Bandwidth control

[Lucky_dutch]

I appretiate some of you may not be inclined to help me with this but I need help controlling my housemates torrenting. All day he destroys our bandwidth with downloading pirate tv/films, to the point that we struggle to do our university work. We have repeatedly asked him to only do it at night but he doesnt listen so we need to take matters into our own hands.

We dont have QoS on our netgear WGR614v9 router which would be my first thought. Is there any way to download it?

I have thought about changing his utorrent settings to use a set port and block that during the day. This would work because hes enough of a technophobe to not notice if it work for the fact that I think utorrent informs you if your access is blocked? Is there any way for me to get around this?

Im not trying to stop him altogether but theres 7 of us in the house and right now us 6 are paying for internet we can barely use.

Any help would be greatly appretiated.

Thanks!!!

[DreadWingKnight]

http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?id=15992 has steps you can use to configure his settings to not kill your connection.

[Switeck]

Do verify you're actually getting the linespeeds from the ISP you're paying for, because line problems may be making things worse.

[Lucky_dutch]

Thanks, ill see if applying that helps next time hes out. Still, we agreed no torrenting at all during the day and id quite like to limit it from say 12 at night to 10 in the morning or something.

As for our internet speeds, iv ran numerous tests while hes been away and we can get up to 8MB (still less than the 20 we should get but more than enough). Running the same test with him here and torrenting gives a result of about 1-2MB. Ping to google can fly up to anywhere between 1000 and 2000 while hes using it.

[DreadWingKnight]

Then set up the scheduler so that he can still line up his torrents through the day, leave the client running, and they will automatically pick up when the schedule permits.

[Lucky_dutch]

Well how can i block the actual downloading like that? I seem to only be able to block keywords or ports. Words will stop him searching for them in the day but he can (and will) line up 10-15 downloads at night which will continue to run during the day. Ports like i said, utorrent will inform him if the ports its using is blocked. Is there just an easy way to prevent this message? We could block it during the day, get our internet back and he would most likely never realise avoiding him throwing a fit.

[DreadWingKnight]

uTorrent's scheduler can be used to limit/stop transfers based on time of day.

[Lucky_dutch]

I tried changing the preferences on my own utorrent, unchecked 'randomize port each start' and then blocked the port it says on our router for TCP/UDP and all IP ranges. For some reason a download i started as a test worked as normal. The other checked boxes are:

Enable UPnP port mapping

Enable NAT-PMP port mapping

Add windows firewall exception

How come that port isnt blocking properly?? :-/

That scheduler might work. Put it on limited or off during the day and he might never notice. If he did though it would cause trouble so i'd rather just be able to temporarily slow/stop the torrent downloads while people are working.

[Switeck]

If he's Force starting torrents, scheduler gets ignored.

[Lucky_dutch]

Force starting?

[Switeck]

Right-clicking on torrents and choosing Force Start instead of regular Start.

[Firon]

Unplug his port on the router until he stops being a douche. Or go to his room and unplug his PC. If it's wireless, you can usually block particular MAC addresses from connecting, or change the wifi password to something else (and don't give it to him).