Problems with the Multi-tab Internet Explorer

I had posted previously that the new Multi-tab Internet Explorer using MSN Toolbar. I have been using it for 3 weeks now and I have noticed some issues with the multiple-tab.

1. The IE window looses focus on occasions. When I open a new page as a background tab, after a while the IE window itself looses focus.

2. The MSN toolbar goes missing on occasions. This sometimes happens when I am switching tabs. This does not come up all the time.

3. Sometimes minimizing the IE when multiple tabs are open is not possible. One of the tab pages appears (out of focus) when trying to minimize the IE windows. The weird thing about this page is that it does not have the standard Min/Max/Close icons on the Top Right corner. Instead a really small close button appears.

4. If a pop-up is blocked by one of pages, then the view is suddenly switched to the page where this has happened.

I think these issues arise because of the implementation of the multi-tab in Internet explorer. What I think is done to achieve multi-tab in IE is that the tabs are not actually and MDI (Multiple Document Interface) version of IE. Instead I think they have programmatically made multiple instances of IE appear as if they are multiple tabs. This is why focus changes or prompts in other windows are causing the focus problems.

To summarize, I think this is not the best multi-tab browser available right now. Firefox or Opera would still be any day better than the multi-tab IE (courtesy the MSN Toolbar). Somehow, Firefox seems the more seamless browser for multi-tab operations.

I hope Microsoft works out these issues in the next version of the MSN Toolbar. Or you could just wait for the next IE (to be shipped with Windows Vista) which is the real multi-tab implementation of IE.