The file mirc571s.exe contains the 16 bit mIRC version 5.71
This version is made for Windows 3.1x and Windows for Workgroups 3.1x.

Released May 7th, 2000.

mirc571t.exe  (1122304) - 32 bit mIRC, for Windows 95, 98, 2000 and NT. 
mirc571s.exe  ( 948480) - 16 bit mIRC, for Windows 3.x.
mfaq43hp.zip  (  85479) - The mIRC FAQ version 42

Welcome to mIRC version 5.71

mIRC is an Internet Relay Chat (IRC) program for Windows. Just like you need a 
Web browser to surf over the Web you need an IRC client to chat on IRC. mIRC 
is developed and copyrighted by Khaled Mardam-Bey and mIRC Co. Ltd. It is highly 
configurable, perfectly stable and has lots of goodies hidden 'in there'. mIRC 
offers full color control, DCC File Send and Get capabilities, aliases, a remote 
commands and events handler, scripting, place sensitive programmable popup menu's, 
World Wide Web and sound support, and... a lot more. mIRC can act as an external 
Web browser helper application but it can work totally independent as well. And 
most important; to use mIRC you don't have to know anything of the above. Simply 
install mIRC and chat away!

mIRC is shareware. It can be downloaded freely and evaluated for 30 days. If you 
find that you enjoy using mIRC, please try to register your copy. Your registration 
licenses you to use your copy of mIRC and helps support our continued work on mIRC.

mIRC is distributed in self-extracting cabinets that automatically will install mIRC 
on your PC. You don't need any external programs to install and setup mIRC on your PC, 
just follow the instructions. You first have to find out what mIRC issue you will be 
running. mIRC is available in a 16 bit issue (mirc571s.exe) and a 32 bit issue 
(mirc571t.exe). The 32 bit issue is meant for 32 bit Operating Systems like Windows 95, 
Windows 98, windows 2000 and Windows NT. If you are not sure what issue to use, try 
the 16 bit mIRC issue! That issue will always work.

Download the cabinet of your choice and run the installer. Once you have installed 
mIRC, you can run it, fill in the required setup information, and connect to an IRC 
server. When you're upgrading mIRC all your old settings and scripts will stay as 
they were. mIRC will guide you through the initial stages and hopefully you'll be 
chatting in no time. If you get stuck or want to find out more about a certain 
feature, just click on a Help button in a window or browse the Help file and you 
should find lots of hints to help you out.

As you become more experienced you can also start configuring mIRC's features to suit 
your own needs and tastes, features such as colours, fonts, function keys, aliases, 
popup menus, scripts, sounds and many others.

Good luck and have fun!

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Internet Relay Chat.

For those of you new to the Internet, IRC stands for Internet Relay Chat. The 
IRC networks offer a virtual meeting place where people from all over the world 
can meet and talk. Don't mix-up IRC with the slow Web chats you might have seen. 
IRC is specially designed for chatting and works very fast. 

IRC was originally written by Jarkko Oikarinen in 1988. Since starting in Finland, 
it has spread to almost all countries around the world. IRC is a multi-user chat 
system, where people meet on "channels" (rooms, virtual places, usually with a 
certain topic of conversation) to talk in groups, or privately. There is no 
restriction to the number of people that can participate in a given discussion, or 
the number of channels that can be formed on IRC. 

mIRC attempts to provide a user-friendly interface for use with the IRC networks.
As a user you run mIRC on your PC and you connect to a "server" in an IRC network. 
All servers are interconnected and pass messages from user to user over the IRC 
network. One server can be connected to several other servers and up to hundreds 
of clients. You can join several channels at once and participate in private 
discussions at the same time. The various parts of the IRC client mIRC have been 
designed with the aim of simplifying and speeding up your IRC sessions.

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What is new?

mIRC's new version 5.71 fixes most, if not all, of the small but nevertheless anoying 
buggies found in the previous version 5.7. mIRC's new version 5.71 has far too many 
improvements and new features and functions to mention here in detail. I'll point to 
some of the simple ones here - these are the ones you might encounter right away;

