Times Online tried Microsoft's new search engine, and it broke. Here's a selection of reader experiences with the new service

Guess what? Using the search term you gave in your article msn search returned 6823 results in 0.07sec, Google returned 9100 results in 0.14sec. Though MSN seems to crash occasionally (which Google has never done to date), I guess the search game is going to get more interesting in time to come. Dr Natarajan Ganesan, Dept of Computer Science, Georgetown University, Washington DC

Come on, you could have at least added a disclaimer: "Now a word from our sponsor - Google" Name and address withheld

Your article stated that "paid-search sites make money by charging website owners a fee to have their site appear at the top of the list when users search for certain key words". I think this is misleading, in Google's case anyway. While Google does place ads next to search results, they claim that their search results (based on PageRank) are "pure", and are not affected by their advertisers. Fiction: Advertising on Google affects my rankings in the search results.Fact: Advertising with Google neither helps (nor hurts!) a site's rankings on Google. I think it's an important distinction. Paul Jensen, Ottawa, Ontario

Sticking your thumb back in the pie does not mean you always get a plum. Name and address withheld

Microsoft's search is ok. A touch bleak, perhaps. But I don't think I'll be leaving Google just yet. Name and address withheld

Google sends its robot out much more frequently. As of November 11, the cached version of my page on Google was dated November 10, 2004, while on MSN it was February 11, 2004. In the internet world, MSN's performance could be compared to the Pleistocene Epoch. James Broad, Business Development Director, Midland Engineering Ltd

I have been using Google a long time now and have watched them improve over the years. I am even enjoying turning the name into a verb and laughing as a new word emerges into our culture. (as in "I was googling for that yesterday"). I checked out the MSN search and, since I use the image search on Google, I decided to give it a go. Google wins hands down. Diane Couraud, Washington State

As unintuitive as most Gates products, MSN Search shines in the category of "simply bad". While Google's search provides many clever features in an easy-to-use format, MSN tries to over-simplify some things too much, and doesn't even bother looking into decent design on others. Name and address withheld

Google's ads aren't annoying, they're intuitive, whereas MSN's ads are bunched against the side of the search text - making it impossible to do any decent research without being constantly annoyed by eyesores. There are many other things that makes Google so much better - especially the fact that Google's News site displays a comprehensive 'briefing' if you will, of news, whereas on MSN, you must search for the news. Google offers both options. People know what they're getting with Google, and for me at least, it's much more comfortable. Gabe Stein, Denver, Colorado

As I am a pro-Google, anti-Microsoft pc user, I am sad to announce that in a 15 minute test of Google and Microsoft Beta, Microsoft won. Microsoft never crashed, and consistently returned more searches than Google, even when searching local items. Justin Morgan, Milwaukee, Wisconsin

Try this one: Superkalafragilisticexpealadocious. The proper spelling is Superkalafragilisticexpialadocious. The Microsoft site actually broke when you used the misspelling. I tried it a second time and it just came back with no results and no suggestions. Google recognised the misspelling and offered a correction. It found the results I wanted. When I used the new spelling on the MS site, it only found three results (as opposed to the 20 or so that Google found). I think my mind is made up. Greg Wilson, Dallas, Texas

I was disappointed. Nothing here to make me want to change from Google. I think we've all been spoiled. The bar is set very high. Perhaps in coming days this MSN site will improve but as of now it reminds me of the low achieving third-grader who when called on by the teacher just blurts out anything that comes to mind, releived to be saying something regardless of whether or not it answers the question. Howard Bott, San Mateo, California

I found a spelling mistake on Microsoft's search site and tried to send them the details using their online feedback. The feedback page doesn't work either, it gives an empty page when I submit so I have no idea if they got the message. Andrew Johnson, Auckland, New Zealand

Microsoft's search engine deficiencies in image searching are horrific. It looks like Microsoft only uses the actual name of the image, while Google uses text on the page pointing at it. The actual quality of return results with various other terms shows that there is better topicality to Google's results as well as order(s) of magnitude more results. Jonathan Peterson, CNTI Product Manager, HandsOnNetwork

I found the new Microsoft search engine much better than Google. If I look up Craswell as a search term, Google absolutely saturates the first pages with entries naming my son Nick, who is a researcher in computer science. However with the new Microsoft search I get a much more balanced spread of Craswells, including even some of my own entries. The difference is the Google's page rank system that tends to give you frequently visited sites on the first pages. I prefer Microsoft from this simple test. Eric Craswell, Bonn, Germany

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