Most people use instant messaging to hammer out quick text conversations with friends, family, and colleagues on a keyboard. However, within the past year, the makers of the most popular IM clients have turned their tools into communications hubs. Add a headset and a Webcam, and your instant messenger from Yahoo, Microsoft, AOL, Skype or ICQ evolves into a voice phone or a videophone that enables you to gab with other users around the world. Not only can you make free voice calls to other users' IM accounts, all of the software apps in this lineup, except Google Talk (which does have voice chatting), also provide paid calling plans that let you connect with real-world telephones--and potentially give up your landline. AIM Triton gives you a free local phone number so that anyone in the world can dial your digits, but you'll have to pay to call telephones. You can pay Yahoo $2.99 per month for a local phone number, which Windows Live doesn't offer. Skype is giving away its telephone calling services for free within North America.
With each of these apps, we found free voice chat as simple as clicking a contact and punching a button to call that person, with no numbers involved. Unfortunately, most IMs let you call only people who use the same tool as you do. However, a partnership between Windows Live Messenger and Yahoo Messenger with Voice now allows their users to text chat with each other.
Windows Live, Yahoo, AOL, and Google provide drag-and-drop file sharing, which lets you share photos and folders of all sorts with buddies. We like Windows Live's virus scanning, but Skype is the only messenger to offer encrypted data transfers, making it the most secure instant messenger of the bunch. Yahoo Messenger with Voice 8 has added a new world of features by enabling third parties to build plug-ins. You can pick from hundreds of extras that let you and your pal view local events or stock prices at the same time, play games, draw flowcharts together, and even make your avatars interact in a room you design. The playful Yahoo
seems to be the most fun for kids.
As of our review date, Google Talk and AOL's AIM Triton are still in beta testing. Yahoo Messenger, Windows Live Messenger, ICQ and Skype, on the other hand, are polished release versions. Devotees of Google may not need to download Google Talk, because chatting is embedded within Gmail.
We've rated many of these apps highly because they give away for free so many features that work so well. Still, that doesn't stop us from griping about the vendors' aggressive installation tactics. We wish that IM apps would stop setting themselves, by default, to change our system settings, install browser toolbars and reset our home page, open up relentless pop-up windows to feed us "helpful" news, and start up each time we turn on our computer. We appreciate the free software but wish that installation didn't force us to step through a potential minefield of check boxes. Therefore, tiptoe during setup to make sure you don't get any unwanted surprises.
| |
Windows Live Messen-
ger |
AIM Triton 1.2 preview |
Yahoo Instant Messen-
ger with Voice 8 |
ICQ 5.04 |
Skype 2 |
Google Talk (beta) |
OS/
browser |
Windows XP |
Windows XP-only beta |
Windows 98 and up; Mac version too |
Windows 98 and up |
Windows 2000 and up, Mac, Linux, Pocket PCs |
Windows 2000 and up |
| Call other users around the world for free |
X |
X |
X |
X |
X |
X |
Instal-
lation settings |
Changes your browser settings if you don't specify otherwise. |
Changes your browser settings if you don't specify otherwise. |
Changes your browser settings if you don't specify otherwise. |
Doesn't change browser settings. |
Doesn't change browser settings. |
Doesn't change browser settings. |
| Encrypted data transfer |
|
(only AIM Pro) |
|
|
X |
|
| Video chat |
X
640x480 |
X |
X |
X |
X |
|
| Voicemail |
No inbound calls |
Free |
Free |
|
Skype Voice-
mail, $20/year |
Yes |
Confer-
ence voice calling |
|
|
X |
|
Four people by voice;
100 people by text |
|
| Call landline phones |
1.9 cents/
minute for U.S. calls; up to a dollar/
minute inter-
national |
$9.94 per month for unlimited domestic and inter-
national calls |
1 cent/
minute domestic, 2 cents/
minute and up inter-
national |
2 cents/
minute domestic, 39 cents/
minute and up inter-
national via Net2-
Phone |
Free within U.S., Canada; otherwise 2 cents/
minute inter-
national up to $1.86/minute |
|
| Avatars |
$3 each through Blue Mountain |
Icons are free |
Free |
Free for limited time, $15 personal cari-
catures |
|
|
| Recently improved spam protection |
X |
X |
X |
X |
|
|
| Online gaming |
X |
X |
X |
Full screen |
|
|
| Photo sharing |
X |
X |
X |
|
X |
Unlimited file sharing |
| Web search |
Share several Windows Live search results with buddy; opens browser window |
Opens browser window for AOL search |
Share several Yahoo search results with buddy; click to open browser window |
Opens browser window for Google search |
|
|
| Links to blogs |
Windows Live Spaces |
AIM Pages |
Yahoo 360 |
|
|
|
| Service and support |
Know-
ledge base, e-mail, FAQs |
Know-
ledge base, FAQs |
Know-
ledge base |
FAQs, e-mail, tours, tutorials |
Know-
ledge base, forum, e-mail, user guides |
Know-
ledge base |
| Interface without company promos |
|
|
|
|
X |
X |
| Phone numbers |
|
Free AIM Phoneline phone number |
$30/year for a phone number |
|
$35/year for a phone number |
|
| Links to e-mail |
Shows new Windows Live Mail messages |
Links to AOL Mail |
Shows new Yahoo messages |
Checks ICQmail |
|
Links to Gmail, which offers built-in chatting |
Custom-
ize back-
grounds |
X |
X |
X |
X |
|
|
| Calendar |
X |
(AIM Pro) |
X |
|
|
|
Custom-
ized ring tones |
|
|
X |
|
$1.50 and up |
|
Tabs for news, enter-
tainment |
X |
X |
X |
X |
|
|
Supports multiple lan-
guages |
inter-
national editions |
|
18 inter-
national editions |
Editions for five lan-
guages |
Supports 24 lan-
guages |
Supports 12 lan-
guages |
| Extras |
Text chat with Yahoo users |
|
Text chat with Windows Live users; third-party plug-ins |
|
|
Text chat with iChat users and others without Google accounts |
Read the CNET editor's take
|
|
8.0 out of 10
7.3 out of 10
6.7 out of 10
