Hate IE? Use A Different Shell

by Rich Menga on Feb 4, 2010 | 18 comments

Based on the commentary from my last article, nobody (or at least the ones that commented) likes IE too much these days. I wasn’t surprised by this.

For you IE haters out there, I have alternatives. No, I’m not talking about Firefox, Opera or Safari because you already know all about those. What I’m talking about are different IE shells.

Windows Internet Explorer uses a rendering engine called Trident. Over the years there have been a few developers that have made web browsers using the Trident engine. This means it uses the same engine IE does (meaning the pages render the same as they would in IE), but the overall browser experience is different – and always better.

It’s entirely possible that if you don’t like IE, it’s because of the way Microsoft designed it. That being said, these alternative shells may be more to your liking.

Avant Browser
Web Site: http://www.avantbrowser.com/

This offering has the ability to store bookmarks and other items online, similar to the way Xmarks does it – except this is built-in. It also a Flash animation filter – a very desirable thing that people like quite a bit. This Flash filter I speak of literally is as simple as a single click to turn Flash on or off. Avant also has custom skins available. IE doesn’t have this on its own.

Lunascape
Web Site: http://www.lunascape.tv

This one will really raise your eyebrow because it has not one, not two, but three different rendering engines in it. Which engines? Trident from IE, Gecko from Firefox and Webkit from Safari and Chrome. Impressive? Yes. This is the only "triple engine" web browser in the world, and you can switch back and forth between engines at whim.

There is way too much to list that this browser does. It is by every definition a power user’s browser.

Firefox
Web Site: http://www.firefox.com

What? Firefox? Yes, it can use the Trident rendering engine from IE. All you need is IE Tab and ta-da, IE in Firefox.

Maxthon
Web Site: http://www.maxthon.com

Maxthon’s claim to fame is that it gave IE tabs way before IE7 ever existed, but that’s not obviously all it can do. It’s packed with features similar to that of Avant listed above (such as storing of online Favorites), but has other quite useful items such as:

A better screen capture (full screen, selected area, selected window or entire page)
Web sniffer (a way to direct-download FLV video file)
Super proxy (a much easier way to switch between proxies, should you use them)

..and a lot more.

An alternative shell may get you to like IE again

I find the biggest reasons people can’t stand IE mainly has to do with the fact it’s not as easily extensible as Firefox, and that the feature set is limited.

The alternative shells above will give most people the features they so desperately want in IE that aren’t there.

For the IE haters, it will make the browser a lot more tolerable to use.

Or dare I say, enjoyable?

Have you ever tried an alternative IE shell? What did you think? Let us know by writing a comment.

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http://twitter.com/philmonger Phil M
I never got this. It’s like saying “Oh, so I want it to look like that fast extensible open source browser, but if you could also make it render things slower and be generally more vulnerable on the web that would be great.”
I assume a ‘shell’ is only used in an IT environment that “doesn’t support” alternative browsers?

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
Your views are one way of looking at it.
If one is forced to use IE6 in corporate environment ((shudder)), then a different shell actually makes the browser less crash-prone. Avant has Safe Recovery, Maxthon has Anti-Freeze. IE6 alone has no crash recovery. At all.
Absolutely none of these alternate shell options render things any slower than they would originally in IE, be it 6, 7 or 8. And in some instances content will load faster.
If you want to know why it’s called an “Internet Explorer Shell”, see this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_Explorer_shell (better to read that than make this comment any longer, which is too long as it is).
[edit]
Also, I didn’t write this article for IT Pros. I wrote it for regular home users. I don’t care whether IT environments support these shells or not.

David Kennedy
I dropped IE mostly because it’s dog slow. Even when you set it to load the blank page, it still takes 5 seconds or more before you can browse to a web page (and don’t start typing too early, or you’ll have to start over). I don’t think any shell is going to completely fix that.

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
Speaking of Maxthon in particular, I don’t know about startup speed difference, but for opening new tabs Maxthon is much faster because it only uses a single instance of iexplore.exe instead of multiple instances like IE7 and 8 do. When you hit CTRL+T for a new tab in Maxthon, it starts it almost as fast as Firefox does.

David Kennedy
Hrm…thanks. Couldn’t be much slower.
Of course you didn’t mention, there’s now an IE Tab for Chrome. It’s a little slow too, but definitely faster than launching IE, and I can just click over when I hit a compatibility issue.

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
Hrm…no thanks. You couldn’t have offered a worse alternative.
Google Chrome uses a rather creepy unique ID for each installation which IE and Firefox do not, and that’s why I don’t mention it.

