Problems with the swarm

[cookie281]

Hi, I am having trouble getting download speeds faster than 20kb/s, I tried downloading slackwire linux as one of the forums suggested and it downloaded at 380kb/s. The forum said the following:

Try testing a torrent from OpenOffice.org, Slackware Linux, or Ubuntu Linux? (If any of them run quickly, then the problems you're experiencing likely lie only with the swarm).

So I am guessing I have a problem with the swarm, the question is how do i fix it? any help would be appreciated.

[jewelisheaven]

Well it depends... Have you already setup your connection using the speed guide? Have you already tried setting your Ctrl-P -> BitTorrent settings to forced encryption and disallow legacy connections? Have you already tried the How-To (link below) post #2? Additionally have you tried only running 1 torrent at once and with half the concurrent connections per-torrent and global?

It is also possible if this is transient... meaning it shows up during certain parts of the day / week that a test-run in 1.8 will notice a difference. 1.8 includes workarounds for shaping profiles enforced on some ISPs... note that it does not work on ALL ISPs.

[Switeck]

Practically ever New Zealand ISP has absolutely horrible ISPs both in terms of how badly they throttle BitTorrent traffic and absolutely tiny monthly bandwidth quotas.

OpenOffice and Slackware Linux may get around that because they include web seeds in their torrent.

[2good2b]

Kia ora from my experience, the latency between you (in NZ) and the connecting peers of a swarm (rest of the world) is also really bad and of course adds to the slowness of bittorrent traffic.

You can work around that a bit by being very cautious in your connection settings:

lower the number of connections per torrent and max global connections; disable DHT and Resolve-IPs; set your max upload far lower than the results of a speed test.

But at the end of the day: waiting for a slow torrent gives you more time to spend surfing or to hang out with friends.

[sweatshopking]

I am having the same problem. all my settings are correct as far as i know, im in western canada, not the middle of nowhere, my openoffice comes in at 480kbps, i have a 10Mbps connection from shaw cable. my up speeds are pretty consistantly in the 50+ range, but my downloadas are usually around +-1 - 15 kbps. connections are set for my speeds, tried dozens of files, but only one that works is the open office one... so if you guys had any idea, please let me know. oh ihave encryption enabled, but it makes no difference. legacy on or off, it doenst help at all.

thanks

Josh

[Switeck]

I wasn't aware that "western canada" was a part of New Zealand.

And by the date of the original posters, (back in early March) I'll wager not from the exact same cause either.

As far as uTorrent's Speed Guide (CTRL+G) is concerned, you do NOT have a 10 megabit/second connection!

As a result, I'd expect your settings to cripple the download speeds of any torrent that is not heavily over-seeded by extremely fast seeds (IE: the OpenOffice torrents).

[DreadWingKnight]

Kia ora smile from my experience, the latency between you (in NZ) and the connecting peers of a swarm (rest of the world) is also really bad and of course adds to the slowness of bittorrent traffic.

VERY inaccurate. Latency has absolutely NOTHING to do with throughput.

Never underestimate the bandwidth of a box van filled with 1tb hard drives.

[sweatshopking]

I didnt say i was in new zealand only that my problem was sounding very much the same as the other post. and good job on the geography. and yes, i have no idea what the problem is. im using 1.8.1 beta. and no of course i know that the guide is different, i have it set to 640kbps, which is of course my upload speed. my problem is that REGARDLESS OF WHAT I CHOOSE THERE, i rarely get about 5 kbps down. like is said my uploads seem to be fine. if you perhaps have any ideas, please let me know.

Josh

[Firon]

1.8.1 is release candidate now, not beta. You could try xx/512k instead, and even if you have the speed guide set correctly, you still need to forward your port AND make sure your firewall isn't blocking µTorrent.

[sweatshopking]

i have done both of those (firewall and ports are good) and i have tried 3 different builds, and i actually dont have the beta, just 1.8.1 build 12549. i really dont know what the problem is. i have tried everything anyone has suggested in the guides. i have shaw as my isp, and suppose it might be shaping, but the maintain that they dont, lots of forum post to say otherwise though. tried 512k no difference.

seems that my big problem lies in connections.... i cant connect to very many hosts or peers... only 5 or six at best, anyway to force connections?

[Firon]

Shaw is lying, they do throttle BT, and quite heavily at that.

