It looks like MSN now has an IE search toolbar in beta. Somehow I don’t think Google is too worried. They look like twins really, it’s almost uncanny. Just compare MSN’s toolbar page to Google’s toolbar page. Come on Microsoft, be original .

So I’ve compared the two for a little while now, Google’s toolbar gets the nod plain and simple MSN’s search is still just way too slow and doesn’t provide results like Google does. The other thing that stinks about MSN’s toolbar is that the pop-up blocker is limited to only 250 URL’s in the allow list and unlike Google’s toolbar it doesn’t let you hold down CTRL to temporarily allow pop-ups for a site.

Things I do like about the MSN toolbar. The Hotmail, Messenger, and News buttons. Messenger crashes a lot, the icon for Messenger in IE is Windows Messenger not MSN, I use MSN, so it’s nice to have that handy since I always have an IE window open. I log into Hotmail a lot as well so it’s nice to have a link directly to the home page so I can log into multiple accounts quicker. News goes to MSNBC which I read as much as Google’s News aggregate. The highlight feature is pretty cool too and seems to work well, only a few minor bugs so far. The last thing I like are the extra search options which let you search Encarta for definitions and check the encyclopedia, stocks and companies through MSN Money, shopping, movies, and the yellow and white pages.

Granted I use TweakUI to add in searches for this stuff directly into the address bar. I just type in “dic eschew” for a definition of eschew. Or “stck MSFT” for a stock quote on Microsoft. I’ve got all sorts of those set up, I can look up recipes, drinks, MSDN, acronyms, the list goes on and on.

So the end result. I like both toolbars, MSN’s seems promising. Ideally I’d like to combine the two. Hopefully Longhorn’s IE will work well enough to neither toolbar will be necessary.

Tags: Ideas, Internet, Microsoft, News

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