StrangeEdge or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Firefox

[mklwrmrdm]

I use it all day every day, I really like the browser and it's interface. Except YouTube for some reason. Edge never ever plays the videos smootly, always a goes bit to fast and then waiting to get up again, which basically makes it unusable for YouTube.

 

[SlideWRX]

I use ghostery, so I am mostly all set in edge. I don't use it though, because when I click the back button, my scroll wheel switches from scrolling the page to back/forward. I have to click on the page to use the scroll wheel in the same way I was just using it! frustrating, and no way to turn it off. I don't want my scroll wheel to go forward/backward, never have. I gave up and use firefox only now.

 

[EssThree]

Performance and page rendering quirks keep me away. Also they still haven't fixed the way the browser handles click-to-enable flash. To many "mission critical" sites for me just don't work in it.

 

[Hirox K]

YouTube actually works fine on my Edge on different NBs... my stop-vid-auto-play injection works fine too.

 

[Jason Rosenthal]

My clients are on Windows 7 so Edge isn't even on the table. IE 11 or Chrome. Since Microsoft dropped IE, for the last few years the only choice most developers have is to target Chrome. Talk about Microsoft shooting themselves in the foot in the enterprise space. Now that Chrome has the market share it would be foolish to change. If a site designed for Chrome works in Edge, then great.

 

[JCaprioli]

Not sure why people think Edge is lacking features... pen compatibility and markup, better touch controls, saved tabs, 'Continue on PC' from your phone, built-in PDF/eBook reader, reading mode, etc. Oh, and a Share button. Seriously, it's 2018. There's no reason other browsers like Chrome and Firefox shouldn't have a Share button. But it's hard to understand 'lacking features' when it does all those things that other Window browsers don't.

Edge is my full time browser. I bought a new Surface Pro about a month ago and still haven't had the need to install an alternate browser yet (although I will at some point since I subscribe to YouTube TV and it doesn't run on Edge, but that's Google's fault not Microsoft's). At work on my Surface Book, I use Edge most of the time, but sometimes have to revert to Chrome since my company subscribes to G Suite. But for all non-Google sites that I encounter, Edge works perfectly well and performs great. Keep in mind I'm also running the 2018 Spring Update on both machines, so maybe that makes a difference.

 

[Andreas Sofogiannis]

Okay, maybe the title of this thread was a little out there.

Anyway, here are the reasons why I won't use Edge just yet.

• Can't import history from any browser except Internet Explorer: this was the deal-breaker for the April 2018 update. It's 2018, and Edge still prioritizes IE (which hasn't been updated in ages). I'm sure that there is a backhanded way to fix this (e.g. some way to export Firefox history to IE, then from IE to Edge), but I have not found it yet.
• EFF has not officially released a HTTPS Everywhere and/or Privacy Badger extension for Edge. The only available versions are unofficial ports/forks that users have created on GitHub.
• Edge does not receive updates as frequently as other browsers. Even though security updates are released through Windows Update, browsers like Firefox are updated in a more frequent basis.
• Edge advertises itself as the privacy-oriented browser, but for the reasons listed above, and the fact that enabled extensions during InPrivate browsing were only added in the April 2018 update makes me skeptical.
• I understand that Edge on Android is a different product, but the fact that it does not have ad blocker or browser extension capabilities underscores Edge's privacy-oriented claims. Ad blockers are essential, most of all on an OS as notorious for being hacked as Android.

If it weren't for these shortcomings, I would use Edge right now. The fluent design interface and the ability to sync across devices is very tempting, but in my opinion, these new features do not outweigh the downsides. I will not say that these points I made are flaws of Edge; they are more like inconveniences. They may not matter to you. In the opinion of a security-conscious user like myself, they seem to indicate that Edge is not yet ready to tackle browser security.

What causes you to skip Edge for the time being?

 

[Mike Knox]

Okay, maybe the title of this thread was a little out there.

Anyway, here are the reasons why I won't use Edge just yet.

• Can't import history from any browser except Internet Explorer: this was the deal-breaker for the April 2018 update. It's 2018, and Edge still prioritizes IE (which hasn't been updated in ages). I'm sure that there is a backhanded way to fix this (e.g. some way to export Firefox history to IE, then from IE to Edge), but I have not found it yet.
• EFF has not officially released a HTTPS Everywhere and/or Privacy Badger extension for Edge. The only available versions are unofficial ports/forks that users have created on GitHub.
• Edge does not receive updates as frequently as other browsers. Even though security updates are released through Windows Update, browsers like Firefox are updated in a more frequent basis.
• Edge advertises itself as the privacy-oriented browser, but for the reasons listed above, and the fact that enabled extensions during InPrivate browsing were only added in the April 2018 update makes me skeptical.
• I understand that Edge on Android is a different product, but the fact that it does not have ad blocker or browser extension capabilities underscores Edge's privacy-oriented claims. Ad blockers are essential, most of all on an OS as notorious for being hacked as Android.

