This page of set-up instructions with the accompaying screen captures for each step is courtesy of Adrianne Schutt, one of the regulars on #pipechat IRC.

Once you have gotten the mIRC software and installed it according to the directions on the ircwin page of this site you can follow these detailed instructions for the set-up.

1) Open the mIRC program. You'll be looking at a little gray window with a picture of a man on it, which nags you to register the program. mIRC runs just as well unregistered as registered, so we can get rid of that screen permanently. Just take the check mark out of the unlabelled box in the bottom left hand corner before you click the X button on the little gray window. If you don't take the check mark out, it will show you that screen prodding you to register it every time you start the program (which is no huge problem, just a slight annoyance having to click its X button every time).

2) When the window with the guy's picture is gone, you'll be looking at another (larger) gray screen titled "mIRC Options". At it's top right is a button marked "Add". Click that.

3) A smaller grey window will pop up with 5 blanks you can type in. Here's how to fill them out:
Description: irc.pipechat.org
IRC Server: irc.pipechat.org
Port(s): 6667, 7000
Group: (leave this blank)
Password: (leave this blank)

4) Click the Add button once. This will put you back in the "mIRC Options" grey window.

5) Fill in your name/email/nickname/alternate nickname in the blanks provided.

6) Click the "Connect to IRC server" button to log onto the pipechat IRC server.

7) After the "welcome to the server" message scrolls up, you will see a window pop up called "mIRC Channels Folder". Take the check mark out of the bottom box and click the X button....you won't have to deal with it again.

9) Now you're back looking at the status window (shows that you're connected to the server). Type this, no space before the /: /join #pipechat

10) The channel chat window will open over top of the status one.

11) You can change the size and shape of the windows within mIRC by dragging their edges. Making your screen look similar to will make life easier. This capture also shows where to type to the other chatters, and how their text will display to you.

Once you've made it into the channel the first time, the second time isn't as hard. All you do is open mIRC, click the "Connect to IRC server" button, wait 15 seconds or so, type "/join #pipechat", and you're off and running.

A note about the mIRC FAQ....I just noticed it's available online as http://www.mirc.com/faq.html , or can be downloaded for offline use through the same page as the install files http://www.mirc.com/get.html

Have fun!
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