With the launch of IE8 and IE's nasty habit of over writing its older brothers I thought it may be useful to show how you can run older versions of IE on your PC or laptop.
If you're lucky enough to be running XP you can simply download and install
MultipleIE but for those of us on Vista there is a more complicated solution.
The easiest way to go through this is in a step by step manner,
1. Download and install
Virtual PC 2007 (roughly 31 MB)
2. Download
IE6 VPC Image. You'll want IE6-XPSP3_VPC.EXE.
3. When the file is down unpack the installer to a folder of your choice.
4. Run Virtual PC 2007 and click new to setup a new virtual machine.
5. A setup wizard that will walk you through the process, you'll need to fill in.
- Select "create a virtual machine" when you are asked for an option
- Name and location: Rename it if you plan to have several virtualisation (i.e. running Linux at the same time)
- Select Windows XP as an operating system
- Go with 128 MB, you can upgrade it later if you wish
- Select Windows XP as the operating system
- Virtual Hard Disk Options: choose "an existing virtual hard disk"
- Find IE6 image by browsing the directory where you unpack IE6 VPC Image in step 3
You should now be able to boot into Windows XP with Internet Explorer 6 installed.
If you want to get online with your new IE6 you'll just need to complete a tiny bit more.
1. Go to Virtual PC console and click on settings > Networking and select "Adapter 1" dropdown menu on the right, select "Shared Networking (NAT)" and click OK.
2. Go to Tools > Internet Options > Connections and click on "setup" in Internet Explorer 6. Make sure to do the following
- Network Connection Type: Connect to the Internet
- Choose Set up my connection manually
- Internet Connection: choose Connect using a broadband connection that is always on
- Click on "Finish".
2. Without exiting the "Internet Option", select "Local Are Network (LAN) Settings" and tick "Automatically Detect Settings" and click OK.
3. Restart Internet Explorer 6 and you should be able to online by now.
Now go browse the interweb in all its IE6 glory.
