I've just downloaded IE8-WindowsXP beta 2 and I find it works well, no difference on this site in fact to IE7. I'm not exactly sure what 'compatibility view' is as I have not selected anything other than what has been presented to me.
I will however be reverting back to FireFox which is a superior browser on a large number of sites including this one.
Thanks for pointing this out, any other users experiencing problems or otherwise with the new IE8 ?
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Ride on !
p.s. I have just tried Compatibility View (the icon located next to the refresh button) and the forum drop-downs work equally well with it or without it. I have read the write-up of Compatibility View and it states for those older sites that you may have difficulty with in text etc. Admin will also check this out, but for me IE8 works well in normal mode.