"Connecting to peers" forever

[wayniac]

ISP is Centurylink

Using Private Internet Access VPN

Using Bitdefender anti-virus and firewall

I am trying to create a torrent and send it to family members to download family photos and home movies.  Once I create the torrent, it seeds fine, but when I send the torrent to family, it won't download.  It hangs up on connecting to peers 0%

 

I have gone to preferences, advanced, and set bt.enable_ tracker to "true"

I have checked for open ports and got an open response

I have tried it with both dynamic and static ip

I have opened a port in my router using static ip

I have checked "Start seeding"

I have tried it with "Private torrent" checked and unchecked

I have tried it with Enable UPnP port mapping and Enable NAT-PMP port mapping checked and unchecked

I have tried it with the VPN connected and disconnected

I have put in "http://123.123.123.123:99999/announce" (with actual IP address and port number)

I have put in "http://localhost:99999/announce"

 

The procedure I have followed is 1.  File > Create new torrent  2.Add file  3.  Enter the trackers in "torrent properties" as indicated above  4. Got to Options>Preferences>Bittorrent and put my external IP in the "Hostname to report to trackers" spot 5.  Save Torrent to desktop  5.  Email torrent to family members.

 

Family members say files won't download, get stuck on "Connecting to Peers" at 0%

 

It is driving me crazy, so I'm hoping someone can help.

 

 

 

[DreadWingKnight]

Private torrent unchecked.

DHT Enabled on ALL clients.

 

Then try.

[wayniac]

I unchecked the private torrent, and enabled DHT on my second home computer.  When I tested things on my second computer (on the same home wireless network), the file downloads just fine.  Then, in order to test things further, I set up a mobile hotspot on my phone, connected the second computer to the internet usingthe mobile hotspot, and tried to download, and it hung up on connecting to peers 0% and the message in the tracker field said something like "could not connect because the target machine actively refused it"   I know that this stuff is pretty basic for an experienced user, but I am just a beginner.  Please be patient with me. 

[RJCode]

Ok guys, I had the same problem, here is what I did: https://developers.google.com/speed/public-dns/docs/using 

 

The instructions are obviously in English. If by any circumstance u speak spanish please google: Usar DNS Publica de Google.

 

Workin 100%.

 

Please let me know your results.

[wayniac]

I can't seem to follow the link.  I get a 404 error

[RJCode]

Yup, it is the same direction that shows the search engine but one opens and the other one no. Try going starting from here instead: https://www.google.co.ve/search?q=using+public+dns+google&rlz=1C1CHWA_enVE577VE577&oq=using+public+dns+google&aqs=chrome..69i57l2j69i60l2.3056j0j7&sourceid=chrome&espv=210&es_sm=122&ie=UTF-8

[wayniac]

I wasn't able to get any useful information from the above link.  It seems to refer to using Google's DNS servers, but I don't know how that could be relevant to my issue.

 

Is there any good, simple, basic, step-by-step guide for how to send a file to directly to another individual using utorrent?  I used the settings in the opening post, and tried to make the changes suggested by DreadWingKnight in his reply, but continue to have problems.  There are so many variables, I am just not sure what all should be changed.  I may just give up, although I hate to leave a problem like this unsolved.  Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated, but I need things to be explained at a pre-school level, or so it seems.

[RJCode]

Well, I changed my DNS and I'm able now to download