Why does iChat keep disconnecting itself?

December 3, 2007 3:29 PM

iChat has an annoying tendency to periodically disconnect itself from AIM and Jabber, bouncing in the dock to alert me. Reconnecting is always simple, but it's annoying. Anyone else have this problem, and ever find a solution?

I'm running Leopard, but this happened under Tiger too. I'm on a desktop with an always-on connection, and it's not a firewall or router problem -- I have the firewall off, and all ports forwarded on the router. (I've also since replaced the router, and the problem's persisted.)

posted by tweebiscuit to Computers & Internet (6 answers total)

I use Adium, which rocks iChat's pants off.
posted by onalark at 3:46 PM on December 3, 2007

I have the same problem, I am at a company with about 50 people, and sometimes it is just me and sometimes its eveyone
posted by brent_h at 3:47 PM on December 3, 2007

Happens to me, using either iChat or Addium.
posted by lekvar at 4:00 PM on December 3, 2007

I had the same problem with a slightly different environment, but one thing I noticed is that my connection would bounce if I was already logged into IM at a different location (home/work, didn't matter). There's something in the AIM protocol that open-source clients don't seem to have power over, and that thing is "remote disconnection." This means that my current client would log on, then log off due to my already being logged in. It was a bit maddening.
posted by rhizome at 4:02 PM on December 3, 2007

Chax will automatically reconnect iChat for you, and dismiss the dialog.
posted by Mwongozi at 4:50 PM on December 3, 2007

I've had the same problem, but it always requires a restart to reconnect (of iChat, not the OS). Irritating.

I will try Chax, now, thanks.
posted by Brockles at 5:25 PM on December 3, 2007