[Switeck]

DISABLE: UPnP, NAT-PMP LPD, DHT (both kinds!), and Resolve IPs (right-click in PEERS window on an active torrent).

That should eliminate UDP packets from uTorrent. You only need to port forward TCP this way. Some (Belkin? D-Link?) routers do not handle UDP and TCP forwarded to the same port reliably.

Keep Peer Exchange enabled...it should be encrypted due to above settings.

Lower net.max_halfopen to only 4. (Constantly making 4 new connections outgoing at once should be enough if uTorrent is not firewalled!)

Choose FORCED encryption outgoing, and disable legacy (unencrypted) connections incoming.

2nd link in my signature gives suggested settings for uTorrent based on your max sustainable UPLOAD speed.

You'll probably need the 512 kilobits/second upload settings.

[sweatshopking]

disabled and changed those settings, but sadly no change. as for the net.max halfopen im running vista x64, so i read not to change that. but if you still think i should let me know. i dont know what else to do really, but change my isp. i simply cannot connect to anyone else, it fails to connect to the hosts. and as soon as i turn on UTorrent, my browsing gets bad, which my brother says is because of throttling. i dont know, maybe change isp's? does anyone know how Telus is?

I should also say that i may connect to between 5-15 hosts, but i am only uploading or downloading off of 1 or 2 of them. dont know if that makes a difference. tried vuze too, same problem.

[Switeck]

Are you getting error 4226 in Event Viewer?

If you happen to be using a half open connection limit greater than 8, that alone can partially explain your problems and cause error 4226's.

Your router may be overloading too, by the sound of it, if your uTorrent-ing affects your web surfing.

[sweatshopking]

well well well, it seems i have like 1000 4226 errors!! how do i fix it? i am using vista x64, i dled the patcher, but it fails to find said file. anyhelp would be appreciated.

[Switeck]

Almost seems like Windows Vista on your computer has a max half open connections allowed at once well below the normal 10...or you have something ELSE using them up!

If net.max_halfopen was above 8 to begin with, try just lowering it to 8. Otherwise...Lower uTorrent's advanced setting net.max_halfopen to only 4. (Constantly making 4 new connections outgoing at once should be enough if uTorrent is not firewalled!)

You may even need to lower it further to 2 before the problems completely stop.

[sweatshopking]

but how do i go about lowering it? i tried a few different patch's, x64 is quite a bit trickier than xp. i can get into windows with a patched dll, but i think the patch i installed makes it unlimited, and you are saying that i want to cut the limit in half? i havent noticed a change since i installed that other dll. i dont know how to edit the file, being as it is a .sys . if you have any idea please let me know. and man thanks for the quick responses. you are really quite helpful. i dont know what else could be using them. i have hamachi, skype, daemon tools running that is about it. not much else. no spyware, just rescanned today. but i dont know if that will make too much of a difference anyway because i get the same torrent speeds in ubuntu...

[thelittlefire]

Haven't tried Ctrl-P > Advanced > net.max_halfopen ?

[Switeck]

I'm NOT wanting you to change Window's limit.

I'm wanting you to change the limit in uTorrent for how many uTorrent tries to use at once.

"uTorrent's advanced setting net.max_halfopen"

[sweatshopking]

right... thanks... i spent like 1 hour today screwing with vista. lol (kinda). damn it i had to repair vista like 4 times. anyway ill see how it goes.

thanks boys.

joshua

no still no change. well i guess it is going to have to be the old isp switch.... thanks guys for tryin. i appreciate that.

but howcome even encryption doesnt work? how do i check to see if it is? if shaw is throttling, isnt that what encryption is for?

i downloaded DU Meter, and when i start utorrent it says my uploads go up too 250kbps. when i close it, it falls to 5. it reads 220, utorrent says 2.0kbps. same with my downloads. not really sure why im getting such huge number differences. and i find it strange that i have the same problem in ubuntu with my torrents, so i dont think it is a windows setting. if i remove my router, and connect to the modem i cant connect to any peers at all. for some reason, utorrent seems to be multiplying my traffic by 10x. so im getting a good speed down, but it is only 1/10 what i seem to be downloading, that im actually receiving. if that makes any sense at all...

vuze gives the same results....

[Switeck]

bits versus BYTES.

Encryption alone is not always effective. MANY ISPs throttle based on traffic patterns.

Lots of traffic inbound to 1 port...is hard to hide.