Why does IE7 fetch every favicon at startup?

Question

I am trying to understand what IE7 is up to and why it takes forever to start up.

I've been using Fiddler 2 to monitor traffic and the content of headers. I'll start Fiddler 2, then fire up IE7. And each time i do this I see that this browser always appears to chase down a favicon for every single site in my bookmarks. Worse it tries for both ICO and GIF format for each.

I can't understand this. Am I mis-configured or is this a well-known 'feature' ?

Answer 1

It is a "feature", because it shows the favicons as the icon for the entry in your favourites menu.