windows live messenger

[Twinstar1]

I have been having an issue with Windows Live Messenger that keeps getting worse. I have been having this issue for well over a month at least.

I will sign in and have myself set to either "away" or even "available". After a bit of time, it will show me offline to my contacts but my status doesn't seem to change itself. I tend to have to sign out and sign back in for it to work temporarily. It's really getting annoying as I have some contacts who can not message me when I'm showing offline.

Now I have tried to look this up and I know I'm not alone. I am afraid that it's my account though and not the program.

Why?
-I have this problem on other computers and my iphone too.
-I have uninstalled/reinstalled and it doesn't help.

Now, I don't want to switch to the new windows live to test that out as I did try it briefly and I didn't like it at all. I currently use version 14.0.8117.0416, but again, I doubt that makes a difference.

Basically, I'm just wondering if there is a fix for this without having to make a new account since this is the account I've been using since I first started emailing years ago

[fataltea]

Could you clarify something for me, Twinny? You said that it'll show you as offline to your buddies, but that your status doesn't change. Does that mean that your buddies see you as offline, but that on your list, there is no change?

[Twinstar1]

Exactly. I'll be set to away and it'll still say I am, even if I show offline to others.

For example, I am set to "away" right now as we speak. Yet for my contacts, I might be showing offline to them. I don't know unless I'm talking to someone who can message me if I am offline (aka, someone who isn't using msn on their phone).

[fataltea]

Huh. Is this something that started happening after you started using your iPhone to login to messenger? I've never used an iPhone for messengers, so I'm not sure what sorts of settings it might change, but I know with my own phone, I had to go in and tweak my account preferences after using it to login to MSN and Yahoo messengers.

[Twinstar1]

well I did start having issues when I started using my iphone but I don't think there are any settings that it could have thrown off since it doesn't happen just on the phone. I have reinstalled msn on my computer and had this issue on my old computer I recently replaced since, so it would have the basic settings. Also it didn't happen that much at first but it's been getting worse after time.

When I did start using my iphone, it would actually do the opposite thing to me. It would show me as online even though I had signed out on my phone. I would then get a message on my phone out of nowhere from a contact telling me I was online.

[fataltea]

Imo, from the sound of it, I'd say it's a problem on MSN's side. Since other people are experiencing the same issue, and you experience it from other computers, using both the most recent version of messenger as well as older versions. My first bit of advice would be to update to the most recent version on your own computer (even though it's awful and I completely understand why you don't want to use it), since using older versions of messengers often causes problems of this nature (their servers are no longer set up to be compatible with older versions). You'd have to give it a couple of days to see if there was any difference.