Discussion
I (think I) understand the basic concept of torrents but one thing that still baffles me.
Take a file I'm currently downloading. Well seeded, plenty of peers, 750mb yet it's taken 2 days to download 602mb of it but (and here's what I don't understand) I've uploaded 1.9gig so far. Given that my download speed is many times that of my upload speed, why does that happen?
Not really a complaint but I'd just like to understand it and, perhaps, find a way of improving things.
Take a file I'm currently downloading. Well seeded, plenty of peers, 750mb yet it's taken 2 days to download 602mb of it but (and here's what I don't understand) I've uploaded 1.9gig so far. Given that my download speed is many times that of my upload speed, why does that happen?
Not really a complaint but I'd just like to understand it and, perhaps, find a way of improving things.
Slow d/l is probably because its having trouble finding sources for some of the chunks of the file, or the only places it can find them are very slow.
Large u/l is because of the nature of P2P file sharing. As you d/l each chunk of the file, it becomes available to the world at large, so many people may be pulling it from you even as you're pulling the remainder from elsewhere.
Its good etiquette to leave the connection running for a while once your d/l is complete so that more people have a chance to get at the file from your pc.
Large u/l is because of the nature of P2P file sharing. As you d/l each chunk of the file, it becomes available to the world at large, so many people may be pulling it from you even as you're pulling the remainder from elsewhere.
Its good etiquette to leave the connection running for a while once your d/l is complete so that more people have a chance to get at the file from your pc.
Edited by pdV6 on Thursday 3rd August 10:12
Slightly O/T...
I've been using BitComet to get the last couple of episodes of Top Gear but the downloads are really slow. Also bitcomet really seems to mess up my connection with much slower responses/timeouts in Firefox and MSN Messenger signing out regularly but I don't have this problem with emule.
Anyone got any idea why this would be?
I've been using BitComet to get the last couple of episodes of Top Gear but the downloads are really slow. Also bitcomet really seems to mess up my connection with much slower responses/timeouts in Firefox and MSN Messenger signing out regularly but I don't have this problem with emule.
Anyone got any idea why this would be?
Cheers aldi - that may be it, I'll have a check tonight. It just confused me how everything is stable if I use emule (with 30+ queued downloads) but not with bitcomet with only 3 downloads. I guess if I ensure the connection settings are similar to emule I should be ok!
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If you use Azureus, there is a great page which gives you exact instructions on how to maximise download. Azureus however, will penalise you for NOT sharing - that is if you throttle the upload to 12k/s and maximise you d/l, you will actually end up having a slower overall d/l speed because of your incessant leeching. I'm not sure if other clients do this.
Another reason you might not be getting a proper d/l speed is because you are being bombarded with useless information from machines that are designed precisely for this task - networks owned by copyright holders deliberately seek out bittorrent clients and send them crap.
you could also have a NAT problem.
www.azureuswiki.com/index.php/Good_settings
Another reason you might not be getting a proper d/l speed is because you are being bombarded with useless information from machines that are designed precisely for this task - networks owned by copyright holders deliberately seek out bittorrent clients and send them crap.
you could also have a NAT problem.
www.azureuswiki.com/index.php/Good_settings
Think of the file as sliced up into loads of bits.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
Plotloss said:
Think of the file as sliced up into loads of bits.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
Well done mate, you managed a whole reply without suggesting it might be because it's running on a Mac.
The Dude said:
Plotloss said:
Think of the file as sliced up into loads of bits.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
Well done mate, you managed a whole reply without suggesting it might be because it's running on a Mac.
Ah yes, forgot the 'only share with proper machines' setting.
That could also account for it...
Plotloss said:
The Dude said:
Plotloss said:
Think of the file as sliced up into loads of bits.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
More people have the bits earlier on in the file than the bits later on in the file.
Its obviously a very popular file so you've uploaded the bits you have to many many many people yet the bits you are after are relatively scarce.
That would account for the differences of upload v download.
Well done mate, you managed a whole reply without suggesting it might be because it's running on a Mac.
Ah yes, forgot the 'only share with proper machines' setting.
That could also account for it...
