| | Pidgin (formerly Gaim) 2.4.0 | | GUI:  Features: Ease of use: Value: |  | | still best instant messenger available to everyone. but now Digsby seems to be the best overall instant messenger. Digsby is still in beta tho and u need an invite code to use it. if thats too much to handle atm, just use pidgin and wait for digsby to go to full release. |
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| | Pidgin (formerly Gaim) 2.1.1 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | | well tried trillian pro and its adware too. so trillian and qnext r all adware. this is really shitty. hopefully astra will be adware free when its in final release but pidgin is proving to be the best IM ((free or paid)) without any form of adware. nice job pidgin crew. |
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| | Pidgin (formerly Gaim) 2.1.1 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | | this to me is the best IM client out there. its not too big, its resource friendly, its stable, its got sound, its adware and virus free, it has an opinion for color screens, it has plug-ins. this basically has everything u could want in an IM all bundled into 1 where all the others lack something or have some form of spyware. |
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| | Gaim 2.0.0 beta 3.1 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | | It's a shame that Gaim has only a 4.4 rating at the time of this review. It really deserves 5 stars because it is clearly far and away better than any competition. The GTK GUI is very clean and lacks annoying advertisements like most competitors. Plug-ins come in very hand, such as the "System Tray Icon" and "Guifications" which has a toaster pop-up to alert you when friends sign on and off. It has all of the features of other chatting programs and then some. You can use it for AIM, Yahoo, Jabber, and more. It is simply an amazing program and is much better than any of its competition. |
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| | Gaim 2.0.0 beta 2 | | GUI:  Features: Ease of use: Value: | | They removed the one feature that made this Multi-networked client better than Trillian and Miranda...
The Away Message window (a la official AOL Instant Messenger official client). If you are an avid AIM user, I am speaking of the window that pops up when you turn on your away message that will let you turn off sounds, notifications and will grab all IM windows so they won't bother you while you are away. This is the most important feature of an IM client because I hate being bothered while playing a computer game.
Now, GAIM 2.0.0 has this stupid thing in the bottom of the buddy list which you use to change your status. You can still disable sounds while away in the preferences, but IM windows will bother you as if you never put up an away message. I am so pissed off about this because GAIM 1.5.0 actually had the away window container, but they REMOVED IT!!!!
I refuse to use this client seriously, outside of trying the new builds for 2 minutes, because I NEED the away message container window.
I am so pissed off! |
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| | Gaim for Windows 1.4.0 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | | Actually, just figured out how to minimise to system tray. GUI score goes up to excellent, as does the overall rating. Definitely switching to Gaim from this point onwards! |
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| | Gaim for Windows 1.4.0 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | | Very nice program. I like being able to group multiple entries for a single person. Would be good if the Windows version could minimise the buddy list to the system tray notification area rather than having to keep it on the taskbar. Was annoying that it crashed as soon as I tried to run it, but if you delete the /Gaim/plugins/tcl.dll file it solves the problem. |
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| | Gaim for Windows 1.3.0 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | I had to drop the value down to 4/5 because I have been using Yahoo IM service to talk to some SoftPedia people and GAIM with Yahoo IM is just not going well.
I thought that GAIM had a problem with AIM disconnects. The Yahoo IM disconnects make AIM disconnects look like nothing. Every hour or so, or more, Yahoo IM connection needs to be refreshed. Its a pain in the ass when you are trying to do work in other applcations...like GAMES for example. I finally found myself exiting AIM just to avoid the reconnect window due to Yahoo IM connection issues.
There is no option in GAIM to suppress this window, unfortunately.
I really dont like the fact that more major updates to the software are being completed. Every update seems to have some dopey security fixes that no one in their lifetime would come across or be subject to.
Trillian at least feels the need to upgrade the interface every so often....reworking the whole program.
Miranda? Version 1.0 is supposed to be built from the ground up.
AIM? AIM Triton
MSN? Im not sure (since i havent used MSN very long), but doesnt V7 include a new interface over V6?
Yahoo IM? I remember the days of Version 5, and todays version 6 and 7. Talk about big interface changes.
IM2? Ehh...its still to early to have the need to rework the entire interface, but from what i understand version 2.0 will be completely new, and built from the ground up.
GAIM on the other hand, gives users no hint of any major upgrades.
It has been the same ugly interface for years now...
People keep telling me Direct IM works for AIM, but for me it doesnt. It will connect no problem, but the pictures just do not send, nor can i receive images. This is just unacceptable.
