Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 to boost performance and reliability

Beta 2 is aimed at a general audience; not just web developers who need early access to IE8 to find out what breaks (and what finally works), but a broader audience including IT staff evaluating the next browser version so they know whether to deploy it as well as end-users who just have to run the latest version of everything even if it isn't quite finished yet. As well as the all-important standards compliance, IE8 brings a raft of new security, reliability, and management features. The official IE blog has described some of these already, and on Monday gave more details about what to expect in beta 2.

With IE8, Microsoft is attempting to solve one of the most annoying problems with today's multi-window, multi-tab browsers; namely, the disastrous effect that a browser crash has.