Thanks Mephistopheles for posting this on our forum.Pidgin is a multi-protocol Instant Messaging client that allows you to use all of your IM accounts at once.
Pidgin is free software. It is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2. This means you are free to use it and to modify it, but if you distribute your modifications you must distribute the modified source code as well.

anyone else confirm this?
p.s. once this gets fixed Pidgin will be the best
EDIT... UPDATE: i just noticed RAM usage is back to about 22MB now so it must free up ram after a certain point now ... so maybe it's good now
Last edited by ThaCrip on 03 Jul 2008 - 09:40
cause when im just idling in the app it stays pretty much the same as far as ram usage... it's only when i start chatting that it goes higher and higher the more i talk.
also are you using Vista with SP1? ... cause if i recall when i was using windows xp it was fine on that.
Well i've just tried chatting with someone and it only got to 8100K max... with small increase in cpu usage.
Well i've just tried chatting with someone and it only got to 8100K max... with small increase in cpu usage.
are u using Vista with SP1 or WindowsXP?
and also for ram to climb fairly high i had to talk to em a fairly good amount not just a few minutes of text etc.
if your doing what i was saying and your still only around 8-9MB and using Vista SP1 (like i am) then odds are it's a glitch on my system.
p.s.i might consider uninstalling it deleting traces of the program and reinstalling and seeing if that helps.
and also, i wonder if anyone else can confirm your results.
either way, thanks for your time
ok thanks for confirming that it aint just me
but if you noticed my first post i updated it and said... "EDIT... UPDATE: i just noticed RAM usage is back to about 22MB now so it must free up ram after a certain point now ... so maybe it's good now (i did not exit the program since i posted this original message. i.e. it appears it must free up ram now where as before it would just get worse and worse)"
and even at this moment it's back to 9MB
so even though it does appear improved over the previous v2.4.2 version it does seem to need more improvement (i.e. keep ram usage always at a minimum constantly, i.e. say no more than 30MB tops although i figure a 10-20MB sounds about right
ok thanks for confirming that it aint just me
but if you noticed my first post i updated it and said... "EDIT... UPDATE: i just noticed RAM usage is back to about 22MB now so it must free up ram after a certain point now ... so maybe it's good now (i did not exit the program since i posted this original message. i.e. it appears it must free up ram now where as before it would just get worse and worse)"
and even at this moment it's back to 9MB
so even though it does appear improved over the previous v2.4.2 version it does seem to need more improvement (i.e. keep ram usage always at a minimum constantly, i.e. say no more than 30MB tops although i figure a 10-20MB sounds about right
It does seem better with mem usage now. Haven't used it for long enough to see how good it is but so far it seems lower and more stable.
PC's have tons of RAM these days, why do people care for 10-30MB of RAM? It seems quite ridiculous. As long as the program runs smoothly, I see no need to worry for RAM usage.
Also, what plugins are you guys using? I'm using Buddy state notification, History, Psychic mode, and Guifications.
you said, "why do people care for 10-30MB of RAM? It seems quite ridiculous. As long as the program runs smoothly, I see no need to worry for RAM usage."
my reply... it's the thought of it, cause programs should not keep burning up more and more ram when they should be using a smaller amount of memory.... cause the way i see it is 30MB should be plenty for a application like Pidgin (give or take a little) ... but yeah Pidgin does run smoothly on my system but i have 2GB of ram... for people with 512MB (or even 1GB on Vista) that could become a issue using 60-100MB+ or so of ram for a chatting application.
Last edited by ThaCrip on 03 Jul 2008 - 15:00
you said, "why do people care for 10-30MB of RAM? It seems quite ridiculous. As long as the program runs smoothly, I see no need to worry for RAM usage."
my reply... it's the thought of it, cause programs should not keep burning up more and more ram when they should be using a smaller amount of memory.... cause the way i see it is 30MB should be plenty for a application like Pidgin (give or take a little) ... but yeah Pidgin does run smoothly on my system but i have 2GB of ram... for people with 512MB (or even 1GB on Vista) that could become a issue using 60-100MB+ or so of ram for a chatting application.
Like you, I also keep track of memory usage, because some of my systems have limited amounts of RAM. I don't go as far as to complain about it anymore because I am disposing most of the older systems.
