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- This topic has 9 replies, 5 voices, and was last updated 16 years ago by Doris Kenney.
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April 23, 2008 at 11:37 pm #28509Doris KenneyParticipant
I’ll download it and give it a shot in a little while and see what I think of it. It claims voice & video but I’m a bit dubious. I’ll let you know what I think!
April 24, 2008 at 12:34 am #168037Jeff HesterKeymasterThanks Doris!
April 24, 2008 at 3:07 am #168043Doris KenneyParticipantWell, like Superman, I was off like a speeding bullet to download the program and check it out. I went to their website, first from the link in the .doc attached and despite the pretty little button that I presumed was download, clicking did NOTHING. I had to go to the link in the forums to get it, but that’s ok since it did download the most recent version.
Install was easy and quick. And registering as a new user was painless enough. My contacts for all the supported clients was simple as well. I don’t have ICQ but AOL/ICQ were listed together. I imported AOL/YH/WLM and GoogleTalk contacts. I was able to show all or only online contacts which was nice, and you can keep them grouped by client or disassociate them. You can also broadcast your cam as your display pic if you choose to do so. There are however only two current skins to choose from.
Another major nice thing was you can show or hide the ads. What a novel concept! And if you go to the “mini” screen it takes off all the extraneous stuff and shows just your contact list in a very nice compact little moveable screen.
I was able to test text messaging with YH and WLM no troubles at all. Although figuring out how to start a voice conversation was a bit of a challenge. After clicking on most everything on the main contact listing, I finally noticed a small YH smilie that had a drop down arrow in text that enabled 1-1 voice which worked quite nicely. From that same drop down I was able to start a multi person voice conversation which sent a link to my contact. Now that I’ve had time to explore it a little more – right clicking on the contact brings up the same type of menu and is far easier.
We were successful in getting a 2 YH users, and another WLM user on into one conference and we were all able to talk. I was the only one with a webcam, and since mine is integrated in my laptop it was on when I accepted letting Flash run. I couldn’t find a way to disable the video though once I started it. For external cam users that would be no big deal but for an internal cam it’s a pain – but it’s the same with most flash based sites so it’s not a drawback of the program.
The voice quality was fine, although a bit quiet. I had my sound adjusted all the way up on my system and in the program and had difficulty hearing. My contacts however said it seemed fine, so perhaps it was a Flash setting on my end that I need to investigate. It was convenient to be able to see who was speaking, or a message that said no one was speaking and I was free to talk. However, I did notice a slight lag when a contact would “push to talk” and the time I actually heard them speaking. It was quite tolerable however. Just like YH voice conference, there was text available to all contacts as well.
All in all, I was reasonably impressed with it. The voice conference was not as good as Yahoo voice conference, but better than what I’ve experienced on multi person Skype chats. The 1-1 voice was just as good as any of them. I’m planning on testing it out more with another person once they’ve also installed the program so I can see how the Instan-T part of it works – but from a multi client side of things it seems to work very well. It’s certainly worth exploring further.
I don’t know if you wish for this to be posted somewhere public or not just yet, but for any fellow staffers who want to give it a try – it’s one I’d give a tentative thumbs up to at the moment. I’m anxious to try it out further and see how reliable it is, and if I can get the voice to be a bit better on my end and I’ll let you know if/when I have some more success!
Thanks for the opportunity to check this out Jeff!!!
April 24, 2008 at 3:49 am #168042April 24, 2008 at 7:03 am #168040sarahtownyMemberThank you Doris, what an informative review!!
I will check it at the weekend.
April 24, 2008 at 12:12 pm #168044Doris KenneyParticipantI was speaking with Eagle_Kiwi last night and he remembers the program from previous versions (which were apparently a bit lacking) over the last few years. However, even he was duly impressed with the strides they’ve made. For those of you who know Ian – that’s not all that easy to accomplish!! :p
Anyway – Sarah I’d be more than happy to test it out with you this weekend on an Instan-t to Instan-t basis to get a feel for that part of it. And I do still need to check out file transfers and emailing from within the application.
Let us know what you think!
April 25, 2008 at 4:08 pm #168041DermotParticipantThe direct download link is http://inidownload.com/it/Download/Completo/50/ItSetup.exe
April 29, 2008 at 2:27 pm #168038Jeff HesterKeymasterDoris, thanks for reviewing this. Could you go ahead and post your review in the General / Other IM News category?
Please add a link to their website.
Thanks! 🙂
April 29, 2008 at 10:22 pm #168045Doris KenneyParticipantDone! Slight editing to add the link and remove my initial comments to other staffers about trying it out.
April 30, 2008 at 5:18 pm #168039Jeff HesterKeymasterThanks Doris! I’ve edited to add an image. Looks good!
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