"Website preference" option in IE no longer works?

[jonathanmarston]

It seems like the "Website preference" option in IE no longer works in 8.1 GDR1. When I select "desktop version" it still opens the mobile version of any site that I visit. Anyone else notice this issue?

 

[crav4speed]

Yes... Microsoft changed the user agent string for IE11 in GDR1 to mimic iOS and Android devices. So when websites see that string, it thinks your using an iPhone or Android device and opens a mobile optimized webpage. I think it sucks and Microsoft should switch back to the old user agent string as websites I visited worked much better and when I wanted desktop sites, I actually got desktop sites.

 

[jonathanmarston]

Here's the weird part though. This is the user agent when "mobile version" is selected:
Mozilla/5.0 (Mobile; Windows Phone 8.1; Android 4.0; ARM; Trident/7.0; Touch; rv:11.0; IEMobile/11.0; NOKIA; Lumia 1520) like iPhone OS 7_0_3 Mac OS X AppleWebKit/537 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mobile Safari/537

Like you said, it now includes "Android" and "iPhone OS" to mimic Android and iOS devices. But when "desktop version" is selected this is the user agent:
Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.2; ARM; Trident/7.0; Touch; rv:11.0; WPDesktop; Lumia 1520) like Gecko

As you can see there aren't any references to Android or iPhone. So I'm confused about why I'm getting mobile sites when desktop is selected...

 

[Croydon Bogan]

I find this exremely annoying. There is no reason at all to force people to use the mobile websites. I havent found a single mobile website that is better than the desktop version.
This one thing makes me consider changing phones. Microsoft needs to correct this immediately.

 

[hprvez]

It's already correct but websites don't respect standards

 

[Arlan Henry]

Any updates?