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Six Multi-Service IM Clients Reviewed

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the trillian-for-the-win dept.

mikemuch writes "It's been a while since AOL stopped trying to jam third-party IM clients, and their use is now a fairly common desktop experience. ExtremeTech has posted a roundup of free alternatives to the standard IM software from the big boys — AIM, Yahoo Messenger, and MSN (now Windows Live) Messenger. The products are a mixed bag, some of them Web 2.0-based, like the excellent meebo and the ad-heavy eBuddy. Most give you combined message windows with tabs. GAIM is now Pidgin, Meetro tries to get you chatting with locals, and Trillian, now at version 3.1, remains the client to beat."

4 of 258 comments (clear)

  1. And on Mac OS X... by daveschroeder · · Score: 5, Informative

    ...as noted in the article but not in the summary, the "client to beat" is the excellent free, open source, GPL-licensed, and highly customizable Adium (more info).

    (The summary does mention the other five of the six clients reviewed in the article.)

  2. bsflite by John+Nowak · · Score: 4, Informative

    If you want a very lightweight text-based IM client for *nix, try bsflite. I've been very happy with it.

  3. Miranda? by PhrostyMcByte · · Score: 5, Informative

    What about Miranda? It starts out minimal, supports all the regular IM service, and lets you extend it as far as you want with addons (there are many to choose from).

  4. Re:No plugins in Adium? by VGPowerlord · · Score: 4, Informative

    That's OK, according to the table at the end of the article, Pidgin can't be installed on Windows, even though they tested using the Windows version.

    Which I think tells a lot about this report's accuracy.

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