im+IM+ just came out with a new version that has the Push technology in it.  It is the first app that I’ve used that has that (other than the built-in mail and SMS app).  Have to say, I really like it.  The app is currently $9.99 in the app store.  That is a bit steep for me, but it *is* a free upgrade for those of us that purchased it at much, much lower prices and is probably worth it for those addicted to connectivity.  Not only does it offer an “all in one” place for IM’s from Yahoo, MSN, AOL, and Google Talk, but also offers connections to ICQ (does anyone use that any more?), Jabber, Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace.  As messages arive, they show up in the same kind of window as a SMS alert with an option to view them or close the window.  A message counter also shows up on the app icon.  The app has different high-quality backgrounds available for the chat windows as well, so you can customize it to the look you prefer.  If a message has a URL in it, you can also launch it in the built-in browser.

Setting up your accounts is very easy.  I kept getting messages that I was logged into AOL at multiple places, so I had to log out of Trillian on my PC and out of AOL on my chat sidebar of Gmail.  With the push notifications of any IM’s, as well as an DM’s from Twitter, there is really no need for me to have the other running on my PC.  I’ll still use TweetDeck for all the Twitter traffic, but IM+ will do nicely to alert me to anything important.

I did have a couple of error messages pop up when launching the application though.  It said it had not been closed properly.  Not quite sure how to close it any other way, but I did fill out the nice interface it had for submitting logs to the developers.  As this wasn’t typically a crash while using the program (although that did happen once), it didn’t really cause me any issues. Twitter updates don’t seem too frequent either.  So don’t be surprised if a maintenance release is in the works.  Ultimately, while I love the interface, the performance to me was not quite up to a $9.99 price tag.  I think it is getting there though.  It doesn’t make my “must have” list, but does get a thumbs up.