Well, it's using as much ram as it ever did, around 120M, but it's not complaining or slowing down quite as much. What happens to the index file that causes this (or at least, worsens it?) Why isn't it listed as a Known Problem with a Known Workaround in the appropriate section of the user's guide on the Web site? Is there a way to avoid the index file being damaged in this way? Does upgrading cause it, maybe due to a drift in the format of this file which gets markedly worse when it's a major version number increase (e.g. 3.x to 4.0)? If so, why isn't it converted when an upgrade is run for the first time, or at least rebuilt? (ICQ does this with its database files sometimes when you upgrade. Otherwise it's no example to follow: slow, bloated, somewhat buggy, though not as bad as MSN for taking matters into its own hands and deciding you wanted it to disconnect when you told it no such thing. And that silly mouse buttons dialog! Why not just make either mouse button bring up the menu, or make clicking just select a contact, double clicking launch a message window, and right clicking bring up the menu? The latter would fit standard windows UI behavior, and although currently double clicking is supposed to open a message window, half the time it opens the menu instead and sometimes it seems to simply do nothing, or the app hangs...)