They can keep coming out with new smiley themes to appease those dopes who are all over smiley themes, or little security fixes to appease those weirdo's who somehow stumble upon the issues, and so on, but the fact remains that GAIM is in desperate need of a complete rework...
I tried to get back into GAIM...i ran it for a week. I just recently uninstalled it because I need perfect Direct IM capabilities, and I cant stand the Yahoo disconnects. And a lot of other minor things which make my AIM/Yahoo IM experience terrible.
I couldnt care less if the memory usage is 5 times less with GAIM vs Yahoo IM or AIM...I need a client that can maintain the productivity I have with chat clients, and GAIM just doesnt fit the bill. |
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| | Gaim for Windows 1.2.1 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | hardly ever any AIM updates for GAIM...
Yeah i know the 3 week deal is nice...since like no other software updates as often...but come on, i want to see some major upgrades for the software...maybe some AIM protocol updates.
Direct Connectioning really needs some fine tuning...
Still great though... |
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| | Gaim for Windows 1.1.4 | | | GUI: Features: Ease of use: Value: | | There are serveral softwares available that give users the ability to connect to the major networks not as an alternative to using the official softwares, but rather all at the same time in one program. GAIM is one of them. Heh, I know the people who made the program hate when people call it "GAIM" instead of "gAIM" or "Gaim", but thats how i do it so tough.
There are a couple others out there.
Trillian...its not free though. unless you want the feature stripped free version.
IM2...kind of immature right now, but give it time.
Miranda...highly polished, but heavily feature lacking.
Easy Budy...talk about "use for chat only"
GAIM is the only one that is not only polished (few bugs) and is free, but is updated on a constant basis. You really can't say that with the other ones available. Trillian is on like a 2-3 month update schedule, Miranda...jeez, updates are rare, IM2 is on a 1 year schedule as it seems, lol...Easy Buddy i dont know about.
Now i must note that ive only used GAIM for AIM because i have no buddies on the other services giving me no reason to use it. So this review is solely AIM related.
GAIM supports all the popular features that the Official client has:
Direct Connection
File Send
Buddy Icons
Time Stamping
Away Message Container...id like to note that the one that GAIM provides is almost exactly the same, and therefore gets my vote. Trillian has an away message container but they it was implemented and made in such an idiotic way that its the ONE thing that steers me away from the software, besides its memory hogging.
what else...
Font configuration
And other favorite features i cant think of off the top of my head.
There are a few it lacks from the Official client, whether useful or not:
Expressions (boo-hoo)
AIM Greetings button (boo-hoo)
AIM Games (boo-hoo)
Talk
Video
and some others i cant think of off the top of my head.
Then there are features that GAIM has that the Official client doesnt have (which are usually standard will all the new multi-network IM softwares these days):
Plugin support
Smiley set importing
Tabbed IM windows
Chat Logging
and some others, of course...
Then there are a few features that are exclusive to GAIM, from my understanding:
Buddy Pounce (offline messaging)
...nothing else is coming to mind at the moment...but you get the point...the software is loaded.
The GUI is nice. The installer comes with a skin called "Wimp" which is meant to mimc the Windows look and feel. It does it very nicely.
The only problem i had with the GUI is that scrolling was a bit sluggish in every version i used, but that may be because my computer is not up to par with today's standards.
Independent of what skin you have, the GUI blends many different clients into one...you have the Official AIM client, with the list and the group headers, then you have the iChat look with the user buddy icons in the buddy list, then there are the network icons as well, and the away message also appears under the names of people who are away. Its really nice to look at. I can't recall, though, if there are any options ot turn any of those things off.
Its very easy to setup.
First time users will need to download the package that includes GTK. Im not a linux user so im not completely familiar with what GTK, but its required.
Included in the installer is the Wimp theme, as i mentioned, which wasnt there in earlier versions...so no extra downloads there.
It also comes with a list of default plugins which i think are necessary. I think a few other plugins should be added too (e.g. Extended Preferences), but its not hard to download them and implement them. Implementing smiley sets could not be any easier. Load up GAIM, download the smileys you want, open the options/settings window, and DRAG the file in...very neat functionality.
Because its kind of sluggish on my machine Im sticking with the Official AIM client until i get a new computer.
But i highly recommend this software for anyone looking for a multi-networked client.
The fact that its free and open source makes it all the better. |
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