Should I switch to Google Talk?
After the appearance of this article, I will state my thoughts regarding the use of Google Talk .
Along with the advantages described in the next article, the client under discussion also has disadvantages.
• The US version of the client is more functional than the versions of other locales.
The US version makes it possible to use data transfer, the “Show current music track” function, additional skins.
• A fairly small number of settings. The main vital set is, but I would like more extensibility. For example, to set up your settings for communication windows, and not just use ready-made skins.
• Show current music track - the function used by many in Miranda's and QIP's is built-in here. No plugins are needed, GTalk itself pulls the current track from any of the supported players . But at the same time, an “amazing” processor load is obtained. • If the connection is lost, the status of the contacts does not change. Quite often you don’t notice that the connection is broken and you continue to write. As a result, messages reach the addressee only in the form of chat history, or may not reach at all. At the same time, this happens “on the other side of the wire,” when the GTalk interlocutor does not report that I went offline.
• If the connection is lost, the client starts reconnecting itself. At what time is growing with each attempt. Out of habit, you write a message offline and wait for the Internet to appear to send it. You will write lines 10-20 and then the Internet appears. And the client is going to connect in 70 seconds. In this case, as expected, click "Disconnect / Connect", and, in this case, the vile client closes all open chat windows, and your scribble goes by the tail.
• To the difference between the US and other versions - the difference between the local and web client. The web client offers even more features , such as tabbing active windows, 3 sets of emoticons, the ability to play video in the chat window. All this would be useful in the desktop version.
• When using the “Show Desktop” function, or simply using the combination of the Windows + D hotkeys, the chat window minimizes, but then returns to its expanded state, while remaining “minimized” in functionality. Right-click on the chat window in the taskbar, and two functions are active in it: “Close” and “Maximize to full screen”, although the window is already expanded. Sometimes it's annoying.
• When you open the next chat window, it opens in the “dock” of the previous one, minimizing it. Generally I do not understand the usefulness of this function. Especially when the windows are not small, pulling a new window out of the dock is not very easy. This function cannot be removed, weak extensibility again affects.
• Well, the last thing I don’t really like about the IM client under discussion is the traffic when using voice communication. Empirically, it was noticed that for normal voice communication, a speed of more than 9Kb / s is necessary. Unfortunately, with my adsl connection, the outgoing traffic is no more than 8Kb / s, so voice distortions or breaks happen and I have to return to other voip clients that are less demanding on traffic.
PS In such cases, the use of other clients with jabber protocol support is a more acceptable option, but I continue to use GTalk further due to the ability to view pictures in the chat window. But I want the product to be beta than nothing.
