MSN Browser Preview 1

Hot on the heels of news that Microsoft's Internet Explorer leads the browser wars with 85 percent market share, comes the preview release of another product from the same stable; MSN's Browser.

This tiny 2.5 MB download is available for English users on Windows 9x/NT/2000. As a product, you fall in love with it at first look. I found the fresh, colourful interface with slick looking buttons a great suck-in.

I first tried to install from the Web. However, a poor connection put paid to that. Instead, I downloaded the Setup file and then ran the install from my hard drive. During setup, there was some rather irritating music; perhaps because it was looped and kept replaying. Other than that, there were no visible glitches. Rather ominously, the browser insisted that I restart the system before I could use it. I ignored this warning and exited setup.

I then right-clicked a new butterfly icon on my task bar. This began the browser's user registration. It helps when dealing with Microsoft to have a Hotmail account; all their sites ask for it. MSN is no exception. Unfortunately, the browser doesn't offer much visible feedback on connecting progress. This was especially apparent when the login failed. After trying to login to MSN several times, I disconnected from my VSNL dialup and switched to a private ISP (Southern Online). This time, the registration was completed without any glitches. It's possible that the VSNL servers were overloaded

My first impression was a very pleasing, visually rich interface. The buttons are smooth. For new users, I can see MSN's Browser making deep inroads into other browsers' territory. You get slick, smooth buttons to go forward and back. The butterfly takes you Home (to MSN). And an envelope to Hotmail. Favorites can be viewed using a Starfish. And you can add new sites, or import your old IE ones.

There are separate, equally-slick icons for chat (Messenger), community (People and Chat), MoneyCentral (Money), and eShop (Shopping). The Messenger icon even displays the number of your online contacts logged into the system. When you use smileys, the chat interface translates them into icons; much like MS Chat.

The Browser becomes your desktop. Its left bar contains links to other sections of the Portal. The focus of the day appears with a thumbnail image and write-up. Also integrated is Search that uses MSN's search. Windows Media Player plays and controls streaming media content from the Web. Click the icon and it takes you to the Windows Media page. Another icon takes you to MSN Today; the portal's news channel. For news junkies there even an MSNBC News Menu plug-in to display all the available stories.

Help is online which I guess was required because help files themselves usually are 3-5 MB of an application's size. However, you can change your browser settings on the desktop itself. If you feel lost without the familiar keyboard shortcuts, those exist but are hidden. I found the complete list from the Online Help.

MSN Browser compares very favourably to NeoPlanet, the first browser-for-a-portal (Snap). However, as a former NeoPlanet user, I sincerely hope the MSN team doesn't fall victim to browser bloat. Consequently, releasing unstable, inadequately tested software that depends a little too much on anarchic open-source code.

I have just four requests for the Preview team. The first is include a progress bar during registration and setup. The second is right now you can't modify the screen layout. Some sites scroll horizontally. Keyboard support should be made more visible; not buried in a link in the online help. Finally the Open a New Window command opens a child of the current window, without an address bar.

All in all, MSN Browser Preview 1 is an impressive product. You can heed the warnings that this is a Beta, et cetera. Otherwise, you can simply download a copy today and see just how great this tool is.