David Kennedy
Meh, I’m not going to lose any sleep over any unique ID. Seems more rampant paranoia along the lines of NSA Key to me.
http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
Meh, if it’s paranoia, then why do Unchrome and Iron exist?
David Kennedy
OK, now you’re just being belligerent. Nothing is ever created out of paranoia, right? Hand me over one of those pointy tin foil hats, will you?
We don’t know what they use that id for. Maybe they’re using it to track your internet activity. It’s by far not the only way to track that, including cookies, IPs, Windows license, etc etc, OK, if you want to go through the trouble of blocking all of that, you can. But perhaps if you’re that worried about people finding out what you’re viewing on the web you have bigger problems.
Plus, if you’ll read my comments on your other post, you’ll notice I said I use FireFox for things such as online banking, where I want the extra security. But if Google wants to know how often I go to pcmech.com…2-3 times per day. So what.
http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
http://www.google.com/support/chrome/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=107684
If you use Chrome, that browser can send info direct to Google right down to how many times you click the navigation buttons – and that doesn’t even have anything to do with what sites you load.
Does tracking every time you click your back button sound noble? I’ll answer that for you. No, it doesn’t.
Call me belligerent, accuse me of being paranoid, accuse me of wearing a “pointy til foil hat”. I never accused you of any of those things. However I will accuse you of supporting software that sends far too much phone-home information. It took us a long, long time to get rid of software that quite literally sends info right down to the last click when using it – and now Google brings it right back.
It’s painfully obvious you gladly trade your personal identity for the convenience of Chrome. “So what”, indeed. Very big what, sir. Very big.
David Kennedy
I’m sorry, but my personal identity is hardly the websites I visit or the number of times I click my back button. Even so, that link from Google says you can opt out (and I just verified, my setting is off).
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/paranoia
“excessive suspicion of the motives of others”
I’d say assuming that they are out to steal your personal identity because they seek to track usage statistics fits. (Which, incidentally, tracking statistics is what Google was built on).
If you or other don’t choose to use it because you are worried, fine. Funny, though, that people willingly give up far worse information on Facebook and the like without a second thought.
http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
By using Chrome, Google knows where you bank online. Where you shop online. Who your friends are (the names of your friends are in those Facebook URLs). All the social networks you use. Every internet search you perform. All sites you visit are recorded – and this is undisputed fact, not assumption. Google calls it user metrics. It paints a clear picture of you in a very short period of time. They may not have your name, but.. oh wait, that’s right – you’re using a Gmail address. Google DOES know your name. And being that Google cookies never expire it’s all tied in with your mail and searching.
That’s a whole lot more information than Facebook could ever give.
If you opt out, guess what? Every site you visit is still checked against Google Safe Browsing, so where you surf is still recorded by Google. Again, this is undisputed fact.
I never stated at any time that Google steals anything from anyone. Google doesn’t have to steal because you give information to them freely just by using their products. And by the looks of it you’re giving them everything but the kitchen sink.
Lastly, if you’re not worried, why did you opt out? It shouldn’t matter if you have faith and trust in the product, right?

Jase
I used ‘crazy browser’ (another IE front end) while I was doing my tech course, as the machines at the time had IE6 only, and firefox hadn’t been invented yet.
folks on computer related courses had permission to install whatever they liked (within reason), and free printing.
it allowed tabbed browsing, but was quite heavy on system resources as I recall.
Jase
above you mention IETab for firefox,
just thought I should mention that it currently doesn’t work in firefox 3.6 without the nightly tester tool
David M
An alternative to something does not necessarily mean that it is better.

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
In IE’s case, yes it is.

David Kennedy
Are you arguing against using Chrome? Or are you arguing against Google? Because we already know you have an agenda against Google much like Dave does against PCs.
Originally, you said Chrome was the “worst alternative,” because they store a unique id, as if it was something nefarious. Now you’ve gone on to prove that they’re open about what they track. They’re not doing anything any other browser couldn’t do, at least they have (so far) been honest about it. Are you so sure those small browser developers have been?
I’ve already said, they do not know where I bank online. I don’t use Chrome for that. Neither do I when I “check out” shopping online. Neither because I’m worried about them sneaking my data, but because Chrome’s overall security is still in doubt. I don’t use social networking, other than something like this comment. This is already public record. Searches? Email? I’ve already used Google for years for those. Cats out of the bag there. Do you use Gmail? Google internet search?
Why did I opt out? Uh, if you read the link you posted, it’s apparently an “opt in”, so I assume that’s the default. So I’m even less worried now than I was to begin with. Thanks.
Continue to mock me or bash Google or whatever you choose, I’ve wasted enough time on this. You are right from the stance that everybody should be more careful with their personal data online, regardless of which browsers or websites they use. Speaking of which….perhaps I shouldn’t use my real email here at pcmech, since you’re a little cavalier with that, eh?

http://www.menga.net Rich Menga
I quoted nothing but facts about Google and what Chrome does. It phones home. A lot. This is undisputed fact.
Yes, Chrome is the worst alternative to IE for said reasons.
When did you opt out? I’ll quote you: “I just verified, my setting is off”.
I never mocked you. I stated facts. You on the other hand directly called me belligerent, paranoid and inferred I wear a tin foil hat. That’s mocking.
On comment replies, the email address is shown.
You’re a fool for believing Dave has anything against PCs. I don’t have to mock you, you do it to yourself by stating ridiculous things like that.
Have a nice weekend!