Two years and a half after IE7 was available for users, Microsoft has shipped the final version of Internet Explorer 8.

How good is it? Have a look at the light and dark sides of Internet Explorer 8 here.

Not much different on the interface front from IE7, you would not have much trouble finding your way around IE8. Something new to look for is the color coded tabs – the one feature that most of us love in Microsoft Excel – now introduced in IE8.

On the minus side, this new version is slow in loading pages compared to other browsers, including the previous version of Internet Explorer. Another thing pointed out is the change in the browser to meet web standards – which is now a pain for developers who have been trying to code versions of websites which look good in the previous versions of Internet Explorer. A lot of websites including eBay and Facebook now doesn’t render correctly in IE8. Microsoft offers the “Compatibility mode” option to render the website in an “IE7″ style.

You can download and install IE8 here.