IE8 is stable on my PC, but safari isn't.
It takes only 5 mins to make safari unusable, IE8 lasts longer.
However, opening a new tab in IE is very slow...
A good reason to use either Google Chrome or SRWare Iron.
New tabs open immediatly in IE8 for me but then my systems have adequate RAM that IE8 needs as each tab uses its own address space to isolate each session.