Uninstalling IE?

[Guest]

I absolutely loath Internet Explorer... It's a huge spam, worm, trojan horse
and general crap on the Internet magnet and despite my best efforts some of
the .dll files were corrupted by some sort of spyware. Fed up, I've
switched to Firefox and its been smooth sailing since then...

But I hate the space that IE takes up on my HD, I get error messages when IE
tries to launch itself (usually when I'm using other Microsoft products- like
now) and it won't fully load the program correctly anymore since it was
corrupted and now I cannot use retrieve or use the address bar so I can't
even navigate with it...

I don't want to reinstall IE. I just want to remove it or disable it. How
do I do that?

 

[M and D]

IE is part of the operating system and can't be removed. In any case, IE doesn't attract spam (it's a browser, not an email client) and if viruses get onto your computer you can blame yourself for not being careful. I've used IE at home and at work since version 3, and I've never been infected by a virus or spyware.

What is correct to say is that most virus writers target Internet Explorer because it's the browser used by something like 85% of Windows users. If you wanted to spread havoc, would you target the browser used by only 5% of Windows users?

Steven

 

[Guest]

I'm not sure how to interpret your reply when you say:

"if viruses get onto your computer you can blame yourself for not being
careful. I've used IE at home and at work since version 3, and I've never
been infected by a virus or spyware."

Am I being scolded here? I'm not sure what your intention behind these
statements were ... but the because I have only the limited context of well,
text- its pretty hard not to take this as generally rude and unhelpful. It
seems fairly silly to me that you would take the time to even write anything
more than 'no, you can't remove it because its part of the operating system'-
that would have been sufficient. You don't know the circumstances, so please
don't scold me as though I'm a careless child.

That said, is there a way to disable IE so that in all instances Firefox
always loads as a default?

 

[Mike H.]

Tools - Options - General - then check box "Firefox should check to see if
it is the default browser when starting".

As for IE, no it can't be uninstalled. I would repair and keep it updated
it since it's woven so tightly into Microsoft and their products. I just
wouldn't use it anymore than necessary.

 

[M and D]

Start > Set program access and defaults.

Instead of taking responsibility for your mistakes, you blamed them on Microsoft. Then you lost credibility by claiming that a browser is a spam magnet.

Steven