The laptop I'm on has 1GB of RAM, it used to run Vista. It runs well considering there's integrated graphics, so there really isn't 1GB of RAM available to Vista.
"but yeah Pidgin does run smoothly on my system but i have 2GB of ram... for people with 512MB (or even 1GB on Vista) that could become a issue using 60-100MB+ or so of ram for a chatting application"
Incorrect. You need to go read up on how Vista manages its memory. Also, this is besides the point, but if you have 512MB of RAM, you shouldn't be using Vista. The bare minimum really is 1GB of RAM.
Bottom line is Pidgin uses little memory, and while it can probably be optimized more, think how much memory you'd use if you ran all the individual programs for each protocol (AIM, MSN Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, etc). If you don't like Pidgin, there's other multi protocol IM clients.
you said, "why do people care for 10-30MB of RAM? It seems quite ridiculous. As long as the program runs smoothly, I see no need to worry for RAM usage."
my reply... it's the thought of it, cause programs should not keep burning up more and more ram when they should be using a smaller amount of memory.... cause the way i see it is 30MB should be plenty for a application like Pidgin (give or take a little) ... but yeah Pidgin does run smoothly on my system but i have 2GB of ram... for people with 512MB (or even 1GB on Vista) that could become a issue using 60-100MB+ or so of ram for a chatting application.
Like you, I also keep track of memory usage, because some of my systems have limited amounts of RAM. I don't go as far as to complain about it anymore because I am disposing most of the older systems.
The laptop I'm on has 1GB of RAM, it used to run Vista. It runs well considering there's integrated graphics, so there really isn't 1GB of RAM available to Vista.
"but yeah Pidgin does run smoothly on my system but i have 2GB of ram... for people with 512MB (or even 1GB on Vista) that could become a issue using 60-100MB+ or so of ram for a chatting application"
Incorrect. You need to go read up on how Vista manages its memory. Also, this is besides the point, but if you have 512MB of RAM, you shouldn't be using Vista. The bare minimum really is 1GB of RAM.
Bottom line is Pidgin uses little memory, and while it can probably be optimized more, think how much memory you'd use if you ran all the individual programs for each protocol (AIM, MSN Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, etc). If you don't like Pidgin, there's other multi protocol IM clients.
yeah i agree with you about 1GB is minimum for Vista... but the 512MB stuff i was basically referring to XP.
"Incorrect. You need to go read up on how Vista manages its memory." ... so your saying it's normal for Vista to burn up all that ram when running Pidgin? ... cause Firefox 3 does not burn up massive amounts of ram on Vista (and that's a much more memory hungry app vs pidgin)... i dont think i hit over 125MB MAX so far (i probably average around 80-105MB area) and i usually have quite a few tabs open.... so to me i dont think it's normal for Pidgin to keep climbing higher and higher the longer you chat with a person.
but yeah i can see your point about the running of each official app for the msn/aim/yahoo etc as that would probably burn up more ram than pidgin but still
i DO like Pidgin (i been using it since it was called 'gaim'
Last edited by ThaCrip on 04 Jul 2008 - 02:40
main reason i did not use miranda myself is cause even though it's lite (which is nice) on resources i never like the overall interface/feel of it.
It's overall interface can easily be tweaked... it's some effort, though.
Anyone who's used both have a preference?
@Everyone having mem issues...
I'm running Vista SP1 using several plug-ins (10 or so) and 5 different protocols.
Had good chat activity, Pidgin has been up for several days, and mem usage is sitting around 35 MB. Seems a little high for an IM client but nothing for me to complain about, really.
@Everyone
If you use MSN through Pidgin and want MSNP14/15 support, you should Google for the "msn-pecan" plug-in and check it out. It's a work in progress but I've been using it for a few days and I think it's already ahead of the stock MSN plug-in. Plus, the author is involved much more directly with the users and takes feedback seriously.
There are other, better clients out there, with devs who actually listen to what their users want and act on them.
There are other, better clients out there, with devs who actually listen to what their users want and act on them.
This is why Carrier was formed. It is ashame about the arrogance, nice though that people put the work in.
I swear I've had it longer than that.
Anyone who's used both have a preference?
Last edited by Kreuger on 08 Jul 2008 - 18:25
Commenting has either been disabled on this article or you are not logged in. Click here to login or register, its free!
Note: Anonymous commenting is disabled in order to keep the quality of responses to a high standard.