Ok, ok, this is another one of those tech support topics...
Because of the security leaks or something everybody has to upgrade to a new windows live messenger version (no# 9 i believe).
The problem though is that I'm using win xp 64 (which is awesome) and for some reason microsoft decided to shaft all the xp 64 users by not supporting it on this OS (read here (http://www.techspot.com/blog/129/how-to-run-windows-live-messenger-on-windows-xp-x64/)), even though it SHOULD and HAS run correctly was it not for the setup file checking the OS version and then cancelling the installation. Messenger 8 and below worked fine and I got 8.5 running too after finding an unofficial patch.
But now I'm back at square one. I managed to install messenger 9 but it won't connect. It says that the service is temp unavaileble, though I'm sure that's not the problem, and it's not the firewall eighter.
I tried finding a solution with google but the pages it links to are sometimes 5 years old, and I obviously can't ask people on msn for help so I'm turning to the forums as a last resort.
I doubt people can help me with this problem, I just needed to vent, but maybe they CAN tell me about a messenger alternative that they use. Like trillion, except free and without twitter crap.
Well... I had a similar experience but then under XP. 8.5 wouldn't work anymore and even after upgrading to the newest version (2009) I couldn't connect. Then I rebooted my machine...... That seemed to help. Maybe you did that already, still I thought I'd share...
Try Pidgin (http://www.pidgin.im/). It's a decent free messenger client supporting a multitude of protocols.
Yep Pidgin is pretty good. And I read somewhere that it's not so much Messenger that's to blame, but the actual installer that's not 64bit compatible (by the way, what gives Microsoft? how come your own software does not work on your own OS. Little silly, eh?).
Google around for the non-installer version of Messenger...
I had a problem with MSN not loading (it would load, but wouldn't "connect") a few weeks ago! The only solution I could find was to update my Trillian client. It (MSN) has worked fine since but I'm still not wild about the version of Trillian I'm forced to use. I know that's completely useless information to you ... but thought I'd share my pain with yours!
I did got messenger 9 to install and run, but it won't connect. But I'm using Pidgeon now which DOES work.
I also had problems installing .net framework 3.5, which took me this whole weekend to get it right, but at least everything is working great again. (But for how long?)
This (http://petesbloggerama.blogspot.com/2009/03/windows-live-messenger-unable-to.html) might help.
It did for me.