Yandex 17 Browser for Vista and XP

[Vistaar]

Hello, I am the original poster and my chosen topic is Yandex 17 Browser for Vista and XP. I am definitely not interested in any discussion of other browsers here, including (but by no means limited to) Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera or SeaMonkey. I assume that this forum’s most prolific posters have no experience with Yandex, since their thousands of posts contain no mention of Yandex as far as I can recall (which is pretty far indeed), so I hope they will restrain themselves from taking my post off topic for a change. It should go without saying that any discussion of Windows 7, 8 or 10 (none of which currently suffer from any lack of browser support) would also be off topic here, but Windows XP users who also use Yandex 17 are welcome to post.

Yandex was originally a Russian search engine that later decided to make their own Chromium-based browser, which is the sole topic of this post. If you visit the main Yandex download site using Vista or XP, it should offer you a stub installer for the compatible version 17.4.1 (unless perhaps you are spoofing a newer OS). Alternatively, you could go to Last versions of software for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 where you could find download links for Yandex 17 (and practically anything else that you might want to install on Vista). Yandex installers are not global: They install the browser for the current user only. If you wish to install Yandex for the standard account that you wisely use for web browsing, just double-click. You will not be prompted for administrator confirmation. The installed files will be in the user’s AppData folder, not in Program Files.

Yandex 17.4.1 is a 2017 version forked from Chromium 57 with backporting for Windows XP and Vista support. (Yandex no longer supports Vista or XP, but neither does any other browser.) Among other advantages, Chromium 57 is capable of displaying YouTube’s newest Polymer v2 layout. For YouTube users who are still running Vista or XP, Yandex will become the only browser I could recommend in the near future.

I seem to recall a forum rule against discussing ad blockers, but Yandex newbies should be aware of their special relationship with another Russian company, Adguard. If you look at extensions in Yandex, Adguard is already listed there, just waiting to be turned On. If you do so, you will soon find yourself at a website where installation of more Adguard software is strongly suggested. If you would prefer to use a better-known alternative, then do not turn on Adguard and visit the Chrome Store instead (not the Opera addons site, which seems to be a party to the Yandex/Adguard agreement).

 

[Vistaar]

If anyone here might be interested in a portable version, VistaLover of MSFN has recommended Yandex Portable 17.6.0, which is based on Chromium 58. I do not know if that version works on Windows XP - in fact I do not know of anyone other than VistaLover (who is unquestionably our leading authority on browsers) who has used it. The previously-mentioned version 17.4.1 is modern enough to cope with the approaching YouTube crisis, but a download link for 17.6.0 can also be found at the link I provided in the original post.