Firefox 2.0 is still in beta. It won't be considered an update until it has been officially released.

I use two browsers regularly - One is Deepnet Explorer, which uses the IE rendering engine but makes it WAAAYYY better. You can block ads, filter Flash, stop popups, etc. It is lso a tabbed browser. It also include a newsreader and a P2P client (optionally, if that's your thing.) Can't recommend it highly enough.  Also it will not work with those troublesome Browser Hellper Objects (used primarily for drive-by spyware installs, although Google and Yahoo toolbars are also this type of thingy.)

My other browser is Firefox, which needs no introduction. Generally it's Deepnet for work, Firefox for play.

Why tabbed browsing? Ebay is reason enough. I have a list of 20 items to check out, I can open them all in separate tabs (this is just a drag & drop gesture in Deepnet, no keyboard needed, a big timesaver.) I can peruse items, close them if I'm not interested, etc. without ever losing the context of the original list. I handle Poser forum topics the same way.

IE users can use the windows XP grouping to handle windows in a similar way, but it's not available on Windows 2K which I run on my laptop, plus I've always found the grouping thing to be flaky, and it doesn't kick in unitl you hit some kind of threshold. Windows controls it, not me, whcih is reason enough not to use it. Plus closing an IE window doesn't neccesarily return you to your previous IE window - it just shows you the app that's stacked under IE on the desktop, whatver that is.

Tabs are good for research too. With Deepnet, I can save 10 or 15 relevant links to a favorites group, then come back later and open them all at once in their own tabs with a single click. Don't know if Firefox can do this.

• Jimdoria  ~@>@