Image: Internet Explorer 7 Beta 2 an easier installation than expected

The download page looks innocent enough, but what's on that support page I wonder. Maybe I'd better look before I download.

Hmm. I may have to spoof Web sites into thinking I'm using IE 6 to get it to work right. That doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

Gulp! Here we go; there is no turning back now.

Sheesh! I have to validate in order to install a beta version of a Web browser. Paranoid much?

A beta with updates; this is going well.

Well, the deed is done and fingers are crossed.

One time questions -- I'm anti phising, so yeah that's okay.

Customer Experience Improvement Program? No thanks; if Microsoft can be paranoid so can I.

I skipped the tour -- I mean it is just a Web browser after all.

Well, the TechRepublic Web site seems to render just fine, so it can't be all bad can it? Note the new toolbar in IE7. I also like the fact that it integrated my Google tool bar from IE6.

Besides tabs, which everyone knows from Firefox, IE7 has a nifty tab thumbnail feature so I can see what each tab is pointing to -- not sure how I would use it, but it's a spiffy addition.

The built-in RSS reader is a nice touch; I can retire my old RSS Reader.

I can keep track of the latest TechRepublic articles and downloads from within a single application. I wonder what Apotheon's article is talking about -- let's click and find out.

For my installation, IE7 defaulted to Google for searching the Web. I would have expected MSN, so that was a nice surprise. I can add connections to just about any search engine I want.

I show up in the oddest places. On Google, a search of my name returned a discussion of an article on reading POP3 accounts with Perl. The same search on MSN returned this discussion on creating a TechRepublic guild in the World of Warcraft. I'll let you decide which is more interesting.