Miranda vs Adium vs Meebo

Chris Pirillo — Wed, 16 May 2007 23:00:37 +0000

http://live.pirillo.com/ – Chris is asked what IM application he uses and what he would recommend for different operating systems. So, what instant messaging applications does he use?

Miranda is a popular choice for Windows systems:

Miranda IM is a multi protocol instant messenger client for Windows. Miranda IM uses very little memory and is extremely fast. It requires no installation and can be fitted on a single floppy disc. Its powerful plugin system makes Miranda IM very flexible. Only the most basic features are built in, but there are currently more than 350 free plugins available for download that allows users to extend the functionality of Miranda IM.

Adium is the IM application of choice under Mac OD X:

Adium is a free instant messaging application for Mac OS X, released under the GNU GPL and developed by the Adium team. With Adium, you can connect to any number of messaging accounts on any combination of supported messaging services and then chat with other people using those services.

Meebo is quickly gaining support as the IM client for mobile devices:

meebo.com is a website for instant messaging from absolutely anywhere. Whether you’re at home, on campus, at work, or traveling foreign lands, hop over to meebo.com on any computer to access all of your buddies (on AIM, Yahoo!, MSN, Google Talk, ICQ and Jabber) and chat with them, no downloads or installs required, for free!

Formats available: MPEG4 Video (.mp4), Flash Video (.flv)

Miranda vs Adium vs Meebo

Miranda vs. Trillian

Chris Pirillo — Wed, 13 Sep 2006 07:32:33 +0000

Miranda vs. Trillian

As reported tonight, I’ve switched from Trillian to Miranda (for several reasons). It’s been a pretty good experience so far, save a couple of random crashes. Here’s what I love about Miranda:

Active development community cranking out updates frequently
Slick interaction with popular and minor IM protocols
Polished skins are readily available through the directory
Fast startup and shutdown, relatively small memory footprint
My buddy list is transparent (read: no background)
I can see what IM clients and versions all my buddies are using
There’s a decent “Find Updates” plugin available
It’s a nice upgrade from Trillian 2.x’s feature set
Individual message windows can contain useful info
It’s open source – bonus!

Things I dislike about Miranda:

It took a full day to configure to my liking
Options are all over the map (in a disorganized config hierarchy)
no full support for Skype (read: Skype must still be open)
Skins aren’t applied program-wide (very frustrating)
I can’t undo a specific font change I made
You can’t set a universal buddy icon easily
User experience lacks the polish of Trillian’s
Some cryptic error dialogs
It was designed with geeks in mind
I’ve been having problems with MSN connectivity
Random crashes with no easy way of recovering open convos
I can’t access more than one account on any single network
It doesn’t auto-organize incoming IMs by preset protocol groups

I’ll stick with Miranda for the time being. If Trillian 4.x can lick the performance issues that dog 3.x, I’ll go back to it. No word on when the new version will be unleashed, though.

Miranda vs. Trillian

Chris Pirillo » miranda

Miranda vs Adium vs Meebo

Miranda vs. Trillian