I’ve been meaning to give Digsby a spin ever since the public Beta was released about two weeks ago. It looked like it was a well designed cross-network (and cross-platform) instant messenger, and it offered quite a few features that no other instant messengers have touched on before. And after having used it for only about 30 minutes I think I may have found myself a new messenger. In case you’re wondering it is free!
As you would expect with a cross-network messenger this one supports all of the major networks, just like the open-source Pidgin does. In addition to those you can also add some social networks like Twitter or Facebook where you can change your status from within Digsby. Still not impressed? Here’s a list of some of my favorite features it has:
- AIM, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, Google Talk, and Jabber messenger account support
- Twitter, MySpace, and Facebook support
- Check Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo Mail. AOL, IMAP, or POP accounts for new mail
- Reply to instant messages directly from the popup notifications
- Tabbed conversations
- Audio/video chatting provided by TokBox
- Inline spell checking
- Update your status with the music you’re currently listening to
- Complete synchronization across computers (including everything from skins to status messages you create)
One of the coolest features has got to be the fact that you can reply to messages from within the notification window that pops up. I mean really, that is pure genius right there. No more having to switch back to the chat window just to send a quick reply! What a huge time saver.
It’s also been difficult for me to find a good application or messenger that can support checking multiple email accounts, and also provide decent notifications when the new mail arrives. That’s one of the reasons I’ve really grown keen to Digsby. Not to mention that the interface is very easy on the eyes:
If you haven’t been content with your instant messenger then I recommend checking out Digsby. It’s completely free, and works on Windows, Linux, and Mac operating systems.
Digsby consumes around 70MBs of RAM! That’s more than any other messenger! Even web browsers and office suites consume less RAM!
I just checked and it does take up 44MB on my system, which is rather high. Hopefully they’ll be able to reduce that by the time it is released, but I’m willing to sacrifice that much memory for it right now. Normally I wouldn’t, but this really brings several different applications that I was using into one.
I’ve been using it since it first went public beta. It is a little heavy on the RAM, but I just don’t mind much because I absolutely love it. It kicks Trillian and Pidgin ass in every way, and does just look beautiful on Vista too.
I’ve been using it for a few weeks now, and while the RAM is a bit high, it uses about the same amount of RAM I used to need to run Pidgin and Twhirl. And not only does it replace both applications, but it also adds email and Facebook notifications.
My only complaint is that Digsby doesn’t differentiate between normal tweets and replies/direct messages when it shows the pop up windows. So if you don’t regularly open the Twitter dialog and manually change to the replies/directs views, it’s easy to miss tweets directed at you.
Trillian astra takes up approx. 27mb ram space. Since I only got a 256mb+128mb ram I should stick to astra, especially with only 780mb left of the 17gb I dont have much space. Though Digsby looks neat/simple.
Love the conversation reminds of the Adium does.
Tried it out as well a few days ago and it sure looks promising. Great features and interface. I uninstalled it thought, because of 1) the enormous RAM usage and 2) no possibility to login securely (to gmail at least, not sure if it’s possible with the other services). Not sure if I can trust this app yet with all my passwords.
I have really gotten used to Digsby’s many cool features since their public beta. My biggest things are the Twitter and Gmail notifications. I love the ability to mark as read, delete, spam or archive a message right from the notification window! Saves me a bunch of time and when I actually open my Inbox, I don’t have all this crap staring at me. As Brad mentioned, it would be nice if it recognized direct tweets/replies and had a special sound setting or something.
It really does look nice, and that’s something Pidgin really lacks.
The Twitter integration could be a little better, but considering how new Digsby is I’m sure they’ll continue to develop the set of features.
Those are the kind of things that really impress me with the service. The fact that they’ve put so much time into the details has really paid off.
The Mac and Linux versions, I believe, are not released yet.
Ahh, you’re right. I saw the download links and assumed it was. Turns out when you click on those links it takes you to a “coming soon” page.
I love how people bitch about the difference between 27 mb of ram and 44 mb of ram being used. What are using a computer from 9 years ago? At worst-case you’ve all got at least 1 gb, but most of you probably have 2gb. Just to even use this as augment anymore is just weak now. That argument was applicable 6 years ago. Move on.