New to Torrents, please be gentle!! Download speed fluctuating

[BlackandLowGTO]

Hi all. I'm very new to the whole Torrent thing so am reading the guides and setup procedures etc and trying to take it all in.

I have something strange going on with my download speeds, the upload speed seems to stay fairly steady at around 30kB/s, but the downoad speed fluctuates by loads and doesn't stay steady at all.

This happens on the test download of openoffice too so it doesn't seem to be the file I'm downloading that is the problem.

I have also tested whether or not my ISP is throttling torrents and the test came back negative - I'm with Orange and it doesn't appear on the list of bad ISP's for torrents.

I have checked a few settings in advanced and they seem to tally with what people recommend on the FAQ's when having slow download speeds but nothing has made a difference yet.

The file I am trying to download fluctuates between 0KB/s and around 50KB/s at most, but fluctuates seemingly randomly about once or twice a second like it's oscillating.

The openoffice file downloads a lot faster at around 83kb/sec maximum , although that also fluctuates from about 83kb/sec down to 11kb/sec constantly, the figure changes every second or less!

What info do I need to post in order for soemone to be able to suggest some things to try? Do i need to paste a report here?

My settings under setup guide are:

Upload speed = 278.5Kbit/s

Upload Limit = 34.0KB/sec

Connections per torrent = 70

Max active torrents = 3

Upload slots = 4

Connections (global) = 200

Max active downloads = 2

These are in place after running the tests and saving the results.

I have UTorrent as an exception in my router and firewall settings.

Thanks for any help