Windows Live Messenger remains a fierce rival of Yahoo Messenger, and this is probably the main reason why the developers over at Microsoft are basically offering the same features packed under a different interface.

The new generation MSN Messenger follows the same trend as Yahoo Messenger and includes all kinds of communication features, such as video chatting, file transfer and phone calling. And, to be sure everything works seamlessly, Windows Live Messenger and Yahoo Messenger are now interconnected, allowing users of the two to chat no matter the application they're using.

Unlike Yahoo's software, Microsoft's displays the webcam right into the conversation window, thus allowing users to have a better chat experience. During our tests, the webcam worked flawlessly which is actually one major advantage over its rival, although some webcam settings to adjust the image brightness and gamma would have been a godsend.

Sharing is piece of cake with the new Windows Live Messenger version, as users can easily create a so-called Sharing Folder to send files to somebody else using the popular Mac OS X-inspired drag-and-drop method. We've sent tons of files just to test WLM's reliability and everything worked just fine, without errors or performance issues.

The interface remains friendly and intuitive, and you shouldn't have too many problems browsing through menus and settings. We were however a little bit annoyed by the advertisement banners showed at the bottom of the main window and, unfortunately, there's no way to get rid of them.

Other than that, Windows Live Messenger is, in fact, an extremely easy to use application to chat over the Internet. It does exactly what its name suggests, packing advanced features under a pleasant interface.