I dunno why I never knew about this before… I’ve used Trillian and hated it; but currently using Gaim I am logged onto ICQ, AIM, YIM, MSN, and Google Talk simultaneously, with very little system overhead. Great stuff. If you have accounts on multiple messenger clients, definitely check out Gaim. I’ve barely started playing with it (options, extensions, etc., are still yet unexplored), but I used it to sign onto AIM for the first time in many months and discovered a long-lost friend that I haven’t spoke to in quite some time.
I’ve used Gaim for more than a year now and can’t imagine using anything else. I used Trillian for a while as well and didn’t like it either. Gaim wasn’t very stable or compatible with the many protocols/services at first, but they’ve come a long way. That’s one reason why I like open source products such as this. Like you said, Gaim uses very little overhead and simply makes it easier to stay connected by having everything you need in one handy little program, rather than have 5 or more running. And no ads, either! ;-)
Chris read my mind. ;)
The no ads is one of the best features! :)