- Support for dual monitor displays (in the 32bit mIRC) has been improved by a new 
  option in the Display/Options/ dialog.
- The 32 bit mIRC now supports .JPG and .PNG image files next to the older bitmap 
  support for backgrounds etc. 
- To prevent you from getting flooded the CTCP Version requests are now queued by 
  mIRC, and the replies are sent once every few seconds.
- When clicking the "Connect" button to connect to a server, you can now hold down the 
  Control key to force mIRC to use the next server in the list. mIRC has lots of handy 
  functions like this. They are explained in the help file. Some need a little practise, 
  others will come to you by nature.
- Several things in the Channel window interface changed. The number of users in channel 
  is now shown in the channel titlebar, you can now resize the nicknames listbox in 
  channel windows, you can add colour to the nicknames that are talking (the "Highlight 
  nicknames" option) and to complete things you can now prefix nicknames with their mode 
  on the channel (.@%+) by the "Show mode prefix" option in the IRC dialog. This allows 
  quick insight in the users status.
- After manual support for the Microsoft Agent was added in version 5.7 
  (see http://www.mirc.co.uk/agents.html) built in support has now been added to mIRC 
  in the options/Sounds/ dialog. You can easily enable agent events for channels, 
  messages etc. without any scripting knowledge. It has never been easier to listen to 
  IRC!
- An important change was made to the DCC "ignore file types" feature in DCC/Options/. 
  It now works as an "ignore all except.." filter. This will prevent you from downloading 
  unknown but malicious files from strangers. A simple ignore timer, allows you to turn
  off the ignore for a small period after which mIRC auto-activates it again.
- When using wildcards the highlight method now matches the wildcarded text against 
  individual words separated by spaces, instead of against the whole line.

Scripters can now have unlimited controls per tab section in a custom 
dialog and the custom dialog tab control now automatically adds a scrollbar 
if the tabs don't fit the width of the tab control. mIRC now maintains an 
internal banlist for each channel and several related strings have been 
added. Check out the $banlist for instance! Apart from these lots of other 
variables and identifiers have been added. Have fun exploring them!

Please read the details of all changes in the versions.txt appended to this 
file, distributed with mIRC and available on the Web. Good luck and have fun 
with this new mIRC!

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More information.

mIRC is supported by a set of WWW pages. On these pages you'll find information 
on new versions, new ideas, known bugs and solutions, and possibly all other 
information you might need on IRC in general, and on mIRC. Besides the newest 
mIRC also the new mIRC FAQ and IRC Intro file are available from these www pages.

http://www.mirc.com/		USA
http://www.mirc.co.uk		United Kingdom
http://www.geocities.com/~mirc/	USA
http://www.nip.nl/mirc/		The Netherlands
http://www.mirc.queen.it/	Italy
http://mirc.kems.net/		Kuwait
http://www.mirc.com.ar/		Argentina
http://www.conesul.com.br/mirc/	Brazil
http://www.mirc.co.za/		South Africa
http://mirc.eon.net.au/		Australia

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License Agreement

mIRC® v5.71 Internet Relay Chat Client
Copyright © 1995-2000 mIRC Co. Ltd.
All Rights Reserved.

mIRC is shareware, which means that you can use it freely for 30 days to 
evaluate it. If during, or at the end of, the evaluation period you decide 
that you would like to continue using mIRC, please register your copy. Your 
single-user registration will license you to use your copy of mIRC, will 
support work on future versions, new features, and bug fixes, and will provide
you with technical support via email.

Please see the How To Register section in the mIRC help file or on the mIRC 
website at http://www.mirc.com to find out how to register.

mIRC may be freely distributed subject to, but not limited to, the following 
terms: mIRC may not be sold or resold, distributed as a part of any package, 
commercial or otherwise, used in a commercial environment, used or distributed 
in support of a commercial service, or used or distributed to support any kind 
of profit-generating activity, even if it is being distributed freely.

If you would like to distribute mIRC as part of a shareware distribution, 
magazine, internet book, CD ROM, etc. contact me for written permission.

All commercial use interests in mIRC eg. site licensing, should be directed 
to khaled@mirc.com.

mIRC may only be distributed in the original distribution install file as 
distributed by mIRC Co. Ltd. The mIRC distribution install file may not have 
files added to it or removed from it, and none of its contents may be modified, 
decompiled, or reverse engineered.

mIRC is provided AS IS without warranty of any kind, either express or implied, 
including but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability and 
fitness for a particular purpose. In no event shall mIRC Co. Ltd. be liable 
for any damages whatsoever including direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, 
loss of business profits or special damages, even if mIRC Co. Ltd. has been 
advised of the possibility of such damages.

mIRC is a registered trademark of mIRC Co. Ltd.
The mIRC Logo is a trademark of mIRC Co. Ltd.
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