Dec 23 2019 09:37 PM
I recently read that Microsoft will be releasing a stable build of its work-in-progress Chromium-based Edge web browser sometime in January 2020. I have the regular Edge browser as well as the Beta channel build installed on my Windows 10 based PC and the same build on my Windows 8.1 based notebook. When Microsoft releases the stable build of this browser, will I need to uninstall these Beta channel builds and manually download & install the stable builds or will the Beta ones be replaced automatically with the stable builds ?
Also, Microsoft already has an Edge browser (stable build) as default web browser on Windows 10, will both the regular Edge and chromium-based Edge coexist separately, or the older one will get replaced by the chromium-based Edge ? I do find the Edge-C more stable and faster than the regular Edge browser, so won't mind if it's replaced by the Edge-C altogether.
Dec 23 2019 09:57 PM
Dec 23 2019 10:36 PM
Hi,
So, as I understand Microsoft will push the new chromium-based Edge browser thru the Windows Update process, replacing my regular Edge browser, on my Windows 10 PC. Would it also replace the Edge Beta build on my Win'8.1 notebook likewise ?
Ramesh
Dec 23 2019 10:40 PM
Dec 24 2019 02:21 AM
So, will I have to download and install the stable builds for both Win'8.1 and Win'10 as and when these are released by MS for these platforms ? I wish the Windows Update took care of upgrading Beta channel s/w to Stable ones automatically :(
Dec 24 2019 02:27 AM
Dec 24 2019 02:34 AM
Ok. So MS will upgrade regular Edge with Edge-C on WIn'10 (being the most recent Win OS, I guess) while for older OSs like Win'8.1 one has to download and install stable builds manually. I didn't realize that there are folks who would want to retain the Beta/Dev/Canary builds parallelly even after the stable build is released. Guess, it's to try out new features (which may or may not find way into the stable build later).
Dec 24 2019 03:08 AM
Dec 24 2019 03:21 AM
Agreed. But as a layperson, I would expect MS to simply replace IE on older Windows OSs like 8.1/7 with Edge-C stable build, as it's stopped developing IE-11 long ago, and many websites often don't render well in IE anymore (with websites urging users to use Chrome/FF). If I recollect correctly, when MS replaced IE-4 with IE-5 and then IE-6 many many years ago, it released the stable build for all versions of Windows at the time. No 'step-motherly' treatment to older Win'OS versions.
The only reason I have been using the Edge-C Beta build is because I dislike (to put it mildly) the default Edge browser on Win'10. So, once MS rolls out the stable build of Edge-C (replacing the default/classic build) I will uninstall the Edge-C Beta. Guess, that's what most folks will do, except techies who like experimenting with unstable builds.
Dec 24 2019 04:53 AM
Dec 24 2019 06:42 AM
Oh yes. I didn't realize that Edge even now has an option to open a website / page in IE mode, so IE will have to coexist with Edge for compatibility purposes. Thanks for sharing the links, which do mention why IE and Edge will coexist. Even in Beta channel, I find the Edge-C much more intuitive and faster and more stable than the default/classic Edge browser, which hasn't really improved over the years, compared to Chrome or Firefox. Hope the final / stable release of Edge-C is just as user-friendly as FF & Chrome are.
Dec 24 2019 09:24 AM
Dec 24 2019 06:21 PM
Ok. I used the Canary build initially, but found it unstable so switched to the Beta channel. The current Beta build is quite good and much better than the regular/classic Edge. If MS fixes minor bugs before the final release in January 2020, it would find more acceptance. Hopefully, Edge-C won't be a memory hog, like Chrome browser is (as both are Chromium-based) :)
Dec 25 2019 12:18 AM
Dec 25 2019 04:22 AM
Well, I use my Outlook.com mail account as well as OneDrive linked to it to store my personal data, mainly in Excel files. Had observed while using the Canary build of Edge-C that it would render the Excel files inconsistently, and I had to reformat data in cells pasted from another worksheet file. Also, some websites didn't seem to work well in Canary build of Edge-C. Haven't noticed such issues in Beta channel, yet. Maybe because Beta builds are the most stable builds among all three, i.e. Beta/Dev/Canary, as issues are resolved progressively from Canary to Dev to Beta channel builds.
For me stability and usability of standard features is more important in a web browser than experimenting with new features, which is what Canary builds are for, I suppose.
Anyway, the current Beta build seems the last one before final/stable release in mid-Jan'2020. It's quite usable even now, but hope it supports more extensions (in MS Store) going forward.