Proposed changes in Speed Guide "recommended" settings

Although Win 9x/ME boxes are becoming fewer and fewer by the day (...at least in the western world), shouldn't µTorrent be able to detect them and limit max connections below 100 -- at least by default?

Also, Win XP SP2's annoying 10 half-open default limit might also be detectable.

Even if not in either case, for lower-speed connections having over 100 connections at once only help marginally at best and often causes problems.

uT can surely check for this OS/reg-settings and advice accordingly.

Nevertheless you should manually increase your max (on win 98) to the 500...

Edit: I mean in your Windows registery, not uT...

The less features and options the better in my opinion

or else you get even more people posting wtf these settings do.

µTorrent is all about being small simple and the best out there.

Azures has a billion things to config and is about 10MB I think

for those who wanna spend all day playing with config options I recommend that client

A 9x/ME user should know (since he's using an extremely outdated system) to do it himself.

Both you assumption and your conclusion logic eludes me (I like this word... ) . It's probably due to your excessive use of XP automation... and patching it - TCP and all

Win98 users knew nothing then and know nothing now... actually no one is an expert on Bill's registry especially when it is an undocumented feature... But - I do agree that there is a limit to what any sane developer will do to accommodate for an old-dying OS. This is one of those cases unless it is done for ALL OSes, which is not at all a bad idea if I may say so myself ...

I can see alot of posts here that concern the half-open limits of Win XP SP2 being exceeded (or tried to anyway...) by µTorrent. That problem is great enough to merit detection of Win XP SP2 right there to make the default settings "safe" for it. Or just assume they have it and make ALL default settings "safe" for it.

But really there's not so much a special NEED for Win 9x/ME detection as many of the lower upload speed settings shouldn't default to more than 100 connections anyway. ...At least up to xx/384kbits IMO.

ALOT of people NEVER run the speed guide and just use the starting default settings, which allows 200 connections max, 50 per torrent, 8 max torrents (5 downloading), 4 upload slots, and NO upload speed limit. That is excessive in more ways than one and a FAR bigger problem than Win 9x/ME boxes overloading due to too many connections at once from using "recommended" Speed Guide settings.

Well to be honest, that's their problem if they don't bother running the Speed Guide that clearly says it configures settings properly. I mean, it's only 2 big fat steps, how hard is it to run it? If they skip the dialog, then they're obviously too 1337 to have to read it, and should be able to configure everything properly. Of course, there are exceptions, like if someone closed it accidentally, but that's generally not the case anyway.

It becomes OUR problem when 100's if not 1000's of people just run the program and expect it to auto-magically work perfectly with their computer+connection.

If they give it any thought at all, they simply think that because they have a broadband connection they can run without speed limits. ...This may be true for the 10mbps down and up (and faster!) connections, but those are few and far inbetween currently.

they start asking for automatic upload caps etc

Maybe an option to include system specs can be added (at least for high speed connections)?

I have 100Mbit full duplex network (one of the benefits of student housing ), and the proposed global connections is 1000!!. This is ridiculous in my opinion. A lot of resources are being used if i open more than about 300 connections. Also I noticed through time that setting global max to 200 or 300 is faster anyway. This way utorrent drops the slow seeds after a while and keeps the fast ones. It's much more efficient on a slower system to download from 10 peers with an average of 200KB/peer than from 100 peers with 20KB/peer.

(My hard disk goes nuts, if it has to write 100 pieces of data simultaniously like that)

Again, these problems only occur with very high speeds of course...

Just because most people can spend money every other year for a computer, doesn't mean we all do so.

Yes, I run WinMe, and have for years, I skipped all the hassle with 98, (both parts,) when I was forced into Me from '95...

Also, did anyone even think about the possibility that these older computers are being fixed and given to the poor kids and others that need them for school work-- of course not! (And who says that they are only used for schoolwork?) A small guide for older computer OS's would help so much, and we people who refuse or unable to to upgrade until required by no parts availible would be a benefit for more that just a few. (Yes, I have been brow-beaten about upgrading by people, including a son who works for an OS developer!) I still refuse, and I need that guide made for 'Me.

We also need guides for people who do not know how to connect two compters to a DSL and get both of them using uTorrent properly, instead of just one computer doing good and the other slower than molasses.

@Switeck: I've no clue why I even responded anymore... reading your first post, I don't understand why I didn't see that it was a reasonable request xD At any rate, I don't like the thought of having specific rules for specific OSes, even though it's beneficial, but I won't fight this request like it seems I was earlier (I do believe I was responding directly to your last paragraph before my post, but even then, it makes no sense... xD).

Probably best to have conservative settings and let people with tweak-itis see if they can get another +5% out of it. (...which can be fatal to a computer if you overclock it too much.)

For the default setting when NO value is entered, some sort of "you seem to be firewalled and/or not configured -- please run speed test for better results" if they don't enter speed limits.

Maybe just a quick line like:

Due to OS limitations, The following OS's are recommended to have as limits:

Win Me with a Global Connection rate of less than 100.

and on about other settings, then to the next OS.

It could even be a text file that could be added into the installation .exe file that says READ ME.

Sounds good to me.

"Due to Belkin and D-Link router limitations, we highly recommend you do not use UPnP, DHT, Resolve IPs, uTP, Teredo/IPv6, or more than 100 connections at once."

