Cyclic unresponsiveness

[ZackMack]

I honestly don't know what forum this post belongs in, so I made my best guess. If I've guessed poorly, please move it to the most appropriate forum. Thank you.

FYI: I am still using (m)uTorrent 2.2.1 for fear of later releases being even worse than the one I have.

When I upgraded from v1 to v2 I reported having a serious problem with the GUI. I can't seem to find that post, or any that seem to address the issue as I reported it or as I continue to experience it.

Every 30 seconds or so the GUI hangs. It becomes completely unresponsive. The 'dead zone' lasts about 6 seconds, sometimes longer. As near as I can tell, all functionality other than the GUI proceeds normally. Downloading continues, connection management continues, etc., but anything to do with user I/O halts. Inputs (mouse clicks, drags, etc.) don't even get buffered, instead they are completely lost. Screen updates cease during the hang. Processing that would result from user input is either delayed or doesn't even register and the input needs to be repeated. Further, no other program is affected at all, including the OS (WinXP MCE, Service Pack 3).

When adding a new torrent, I am at the mercy of the hang cycle. If the GUI is currently responsive the add happens cleanly. If it is hanging, I get a pop-up error box stating: "It seems like uTorrent is already running, but is not responding. Please close all uTorrent processes and try again."

I never run more than one instance/process of uTorrent at a time. I have read the FAQ regarding incompatible software and should be clear there. I used to use Symantec Endpoint Protection as my A/V and firewall, which is not cited as problem s/w. Partly because I was hoping to resolve the uTorrent issue I recently changed to Kaspersky's IS, which is also not on the list of problem s/w. There was no change in uTorrent behaviour.

With all the negative feedback about subsequent releases I am reluctant to upgrade. In fact, I have been strongly tempted to return to v1.8.x! However, if the current version of uTorrent has resolved this issue I'll happily suck it up and cope with all the negative changes to be rid of the enormous nuisance of an unresponsive program.

Has this problem been fixed? Or has this problem not even been adequately documented to have been on the list of things to address, virtually guaranteeing that it is still present in the most up-to-date version?

Any insight into this problem will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance,

ZackMack

[ZackMack]

I posted this a week ago and there hasn't been any response. If anyone has ANYTHING to add, I'd really appreciate hearing it. I find it disconcerting that a week would pass without any acknowledgement from anyone.

Is this being experienced by anyone else?

Has this been reported before?

Has anyone experienced this in the past but resolved the problem somehow?

Is this already solved?

Am I asking in the wrong forum?

Is this topic being tracked in another thread that I missed?

Do the 107 people that read my post (or at least started to) think I'm out to lunch or making this up?

Have I violated some rule preventing people from examining this issue?

Is there some other issue with my post or my description of the problem preventing it from being treated seriously?

Again, any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

P.S. I don't think that this website works well with Google Chrome. Is this a known issue? I've had issues and had to switch to Firefox to use the features of this site.

Thanks again.

ZackMack

[Firon]

This belongs more in troubleshooting than UI design.

Did you have problems when running Symantec, or did they merely persist whether using symantec or kaspersky?

How many torrents do you have? Does this happen whether or not all torrents are active? If you stop all the torrents, does the hang go away?

[ZackMack]

This belongs more in troubleshooting than UI design.

If you can't move it to "Troubleshooting", then I guess I will repost in "Troubleshooting", at which point I guess it makes sense to close the "UI Design" thread.

Did you have problems when running Symantec, or did they merely persist whether using symantec or kaspersky?

The problem seems to be completely independent of my AV/firewall s/w.

It started when I upgraded from uTorrent 1.8.5 to uTorrent 2.0 -- 20 months ago. At that time, my AV/firewall was Symantec. I was using Symantec without problems for all versions of uTorrent up to and including 1.8.5.

I switched about a month ago to Kaspersky's with absolutely no change in the unresponsiveness problem in uTorrent. The cycle didn't get longer or shorter -- everything remained exactly the same.

How many torrents do you have? Does this happen whether or not all torrents are active? If you stop all the torrents, does the hang go away?

