BitTorrent Newbie question

[Arby]

My friend at work said it was easy to use and he emphasized easy. But he's very weak on teaching/ explaining. Most folks, I find, are. Anyway, On the strength of his recommendation, I downloaded/installed (I think) BitTorrent. I had taken a look at this before. I couldn't make heads or tales out of it. It just looks like geeks gone wild. Jargon is all I see. There's no real explanation for anything anywhere.

I just now downloaded/installed BT from a site called Degreez. At first, I thought I'd just download the zipped version, which I did. I'm not sure that it's even something that will work on my windows xp home, since none of the setup files (all of which I tried) worked. Which is fine by me, But why confuse the issue by having, in one spot, a zip file and an installer file for download? I downloaded/installed the installer file (version: S-5.4.2), except that when this installed, I got zero feedback. There was no progress bar, no request to select a folder other than the default folder, etc.. Nada. Anyway, I found the BT folder and clicked on this and that. Nada. The one file with the word execute in it fired up and asked me 'Which file do you want to Torrent?' or something. The folder was merely the last folder I had opened, namely my 'downloads' folder.

I guess this stuff if easy - if you already know it.

What file do I click on to simply fire up this prog, if there's one there? I can't even tell.

[greatcapp]

go here,

http://www.suprnova.org/



and suddenly, everything will become clear.
bt doesn't work in the same way as kazaa or winmx etc.
just clink on a link to download.

[moneoa]

O.k man its simple, go here to get the bittorrent client from the guy who designed it
http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/

I dont know what you downloaded but its not what sounds like bittorrent. There is no progress bar the client installs in about 3 seconds. NOW go to the suprnova url our friend there gave you
www.suprnova.org

(in case you missed it)
so it goes like this, you find what you want. Pay attention to the info beside the torrent link (torrent link = item you want to download) You will see two pieces of info # of seeders and # of downloads Generally the more seeders and more downloads there are for one file the faster it will download. Now its not an exact science, sometimes there is lots of both but it still starts off slow give it time and usually it picks back up. If there is only one seeder for a file it will probably be slow depending on how many downloaders have as much of the file as possible.

Seeders are ppl who have the complete file for download (hence they seed it on the network) downloaders are obviously
ppl who are trying to get the complete file but the way BT works is even if you dont have the whole file you share what part or parts you do have with ppl who dont have as much of that file as you. When the download completes you become a seeder. Now common ettiquette dictates that you keep the BT download window open for a little bit (it only seeds the file if the BT window remains open after download) How long is up to you and indeed you can shut it off after the download finishes but that also means depending on how many ppl are downloading it, it might be a bit harder for everyone else to grab. (power in numbers is the key with this prog)

As I said though its completely up to you. If you have an upload limit it can get eaten pretty fast by being a seeder as you are uploading some large files sometimes. Now not all sites will have seeder and user info (as in how many of each) attached to thier torrents so you might want to grab a prog called torrent spy. If you happen to find a page without that info torrent spy can look and see how many seeders and downloaders there are.

Last but not least obviously if there are no seeders then its a dead download (even if there are ppl downloading it, the seeder has the complete file so if there are no seeders and you try the download will grind to a halt, for example the one guy who has the most data for that file might only be at 45% so you and all the others will only be able to download up to 45%) so files with only one seed are 50\50 if nobody else completes the download before that one seed leaves then you might be fubared with only a half complete file on your hands (lucky though seeders do come back sometimes)

You can become a seeder again after you finish donwloading and after you close the window by clicking on the torrent link and saving it like you were getting it for the first time in the same place you have the file. (also you can resume downloads by this method)

thats about it. good luck and good hunting! (ps ignore all the other BT clients as most of them are betas made by other ppl for use by advanced users)

[lion7718]

Here is a link to the SuprNova Forums ...you can read through the posts to help you out also.

[Arby]

Thanks a mil folks. You're right. This isn't like Kazaa Lite. Which is why I was completely bewildered. I went to work today and gave the same woeful tale to the friend who suggested Bittorrent to me. He chuckled and shook his head. But he's not a great teacher. I told him that I checked out Suprnova as he suggested, but couldn't make heads or tails out of it. When he said 'Yes, That's the spot. You just click on whatever you see, if you want it, and it starts to download', I said, 'Oh! Like the verifieds (sigdats) on Fasttrack?' He said 'no'. But to me, it is similar. What I was looking for, and where the difference comes into play, is software like Kazaa Lite, which I would need first.

I'm wondering whether the prog I downloaded initially is what I am supposed to use to put my files out there for others to download, since, when I clicked on something with 'execute' in it, it opened the last folder I had gone to and asked me whether I wanted to torrent it? But you folks didn't seem to recognize the prog. Well, I've deleted it anyway. But how do you put your files out there? Is Bittorrent exclusive? Mind you, a lot of the stuff I have (about 920 files that are 98% audio) consists of mp3 files I've downloaded and about a dozen avi files that I've downloaded. There's little glitches in the avi files and the mp3 files are as is, since I don't know how to touch things up.

Finally, Count on me to share.

[REDO]

making torrents is different. You have to download makeTorrent, its kinda a pain in the arse.

[Arby]

Well, The adventure continues. I won't worry about making Torrents for now, obviously. It's great that some folks are, of course. But I'll certainly be keeping my Kazaa Lite, since I can search for and, with limited success, find stuff I want. I really saw nothing I wanted on Suprnova, although I clicked on Matrix 2 just to try things out. I sort of wouldn't mind seeing that again, although it isn't the great movie that The Matrix was.

I clicked on it last night and it's now just over half done, although the 'seed' I first noted on the info screen disappeared after a few hours. If I'm interpreting things correctly, there's also a guage that says the average completion for the group currently downloading/uploading the file is 27%. Now, Does that mean that there is only 27% of the file in total for any of us to download?

In regard to the tip that your download rate is proportional to you upload rate, I set my rate at 100%. I noticed no appreciable change in the download rate when I did that. But what do I know? