iChat Setup

iChat is a very powerful and very useful tool that can be used to perform video conferences and share your screen with other mac users.

The program is absolutly free and comes default with your operating system. All you need is either a .mac account or a free aol or aim account.

The .mac account you get if you subscribe to the .mac service which I believe runs around $100/year which I had but out grew the space they gave me so I only had it for one year.

I switched over to a free aim (aol instant messenger) account which you can sign up for one at this address Instant Messenger - AIM - Instant Message Your Online Buddies for Free - AIM . All you have to do is click on "Get a Screen Name" and fill in the blanks.

Once you have yourself a screen name you will configure your iChat to use that new screen name by first launching iChat

Click on iChat in the menu

Click on Preferences

Click on Accounts and you will see a + and - at the bottom of the window. You will click need to click on the + which mean Add an account.

Enter the Screen Name that you setup on the website displayed at the beginning of this article and the password you picked. Click Done and you are done and ready now to begin your video conferencing (with Leopard you have screen sharing capability).

I hope this article was helpful for you in learning how to setup one very important tool.