When this problem began, I'm certain that I had far less than half the torrents I have now. Here is what I would have going at full operational status:

number of torrents in database: 6,735

number of active downloads: 77

- (This is MUCH higher than normal. Usually it is well under 20.)

number of likely dead downloads: 14

- (I've been hoping for a seed to appear seemingly forever. Probably time to give up.)

number of active (complete) seeds: 427

- (I'm a good citizen. I don't let torrents die if I can help it. Also, I try to maintain an excellent ratio. It's getting pretty hard to do with the proliferation of seedboxes and uber-bandwidth connections.)

number of active (incomplete) 'seeds': 79

- (Even if I don't download the entire contents of a torrent I still try to be a good egg.)

number of labels: 70 (+ no label)

- (I doubt this is relevant, but I'm mentioning it nonetheless. Incendentally, there is a separate problem with the labels frame. If I use the scroll-bar to navigate up or down, the 'scope' snaps back to where it was before instead of going where I want it to. It usually takes several attempts to navigate the labels list. This does NOT occur if I use the arrow icons or arrow keys to navigate incrementally npr does it happen when I use 'page up' or 'page down'.)

I grant that many of these are relatively large numbers. So, I checked to see what would happen if I reduced the numbers to trivial levels (as you recommended).

Step 1: 4 downloads. Just 4 normal downloads with a single private tracker (myanonymouse) Cyclic unresponsiveness. Overall, the uTorrent GUI seems marginally faster, but that's not unexpected with a trivial workload.

Step 2: This was accidental. 1 of the downloads completed, so I had 3 downloads and 1 seed. (myanonymouse) Cyclic unresponsiveness.

Step 3: 1 download on a multi-public tracker torrent (just in case the trackers were somehow related to the problem). Cyclic unresponsiveness.

Step 4: 1 'dead' download, a multi-public tracker torrent. By dead I mean there are no seeds and only 1 leecher, which I assume is me. (It is still registered with the tracker.) In any case, there are no Internet connections made....No hanging!

Steps 1-4 seem to imply that as long as I'm actually trying to download something, I'm doomed.

Step 5: Just 1 active seed to a single private tracker. (cheggit) Cyclic unresponsiveness. There does appear to be longer stretches of responsiveness between hangs. (Is that surprising with a trivial workload?)

Step 6: Just 1 active seed to a different single private tracker. (demonoid) Cyclic unresponsiveness. There does appear to be longer stretches of responsiveness between hangs. (Is that surprising with a trivial workload?)

Step 7: 2 seeds with a multiple-public-tracker torrent. Technically, the torrents weren't active as they didn't connect to any leechers. Cyclic unresponsiveness.

Step 8: Just 1 seed -- no Internet connecions attempted. (myanonymouse). No hanging!

Steps 5,6 & 8 seem to imply that as long as I'm actually seeding something, I'm doomed. Step 7 seems to contradict that.

Steps 1-8 may indicate that the problem lies in uTorrent's management of Internet connections.

Step 9: Totally accidental result. I had 0 torrents running. I was in the process of seeking a (myanonymouse) seeding torrent with no leechers. uTorrent hung for the typical 6-10 seconds. Sadly, this more or less invalidates all previous results.

Step 10: An attempt at reproducing the result from step 9. Confirmed. Hanging occurs with 0 torrents running. There wasn't even a change in any torrent statuses (running-not running) within 5 minutes of performing this test. I can only assume that the previous results that were hang-free weren't allowed enough time for the hang to occur.

Sigh. I wish I had better information as it seems to me that this provides no insight whatsoever into the cause of the problem.

FWIW, my modem/router is a 2wire 2701HG-G Gateway (I think). This has been constant throughout the history of my PC and was used for years prior to the first appearance of the problem.

Also FWIW, BitTorrent 7.2.1 runs without hanging.

Again, thank you for your efforts.

ZackMack

[ZackMack]

I've ported this to Troubleshooting, as recommended by Firon.

http://forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?pid=619910#p619910

Please, feel free to close this UI Design thread.

Thank you.

ZackMack