"If you're still using Windows 95/98/ME...apply all the limitations that Belkin/D-Link routers have plus don't even try to use long filenames OR different character sets in torrent files! And you can't download single files larger than ~2 GB either!"

"Zone Alarm firewall was detected. This program is known to cripple µTorrent's download and upload speeds...YMMV." :cool:

"You seem to be on Rogers ISP...I'm sorry."

...and more warning messages that users will never read.

Only the ones that DO know how to read and follow instuctions, but then again, sometimes instructions can be put in a bad form or the readers mind sees what is not there, or just don't understand the instructions. I know I had a bad time learning on these new fangled 'boxes' as you call them, and I still read evrything I can get my eyes onto about the programs I want in it or use.

I even still read everything about the legal files and all that when they have them for seeing, as I refuse to just click 'accept' without doing do. You do learn that way if the program makers are going to use information for what reason, and whether or not the program has an added program that is installed also. I ran into one lately that had a small program in it that was going to report to the company what I did with the other program. I hit 'cancel' quickly.

I admit there are people who don't read very much or anything at all about something they want installed on thier computers. But then again, if you have that type of file or notice it would protect the company from any form of reverberations. So the people who oversee forums like this refer people to the 'OS Guide', and hope for the best. We are all told to check with the 'Speed Guide' on a lot of our questions arn't we?

I ran into one lately that had a small program in it that was going to report to the company what I did with the other program. I hit 'cancel' quickly.

Even that can be too late. A few companies have refused to take no for an answer (or have bugs in their installer) that actually install spyware even if you click "cancel". Or they leave junk behind in the system registry or DLLs. A lot of what passes for commercial software nowdays isn't fit to be called professional much anymore.

Yet even the µTorrent warning saying if you paid for the progam you've been scammed has caused the occassional weird response from posters who DID pay some 3rd party to get µTorrent. Almost like that is somehow the makers of µTorrent's fault they got scammed.

Reminds me of the old saying: "No good deed goes unpunished."

Back on topic, the messages have to be to the point and yet somehow not blame the user for "illegal entry" or "bad command or filename" (...authorities have been notified and are on their way.) The problem with speed guide is it gives a series of settings with almost no link anywhere on why it chooses the settings it does. Even people who should know better might assume any settings it chooses are "good" just because why bother putting in bad settings?

True, as far as programs gotten from the internet or from and retail disk-- (Certain OS are very bad for this). But then again I upgraded (this morning when I woke up it was done and the culptit on his 6 hour trip back to work), without my consent to the OS of XP, the one most of these torrent things work best on, now if I could just find on OS that is not XP I would reformat to the other that I do know better and works without freezing. (My eldest took them all? maybe...)

And I agree that to the point messages or instructions are required. But then again, there are people out there that think they know it all already. So maybe also a READ THIS FIRST file is im order.

meeeerrrrrrrrrcccciiiiiiii

Switeck "Bad News" Moderator, you said:

"Due to Belkin and D-Link router limitations, we highly recommend you do not use UPnP, DHT, or more than 100 connections at once."

What happens on these routers when you use UPnP, DHT or more than 100 connections? I have a gigabyte GN-BR01G, which crashes every 2 - 3 hours when running torrent programs (I have tried a fair few). When it crashes, I still have LAN access, but it loses the WAN IP, can't renegotiate the WAN IP, and admin http server seems to crash too, so I can't issue a manual reneg command. The same happens for my brother's netgear (not sure of which model). Can they be the same issue?

Remotely related -- both routers probably either run out of free ram (they often only have 4-16 MB TOTAL ram) or soft/hard crash due to a stack space bug.

A "soft" crash is where the router still partially functions, which is what you're describing.

They run out of ram because DHT/UPnP/100+ connections at once requires more ram than web surfing.

They are often very flawed in that they keep in ram records of PREVIOUS ip connections that may have disconnected hours or even up to a day ago. So the "trigger event" is more the straw that breaks the camel's back rather than anything in particular.

I've heard that many routers have default timeouts of 3600 seconds (1 hour) for dead connections. Some Belkin routers have a default timeout of ONE DAY and low ram to begin with. BitTorrent's many connection nature...floods them to death.

This is why it is HIGHLY recommended to try the 1st and 2nd links in my signature by more people than just me...consumer networking hardware and software is often just plain bad.

This Maximum Simultaneous Connections test shows just HOW bad most consumer Routers are:

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/component/option,com_chart/Itemid,189/chart,124/

Wow, switeck, I checked out that link in the last post, and I found out that my router's maximum simultaneous connections is WAY less than what the conservative speed guide said I should have for my ISP speed. So I dropped the maximum number of connections in uTorrent and my speed jumped WAY up. You should definitely put that link in your sig as well, the conservative speed guide doesn't really give you the correct information necessarily.

I added that link to my speed chart. I did say previously that lots of stuff cannot handle 100+ connections at once...AND refer to the 1st link in my signature for how to deal with that.

Also, 3rd party router firmware like Tomato or DD-WRT can easily handle more connections...especially if you disable extra features you're not using.

my network connections speed is 54.0 mbps

now my torrent downloading speed maximum 45 kbps, seeds 5(7), peers 16(46)

how can i increase the downloading speed, please help me?

You have confused your LAN speeds for internet speeds!

Find out your internet connection's real speeds and set utorrent settings based on max sustainable upload speed...2nd link in my signature.