I have been using Telegram for years and never ever had any of the described problems with it.
Although there are rumours or facts or whatever that it is developed and run by Russians and that it is overloaded by weirdos and their stupid channels what I - from my personal experience - can say is:
It just frickin' works!
And it is fantastic that you don't have to install a complicated piece of software that keeps interfering with your life (eg. by wanting to reinstall backups or needing old passwords and stuff) but that is designed to DISPLAY what's on the servers. It is designed to be used to interact with (the mobile phone app or the desktop app), you just save locally what you decide to save locally but you can just NOT save stuff locally.
So, great.
And the way the developers implemented how you connect several devices is just fantastic, too:
Run the app, connect by scanning a QR code - off you go!
So, @WetGeek:
If you want to use Telegram on a new machine (or phone, as the case may be) you install/run the app and then, when you start it for the first time, you are asked to scan the QR code from your first device (usually one's mobile phone) and connect.
That normally takes a few minutes.
If it takes longer or if it doesn't work start from scratch. It ain't Telegram's fault. (shrugs his shoulders...)