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Comment by cm2187 | Hacker News Reader

I think Windows 10 S has more to lose than Chrome in this new browser battle. Even on regular Windows 10 people go against every trick Microsoft throws at them to use Chrome rather than Edge (which is kind of a low feature Internet Explorer). If Windows 10 S wants to define itself as the only version of Windows where you will be forced no matter what to use Edge, they will stay in the low single digit market share.

This is not a mobile version of an OS where the browser doesn’t really matter because there aren’t many things you can do with only fingers anyway. This is a full blown desktop OS to be used by laptops.

[edit] actually how would the Chrome installer work in the first place? I thought the very definition of Windows 10 S was that it only allows apps from the store. How would that download app install anything?

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> Edge (which is kind of a low feature Internet Explorer).

I agree with your comment in general, but Edge really is significantly better than IE. It supports most modern web stuff, it's much faster and the UI is pretty nice and clean. Sure, the latter is a matter of taste too but it really beats IE on all fronts.

Opinions clearly vary on whether it can compete with the likes of Chrome and Firefox, but it's not a "low feature Internet Explorer". It's a decent piece of work.

IE probably wouldn't even exist anymore if it weren't for legacy intranet websites that require Java applets and run ActiveX plugins.

Edge has ugly font rendering (seems to be common to all Metro apps) and loses all your tabs when you quit (total dealbreaker for me).

I really really wish Firefox would actually close the tabs when I quit.

Preferences -> General Tab -> When Firefox Starts -> "Show Your Home Page" instead of "Show my windows and tabs from last time"

Can't you uncheck "Show your windows and tabs from last time" from settings ?

Isn't that the default non-mobile behaviour of Chrome and Firefox too?

Though I admit it seems weird for a browser that's apparently designed for mobile.

I don't lose tabs when I close Edge (it does warn that I am closing all tabs when I exit). They come back when I open Edge the next time. Definitely a setting that can be switched.

The only suggestion for fonts is maybe using the ClearType font tuner tool in Control Panel.

FWIW I prefer Chrome but dig what MS is doing with Edge.

To me, it feels like they jumped from having a D-grade browser to a B-grade browser.

Good work, but I'm still not going to use it, given I've already had A-grade browsers for many years.

IMO Edge is a fine browser - snappy, stable, up-to-date with web standards.

My big beef with it is that it tries to force feed me Bing wherever it can (even after switching the default search engine). That's a big no-no.

I’m using Edge and haven’t noticed any Bing promotions. Using DDG for my default search engine.

But I did notice google is trying to force feed me Chrome when I visit google’s web sites. I click “No I don’t want Chrome” in these popups, the popup disappears for a few days and then pops up again.

> [edit] actually how would the Chrome installer work in the first place? I thought the very definition of Windows 10 S was that it only allows apps from the store. How would that download app install anything?

It didn't:

> [Note to Windows 10 S users] Windows 10 S is incompatible with apps like Google Chrome. To use Google Chrome, upgrade for free (for a limited time) to Windows 10 Pro.

You can still see the cached version at http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:https:/...

Last time I reinstalled Windows I just used Edge without any problems. All websites work fine and it is fast. Also has uBlock and other critical addons.

> they will stay in the low single digit market share.

After the whole "Windows 10" thing i seriously doubt there is anything they can do that would result in them losing much of a market share.

Windows 10 S is competing with Windows 10, so there is a potential for really tiny market share.

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