Facebook Messenger for Windows [An experience]

Facebook, a well known social networking website which was launched back in 2004. I guess this site doesn’t need an introduction. As you know, now almost 90% of the world is using Facebook & even our grandparents may have their own profiles created (just saying). Facebook has over 900 million active users now & more than half of them using mobile devices.

What I’m going to discuss today is all about their Facebook Messenger which were launched officially few months back (in February 2012 if I’m not mistaken). Well, at very first it was leaked out unofficially for windows users back in December as per Neowin’s blog-post. But afterwards, Facebook has officially released its very own messenger app.

[lbfenix img=”http://i985.photobucket.com/albums/ae337/darocker077/facebook_messenger_windows.jpg”][/lbfenix]

Currently this app supports only Windows 7, although support for other version will be available in near future. Facebook has clearly mentioned that it is available only for Win7 in here. But for those who use smart device such as Android, iOS & BlackBerry have the capability to download messenger app from their respective stores or by visiting “fb.me/msgr“.

Advantages of Facebook messenger (what I see)

• No need to sign-in to Facebook web since the IM displays pretty much needed infos.
• Application will start on windows start-up as a service.
• Multiple chat windows on a same dialog-box (only switching the panels).
• Friend requests, Photo tags, notifications.. etc will be notified.

Disadvantageous (what I see)

• At times application does not sign-in on start-up (need to exit & re-open for it to work).
• It does not show proper online/offline friends on the list in real-time (try to compare the online list between the messenger and web).
• Unfortunately the one & only IM I’ve seen without voice/video chat (may be due to the partnership with skype) .
• It does not recognize the same IPs (gives a notification when you login to the web while being online in messenger).
• Application is pretty much slow & at times unresponsive (pretty much slow, even on android devices).

Well, whatever said & done are based on my very own experience & some of researches which I’ve carried. Therefore, please do consider this as a review but not as a complaint.

All the above mentioned logos & trademarks are belongings of their respective owners.

Geek Opinion: Overall, the application is a pretty good one released by Facebook. I’d say it will be more better if they can add voice/video support with cross platform functioning. Also, fixing some more bug errors which I’ve mentioned in disadvantageous.

[box] Download: Facebook Messenger for Windows & for Mobile [/box]