A new report coming out of Microsoft claims that Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) is on average faster than both Google Chrome 1.0 and Firefox 3.0.5.

The report titled Measuring Browser Performance: Understanding issues in benchmarking and performance analyzes how various parts of the browser and their network components can impact on performance benchmarking.

Contradictory to all other tests, Microsoft claims that IE8 outperforms both Firefox 3.05 and Chrome 1.0, so the results should be taken with a grain of salt.

Of interesting note, IE8 loads mozilla.com faster than Firefox while Firefox loads microsoft.com faster than IE8.

The full 14-page report is available from the Microsoft Download Center.

New Windows 7 betas show that Internet Explorer 8 is an optional install, a move which should keep the EU and Opera happy.

To uninstall Internet Explorer from Windows 7 follow these steps:

• Go to Control Panel
• Open Programs
• Click Turn Windows features on or off
• Deselect Internet Explorer 8

Results for Februrary are in and Google Chrome, Firefox and Opera are all winners for the month.

Februrary statistics from Net Applications shows that Internet Explorers share continued its decline, dropping 0.04% to 67.51%.

Firefox was a big winner, with a 0.2% increase to 21.73%, while Google Chrome increased its share by 0.03% to 1.15%.

Opera also had a good month increasing its share by 0.01% to 0.71%.

Apple’s Safari did not far so well, with the first decrease in months to 8.00%. That’s a 0.29% drop from last month.

The next month will be interesting, with the inimant release of Internet Explorer 8 expected this month and Apple’s Safari 4 beta being released just days ago.

Google has joined the European Union (EU) case against Microsoft as a 3rd party.

“This is because Internet Explorer is tied to Microsoft’s dominant computer operating system, giving it an unfair advantage over other browsers. Compare this to the mobile market, where Microsoft cannot tie Internet Explorer to a dominant operating system, and its browser therefore has a much lower usage” explains Google’s Sundar Pichai.

The case against Microsoft is good, and will take many months to be heard.

Microsoft has released a new update for Windows 7 users for Internet Explorer 8.

The update – dubbed a compatibility and reliability update – addresses a few issues people were having. A list of fixes include:

• When Internet Explorer 8 is installed with Adobe Flash Player 10, Internet Explorer may become unresponsive.
• You experience a Print dialog box that is unusable when you try to print an Adobe PDF document.
• After a crash, Internet Explorer 8 becomes unresponsive and you must restart the computer to resolve
  the problem.
• Internet Explorer 8 may crash when you visit some Web sites.
• Internet Explorer 8 may crash when you resize the browser window.
• Internet Explorer 8 does not seem to remember information that was stored in cookies on the computer.
• Popular third-party extensions cause crashes in Internet Explorer 8.
• Previously blocked third-party extensions are no longer blocked after you upgrade to Internet Explorer 8.

The update will be pushed out to Windows 7 users via Automatic Updates or can be manually downloaded from Windows Update.

Internet Explorer 8 RTM

Microsoft has finished Internet Explorer 8, with the release to manufacturing (RTM) build expected to hit OEM’s, TechNet, MSDN and Connect in the next few days.

The scoop comes from Russian publication Wzor, with the final build being built on February 21st. This means that any remaining bugs and issues have been fixed.

The final build number is 8.0.6001.18691, with release date for the wider community not expected for a few more weeks.

Microsoft is yet to announce an official release date.

Trend Micro has warned that attackers are exploiting a new bug in Internet Explorer 7 which was patched by Microsoft last week.

The patch which was marked as critical was pushed out using Windows Update last Tuesday, but there are still millions of unpatched versions out there.

The exploit allows remote attakers the ability to install spyware on vulnerable systems.

Users and system administrators are urged to make sure they install all critical patches from Microsoft.

Rumors coming out of Tech ARP suggest that Internet Explorer 8 is headed our way in final two weeks of March.

Internet Explorer 8 will be a free download for existing Windows XP and Windows Vista users, while it is expected OEM partners such as Dell will include the browser pre- installed with new systems.

The date is still speculative, but we should have some more information by early March.

Mozilla has been granted permission by the European Commission to join the suit with Opera against Microsoft for bundeling Internet Explorers with Windows.

Microsoft has been accused with distorting competition in the market for web browsers. If found guilty, Microsoft could be forced to offer other browser upon Windows installation.

Mozilla’s chairperson Mitchell Baker said that Microsoft is harming “competition between web browsers,” and undermining “product innovation and ultimately reduces consumer choice.”

Opera’s chief executive Jon von Tetzchner said “the only way to give users a genuine choice is to strip out IE from Windows and either replace it with a rival browser or offer users a list of browsers to choose from.”

The case is still only in its early stages.

Xfire has today released an update to their gaiming instant messanger. Inside the update is the abbility to browse the web in tabbed windows while you are still in game.

The browser uses an imbedded version of Internet Explorer, and is not using a new brower engine.

In game support is not available on all games, but the list of games is increasing.

Users of Xfire will have the new version pushed out to them while new users can downoad Xfire from the Xfire website.