Need To Change Your Search Engine Default In Internet Explorer?

For those of you who have Internet Explorer 7, you might have noticed the little search box on the upper right hand corner of the  browser.  By default it is set to Live Search, but you can change it. Heres how:

1. Click the arrow by the search field and select, ‘Find More Providers’.  A Microsoft webpage will open up.

2. You have two categories of search engines, select one or more and select, “Add Provider”.

3. If you use none of the browsers listed, open a separate tab to your browser and type in all caps TEST. Copy the search results URL at the top of the browser and go back to the Microsoft page.  Paste in the field provided. Then type the name of the search engine in the second field and click “Install”.  Go to the drop down arrow by the search field in IE7 and your selected search engine should be listed.

4. To make your search engine of choice you default, again, click the drop down menu by the search field, select “Change Search Defaults” Highlight your browser, and click “Set Default”.  This is also where you can remove unwanted search engines.

I use Goodsearch, a Yahoo-based search engine as my preferred browser so as to raise money for my kid’s school.  If the searches are not up to my standards (very rare), I click down to Google and try again.  It only takes a few extra seconds.  Even better, I removed both search engines off my browser at launch, which in turn now loads faster. Originally I had 8 tabs at launch.

Google Chrome – Worth The Hype?

As if I needed yet another application installed into my already over-bloated Vista Business Laptop.  But when I heard about Google’s new Chrome (Beta) browser, I figured my laptop can’t get any worse off, so I decided to give it a whirl.

Installation was dirt easy and took less than five minutes to install and import all my bookmarks (I do not store passwords). I did not opt for the quick launch for or to have it launch from my systray, rather I added another icon to my ever growing desktop. As I have not fully explored the browser yet and certain web sites I utilize only allows for Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, it will not be my default browser at this time.

The homepage will look something like this:

It will show your most used pages that you visit, along with a list of your most recently book marked items.

Of the web sites it does not work with, which I use daily are Office Live & Airset.

One of the best features hands down is the Bookmarks bar, which is also on Apple’s Safari.  Explorer does not have this feature and as a result, I have a whopping eight webpages that I use daily set to their own tabs and take 22 seconds to fully load. With the bookmark bar I, there is no need for me to load all these pages at once and it is faster for me to create an additional tab and load from from the bar.  I can event switch the order or the bookmarks. I have yet to test the speed as to how fast multiple tabs load on Chrome.

Interestingly, while doing work for a client, I had to download an image from the web. Once I saved the JPG in my designated folder, on the lower left hand corner of the browser shows the file I downloaded, which I can either open direct, or open the entire folder.  On the lower right hand corner of the screen, I click and it shows my download history and it is searchable. Great if I misplace a downloaded file .

On setting up a default search engine, I was not too happy to see that I could not make goodsearch.com, a Yahoo-based search engine, my default engine, since I use the searches to support my kids’ school.  So until I figure this out, I have it set as a bookmark on the bookmark bar.

So is it worth all the hoopla? I will need another week or so. This entry will likely be edited multiple times as I get used to the browser and it’s capabilities.  Stay tuned!