I have to grudgingly admit that I also sometimes run Bit Commet on the PC (at home, same connection as the Mac) and it always yields much faster results.
That's what's pissing me off the most.
Hmm. Windows is faster than the Mac. Odd.
Could it be something to do with UPnP? Windows is telling the router what ports to shunt to where thus your getting higher throughput on it? I suspect manually tinkering with the port settings on the router to point to the mac will help. Azureus is pretty easy to manage in this regard as it only uses one port for all traffic.
Could it be something to do with UPnP? Windows is telling the router what ports to shunt to where thus your getting higher throughput on it? I suspect manually tinkering with the port settings on the router to point to the mac will help. Azureus is pretty easy to manage in this regard as it only uses one port for all traffic.
thepassenger said:
Hmm. Windows is faster than the Mac. Odd.
Could it be something to do with UPnP? Windows is telling the router what ports to shunt to where thus your getting higher throughput on it? I suspect manually tinkering with the port settings on the router to point to the mac will help. Azureus is pretty easy to manage in this regard as it only uses one port for all traffic.
Could it be something to do with UPnP? Windows is telling the router what ports to shunt to where thus your getting higher throughput on it? I suspect manually tinkering with the port settings on the router to point to the mac will help. Azureus is pretty easy to manage in this regard as it only uses one port for all traffic.
Wierd isn't it?
The PC (Bit Comet) and Mac (Bit Torrent) both use the same port (from memory - the PC is not on at the minute so I can't check).
Actually, the major difference between the Mac and the PC is that the PC is connected via wires to the router where the Mac goes Airport Base Station->Router->Wall Socket.
But then I also have another Mini connected in the same way (directly to the router) and that too suffers from apalling download speeds (for torrents).
Wierd.
Tonsko said:
Forgot to mention PeerGuardian or Safepeer. They block companies trying to send you crap/damaged files.
Cheers Tonsko - I installed PeerGuardian updated to the latest bitcomet (0.70 from 0.68) and without changing any other settings the speed has seriously increased. It's amazing to see how may organisations are making contact with your PC!!!
egomeister said:
Cheers Tonsko - I installed PeerGuardian updated to the latest bitcomet (0.70 from 0.68) and without changing any other settings the speed has seriously increased. It's amazing to see how may organisations are making contact with your PC!!!
Glad to help.
You will notice some things like counter strike and some company's websites won't open while you've got peerguardian running (HP website being one I've noticed recently). If you notice a website not opening, check peerguardian isn't running Also, if you find your ISP is operating 'traffic shaping' (they inspect packets using stateful firewalls and block certain well known ports) then give some thought to encrypting your BitTorrent traffic. The latest version of Azureus offers this, and it stops them looking at what you're downloading. Winner!
Edited by Tonsko on Thursday 3rd August 19:53
Tonsko said:
egomeister said:
Cheers Tonsko - I installed PeerGuardian updated to the latest bitcomet (0.70 from 0.68) and without changing any other settings the speed has seriously increased. It's amazing to see how may organisations are making contact with your PC!!!
Glad to help.
You will notice some things like counter strike and some companies websites won't open while you've got peerguardian running (HP website being one I've noticed recently). If you notice a website not opening, check peerguardian isn't running Also, if you find your ISP is operating 'traffic shaping' (they inspect packets using stateful firewalls and block certain well known ports) then give some thought to encrypting your BitTorrent traffic. The latest version of Azureus offers this, and it stops them looking at what you're downloading. Winner!
Edited by Tonsko on Thursday 3rd August 19:49
Same here, cheers Tonsko.
My download speed hasn't changed a great deal but the upload has dropped off significantly and I was amazed at all the blocked IP addresses that flew by on the log screen.
The Dude said:
My download speed hasn't changed a great deal but the upload has dropped off significantly and I was amazed at all the blocked IP addresses that flew by on the log screen.
Cool!
It's also worth examining the logs of the blocked addresses, and if you see things that you want being blocked, and decide to run PeerGuardian all the time, then move the ones you want manually to the allow list.Gassing Station | Computers, Gadgets & Stuff | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff