GAIM

Those of you that use AOL's own AIM client, you may want to refrain from installing the latest update, AIM Triton. In typical AOL fashion, it is very bloated and filled with crap that you may not need or want. It is difficult to decide what is the most annoying thing about AIM Triton.

It takes forever just for it to draw a frickin' window. When a program fails at something as fundamental as that, you know it is time to unistall. It also installs extra programs such as Plaxo and AOL Explorer without giving you the option to prevent the installation. I've uninstalled it and installed GAIM instead.

I last used GAIM long ago, when experimenting with Linux desktops. Since then, they have developed a Windows client as well, and so far I'm quite pleased with it. It is very simplistic and through plugins gives you all of the functionality in AIM and more. Like Trillian it also has the ability to connect to multiple networks, so if you like it you can make it your sole instant messaging client. If you're an AIM user, I would highly recommend you abandon AOL's client and go with GAIM.