Disk overload at goes up to 100% What disk is it?

[optimus prime]

I have recently made an old P3 laptop my torrent pc, it only has 256mb ram and a 1ghz cpu. The torrent files are loaded onto a 500gb sata drive that sits in a hdd dock connected to the laptop via USB1.0.

What happens is when I download a file, all my uploads virtually stop and a disk overload message with a percentage rate appears at the bottom of the uTorrent app screen. When the % rate is low, the uploads are fine, but when the rate rises the uploads all but stop.

I did not happen when I had it on the desktop pc, which the 500gb drive used was hooked up via the SATA, but that was a more powerful pc. So I'm assuming its the laptop, but not sure.

Thanks.

[schnurlos]

USB 1.0 connection speed is just 12 Mbit/s, that will be your problem.

Perhaps you can use an USB 2.0 extension card for your old laptop to solve your problem.

[Ultima]

Remember too, that specs define theoretical speeds only. When implemented, USB probably never actually reaches the speeds described in the specs. So even if USB 2.0 is supposedly 480mbit/s, devices using it most likely never reach such speeds either.

Anyhow, indeed, the bottleneck is the bus speed. You can't expect to get past disk overloads if you can transfer data significantly faster than the bus speed allows for.

[optimus prime]

Thanks guys, thought the USB1.0 connection might have been it but was not sure. I will go get a 2.0 card for the lappy and see what happens.