Category: Instant Messaging

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iChat Update 1.0

For the past few months, I’ve been having problems with iChat connecting up with my family back in the states. Bandwidth issues are one thing, but these errors would give me headaches because no solutions seemed to work. Quiting out of all other applications, deleting certain preferences, and running on a non-wireless connection would give me nothing. Every time that the connection would error out, I’d hit that button to send a report directly to Apple.

Yesterday, Apple released iChat Update 1.0. These are the only details.

This update renews the .Mac certificate required by iChat for encrypting text, audio, and video conferences.

This document will be updated as more information becomes available. [apple]

That’s it? I can’t be sure if this solves the problems I’ve been having but am really hoping so. I won’t even get into the fact that the speakers on my Powerbook just decided to stop working about six months ago. Combine these two issues and I’m a little peeved.

Is anyone at Apple keeping track of all the problem reports I’ve been sending in? I’m not the only guy doing this. My godson has sent in numerous on his end when he has had problems syncing up with me over iChat. It’s annoying, and I’m banking that this helps with what I’ve been so desperately trying to figure out.

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MSN 6.0 for the Mac isn’t my new best friend

I use a variety of chat clients. Anyone who does the same knows how much of a pain in the ass this is. I’ve tried those all-in-one things that people cobble together, but let’s be honest about them, alright? They’re crap. Nothing has been made that can truly do with the original version can do. Stability is always questionable, and it never looks pretty. Setup can be a pain, and cross-platform communication is painful.

So MSN 6.0 came out yesterday for the Mac. Great. Yet another version that doesn’t have what it needs to have, and it works worse than the previous one. No video or audio support, and there is this “Windows Live” thing that you can click on. Everytime I do that, it screws up. Gotta quit out and relaunch.

This is the only chat program Rebecca has while she’s at work, and it gets oh so better. MSN will decide to not even send out messages back and forth sometimes. Whole conversations will get mucked up, and we’re left clueless as to what the other person is saying or if either of us got the message at all.

I think that out of all the cients I use, MSN is the most unreliable. The words “Microsoft” and “Mac” probably tells all, but if you’re going to put something new out, make it work. Making it look better doesn’t help things at all.

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Skype releases 2.0 Beta for Mac; Video for everyone

I use iChat to video chat with my family back home all the time. That’s a strict, Mac-to-Mac application. Skype 2.0 Beta for the Mac[download] bridges video chatting with PC users of the VoIP/IM client.

System requirements

  • Mac computer with G4 800 Mhz processor or faster
  • Mac OS X v10.3.9 Panther or newer
  • 512 MB RAM
  • 40 MB free disk space on your hard drive
  • Microphone
  • Webcam: Suggested webcams include Apple iSight, Philips SPC900NC, or Logitech QuickCam Pro 400. Drivers for the Philips and Logitech webcams can be downloaded from http://webcam-osx.sourceforge.net/.
  • Internet connection (broadband is best, GPRS is not supported for voice calls, and results may vary on a satellite connection).

I have yet to put it through the ranks, but if you wanna talk and see your buddies over long distances, this is worth checking out.