks say, in my own personal real world experience IE9 is still faster than either Chrome or Firefox.

 

Internet Explorer (64-bit) cannot be the default browser.

 

Through some small slight of hand, it can be though.

 

I've used chrome and the fox, and I still prefer FF.

 

These are all javascript benchmarks, which means that they focus on one aspect (albeit an incredibly important one) of the browser. I'd be more interested in dromaeo.com's DOM only test, where IE64 might actually show a big difference.

 

I think the overall point is, in a perfect world people wouldn't need to care about what browser to use depending on what they are doing! So it doesn't matter if you use firefox, chrome or IE9 (32bit) or safari, because overall they get the job done. But IE9 64bit is just so slow compared to everything else in tests that would involve every modern website which means its just not viable to even consider.

Im really tired here at work, heh hope some of that makes sense.. sort of forgot where I wanted to go with this.

 

And here I was using the 64bit version.... ok back to the default one (32bit).

 

no matter how nice this new internet explorer sounds, i find it very hard to go back to it after using Google Chrome for so long lol

 

Thanks for the link, Indrek. I personally asked EricLaw [MSFT] on his blog about this fact. My question was truncated from few lines to just one line. . However, he provided a meaningful response. Click the page 4 of the response. Here is the response if you do not want to click the link.

 

JIT is only useful for very heavy and repeated use scripts(on the same page). Going forward, we are going to see more and more of this but now, it would be a 'whose browser win the benchmark test' kind of thing.

 

Indrek
Based on EricLaw's response, the main reason Microsoft did not develop JIT script compiler in 64 bit IE 9 is that most of the time, 32 bit IE is used. Then again, how can Microsoft encourage uptake in 64 bit IE if 64 bit IE is not developed to be faster and better than its 32 bit counterpart?

Any idea?

 

Opera and Google Chrome are the way of the "True" Warrior!

 

Not sure about 64bit as default. I know if from the 64 bit I click the benchmark link it seems to open to 32 browser. to get proper results I had to load the url in the 64 bit browser window. And yes 64 bit by comparison got blown out of the water by the 32 bit version in the benchmarks.........

 

Indrek, thanks for the reply that answers my query. You are right about lack of need for 64-bit IE, given that as for now, there is no need for 4 GB RAM to be used with IE. Even so, 64-bit IE does not have that "must-have" factors that will attract us to use it. Thus, there is no way to convince all IE users to migrate from tried-and-tested 32-bit IE.

Correct me if I am wrong. The current version of Adobe Flash Player for Windows is 10.2.152.32. I have forgotten where I saw the news, but if I am not wrong, the first stable version of 64-bit Adobe Flash Player will be 11. Not even the next version, 10.3 will be a 64-bit version. I am aware that there is a 64-bit beta Flash Player codenamed Square. From what I remembered, we must wait much longer before first stable version of 64-bit Adobe Flash Player is released.

 

Unfortunately Adobe is holding Chrome back. Chromium's 64bit version is available for linux systems but it won't be released until Adobe's 64bit flash is (I assume.)

Firefox has a nightly 64bit out as well but it also probably won't make a full release until Flash 64bit.

 

I see 64 bit IE (and other applications that have no business being 64 bit) as kind of a future proofing method - maybe in fifteen years someone will want to see what IE9 was like, but by then Windows may not support 32 bit applications.

 

Wow this thread has gotten a lot more active and a bigger debate than I imagined when opening it, hehe good to hear people opinions and furthermore their experiences.