Saturday 18 September 2010

IE9 Beta

This week Microsoft released the newest incarnation of their browser - Internet Explorer 9. Whilst still a BETA version, (a pre-release version still prone to bugs and problems), many will be downloading and testing out its features. With so many combinations of operating systems, installed software and add-ons, there are bound to be some hiccups along the way.

So what happens when you do run into problems? Many issues can be traced to incompatabilies with browser add-ons that have been installed. On my system, Windows7 64bit, there are two versions of Internet Explorer, the 32bit which runs as the standard and the 64bit version.

After installing the IE9 BETA the IE9 32bit version would always crash, after starting and before loading a page, but running the 64bit version (Start/All Programs) was fine. Some further investigation (genealogists are good at that), showed the culprit was tbScot.dll - a very useful toolbar for Scottish reseachers from the excellent Scottish GENES.
But how to fix it? Normally to disable a toolbar, you would use Tools / Manage Add-ons  from within Internet Explorer, but how if it crashes each time it starts?

Fortunately Microsoft have left us a few possibilities. Start\Control Panel\Internet Options gives access to the applet to control settings. The Programs tab allows the management of add-ons, although this may show those for 64bit and not 32bit. The Advanced tab gives an option to Reset Internet Explorer settings. Pressing Reset gives will set everything back to the default state, disabling all add-ons. You don't need to check "Delete Personal settings".

After closing the window, you should now find that Internet Explorer 32bit starts without crashing, and at this stage you can now access and manage add-ons via the tools menu item. Through trial and error of re-enabling various toolbars and extensions, the culprit(s) can be found.