No IE onboard Windows 7 in Europe

[Sash]

European buyers of Windows 7 will have to download and install a web browser for themselves.

Bowing to European competition rules, Microsoft Windows 7 will ship without Internet Explorer.

The company said it would make it easy for PC makers and users to get at and install the web browsing program.

In response the Europaan Commission expressed scepticism over the move and if it would allay accusations of Microsoft abusing its market position.

Abusive behaviour

"We're committed to making Windows 7 available in Europe at the same time that it launches in the rest of the world," Dave Heiner, Microsoft deputy general counsel, said in a statement, "but we also must comply with European competition law as we launch the product."

"We believe that this new approach, while not our first choice, is the best path forward given the ongoing legal case in Europe," he added.

In response the European Commission said "It would also have to consider whether this initial step of technical separation of IE from Windows could be negated by other actions by Microsoft."

In early 2008, Microsoft was fined 899m euros (£765m) by the European Commission for anti-competitive behaviour over bundling in the media player and browser into Windows.

In January 2009, Brussels reached a "preliminary view" that Microsoft was denting the chance for true competition by bundling its browser software in with its operating system.

Microsoft is due to defend itself against the charges in a hearing.

If Microsoft fails to convince the Commission that it is not harming competition could mean more fines and enforced changes to the way it does business.

"We're committed to launching Windows 7 on time in Europe, so we need to address the legal realities in Europe, including the risk of large fines," said Mr Heiner.

Windows 7 is due to be released worldwide on 22 October.

"In terms of potential remedies, if the Commission were to find that Microsoft had committed an abuse, the Commission has suggested that consumers should be offered a choice of browser not that Windows should be supplied without a browser at all," said the Commission in a statement responding to Microsoft's announcement.

It said Microsoft's approach of offering the program to computer manufacturers "may potentially be more positive" in terms of remedying its alleged abusive behaviour.

It added that if Microsoft were found to be abusing its position, the Commission would have to work out if the uncoupling of IE offset that behaviour.


BBC NEWS | Technology | No IE onboard Windows 7 in Europe

Cant be that difficult to install a browser is it? Even with my limited computer knowledge.

[Allanon]

This might be a dumb question, but how are we meant to get online to download a browser, without a browser?

[Sash]

Originally Posted by Allanon

This might be a dumb question, but how are we meant to get online to download a browser, without a browser?

oops didn't think of that ....

[Detomah]

Think i'll still be using Windows XP 5 years from now, I can't see me spending more money just to lose even more control of my computer to yet another rehashed operating system, never mind which browser i'm supposed to use and having to go find my own solution.

Sick of this keep up with technology and constantly give us all your hard earned money, or you'll not be able to do this, this or this. Even vBulletin the people that make TFs forum software have gone the way of the facist money stealers by trying to force people to constantly pay out more and more and more to get their latest patches and updates and the likes. It's making me seriously think whether to just keep TF on this software and just security patch it as needed from now on.

@ the worlds money grabbing bastard corporations

[Harv]

as to how do we install a browser without a browser there are more ports to use than port 80

would be via ftp or some auto port setup to perform the download and install it from a button - get ie8 now sort of thing

I do wonder why they insist that DOS is forever gone from windows O/S and then rely on it to perform tasks such as this

[Puratech]

Its more a question of how you find which browsers are available and where to download and read about them without having a browser in the first place, regardless of how you download them - not that you even need a browser to download them on port 80 over http really either. Id imagine itll be a bit like the search providers bit in IE where you click something and it brings up a list of all participating browsers and you click to download.

Silly thing is IE isnt really just an internet browser, it also reads local html and xml format files, which will be a little sucky as currently html is quite a strong universal format as every pc has a very compatible reader. Im guessing the components of IE will still come with windows, for things like msn which use IE for embedded ads (and also for chat history xml).

Sounds a bit silly though really as all the people who just use default IE will surely go download that same IE. ISPs will no doubt still be distributing their dodgy versions of IE with their installers and stuff. Its the kinda thing that makes me more likely to switch to IE because of the competition causing this kind of crap. What happens if people want to make programs like calculator, notepad, wordpad, the W7 task manager (which does the job of pay software), should windows be distributed as a standalone OS with no applications?

[Mars]

Originally Posted by Sash

The company said it would make it easy for PC makers and users to get at and install the web browsing program.

They'll probably have the windows welcome wizard launching a downloader, and
asking the new user to select either microsoft internet explorer, or click a link
'show me what other browsers I can choose from'