If it weren't for these shortcomings, I would use Edge right now. The fluent design interface and the ability to sync across devices is very tempting, but in my opinion, these new features do not outweigh the downsides. I will not say that these points I made are flaws of Edge; they are more like inconveniences. They may not matter to you. In the opinion of a security-conscious user like myself, they seem to indicate that Edge is not yet ready to tackle browser security.

What causes you to skip Edge for the time being?

When Microsoft stops drinking it's on Kool-aid and realizes they lost almost all faith in the dev and consumer market, maybe they'll stop having 2 hour plus conferences about AI ethics. Especially when theirs is irrelevant to 90% of the audience. Nadella needs to stop smoking cloud and become a competitor.

 

[kingtigre]

Edge is alright. I like it well enough. I got used to it from my time with Windows Phone. I came to realize that I don't need nearly as much fluff from my browser as most others seem to. So Edge is my default. Syncing is nice, so I put it on my Android too. Disabled Chrome while I was at it.

In fact, Edge is the ONLY web browser on my computer. Installing multiple browsers on my computer is just a waste of space IMO. This one does everything I need. So why waste a couple hundred MBs on software I don't use?

I use pretty much every browser on my work Surface. I've had no noticeable performance difference between Firefox, Chrome, Edge, and Opera. They each have their quarks.

 

[JoshNay]

As a web designer, I use Edge as my daily driver, though I also have Chrome and Firefox installed for testing purposes. If my sites don't work in all three, then I keep working on them until they do. I think a lot of Edge's problems have to do with web developers who don't take the time to get their stuff to work right.

That being said, I have noticed one or two small issues with Edge, particularly when you have a lot of browser windows open. It becomes slow and clunky, and I sometimes have to close and then reopen tabs to get them to work. These are rare issues, but it does happen.

I agree that Microsoft should remove Edge from the Windows Update timeline and instead update it separately as an app through the Microsoft Store. That way it gets the updates it needs in a timely manner.

 

[Wevenhuis]

Okay, maybe the title of this thread was a little out there.

Anyway, here are the reasons why I won't use Edge just yet.

• Can't import history from any browser except Internet Explorer: this was the deal-breaker for the April 2018 update. It's 2018, and Edge still prioritizes IE (which hasn't been updated in ages). I'm sure that there is a backhanded way to fix this (e.g. some way to export Firefox history to IE, then from IE to Edge), but I have not found it yet.
• EFF has not officially released a HTTPS Everywhere and/or Privacy Badger extension for Edge. The only available versions are unofficial ports/forks that users have created on GitHub.
• Edge does not receive updates as frequently as other browsers. Even though security updates are released through Windows Update, browsers like Firefox are updated in a more frequent basis.
• Edge advertises itself as the privacy-oriented browser, but for the reasons listed above, and the fact that enabled extensions during InPrivate browsing were only added in the April 2018 update makes me skeptical.
• I understand that Edge on Android is a different product, but the fact that it does not have ad blocker or browser extension capabilities underscores Edge's privacy-oriented claims. Ad blockers are essential, most of all on an OS as notorious for being hacked as Android.

If it weren't for these shortcomings, I would use Edge right now. The fluent design interface and the ability to sync across devices is very tempting, but in my opinion, these new features do not outweigh the downsides. I will not say that these points I made are flaws of Edge; they are more like inconveniences. They may not matter to you. In the opinion of a security-conscious user like myself, they seem to indicate that Edge is not yet ready to tackle browser security.

What causes you to skip Edge for the time being?

Saw your thread via Windows Central Post: "Chime in: Are you confident in Micrsofts's future consumer strategy?"

To answer the latter: No
To answer your question:
I don't skip Edge. I think it's a good browser voor daily use. I use it at home and at work. I skip the other browser's because Edge is integrated well with windows 10 and its apps. For me the tablet and pen is imported, this is where other major browsers fall short on windows. The only reason for me to go on another browser of late was because windows central didn't work well in Edge, but did work better in chrome. but that seems to have been improved lately, which makes Edge fine again to use.