So what's the deal :

Imesh is a program that's been around for actually quite a while, and only now is starting to get major attention. Back in the past when I first was thrown upon Imesh I wouldn't have even written an opinion on it, it had major flaws back then. In the many months since that time Imesh has improved substantially but still becomes frustrating and tiresome after many hit-and-miss tries at getting that particular file you want so badly.

It is a program similar to Napster, with a similar purpose, file sharing. Except with Imesh you have the option to download multiple file types.. ranging from .avi and .asf files to .mp3 and .wav files. Tabs let you cycle through the downloads, uploads, search, and browser window, and options are easy enough to adjust.

Pros :

As I said, it's increadibly easy to use. Even the most inept with computers can pick this up in minutes. It has a star system in the search engine to help you out (this will also be mentioned in the cons) and it has good details of how the download is going.

One major plus with this is you can find somewhat rare files that would be difficult to download (at least a working version) anywhere else. Also, in the search box you can specify what type of file your looking for, narrowing down the list.. (otherwise in most cases the matches would be in the over 600 range).

Doesn't sound to bad.. right? Read on.

Cons :

It's slow. Plain and simple. I don't know if the program has some kind of effect on the downloads, as it's only supposed to work as a directory service from what I understand, but using DSL I could never get a download to go faster then 16 K a second. And that number was only on a couple of occasions, while downloading from the web or even Napster I can get connections of up to 60 K a second with good conditions.
It's also frustrating, you'll get connected and then the connection will drop and you'll have to wait another five minutes while Imesh just tells you "connecting" to get a connection going again.. and then sometimes not even get another connection.

The star system is misleading. It'll say five stars (which is the maximum number possible) for a particular file, but a lot of the time I would try several "five-star" downloads with absolutely no success... and then try a 3 star and get a steady download.

Another thing is it's hard to connect to a server a lot of the time, although this has improved in the latest versions.

One other thing I also didn't like was the fact that you can't actually choose the people you are going to potentially download from. It sort of chooses them for you. You can see who you are currently downloading from, but other than that, you can't.

And the last thing is I don't approve of CyDoor Spyware (check your registry) being installed on my computer, just so iMesh can show it's adds.

Overall :

If this worked as well as you'd hope it would it would be a gem. Right now it should only be used as a compliment to napster or a last resort if you can't get the file somewhere else... It won't currently replace any of your other methods of getting files. Maybe in later versions.

You may be best leaving this program off of your hard drive.. I've heard it can hog system resources. And it seems to me, in most cases, it's more hassle then it's worth.

I just had to format my hard disk (not because of iMesh of course) but the truth is.. this time I'm going to leave it off of it. So I can't recommend it to you. Not in it's current state, and not while it spies on my system.



Recommended: No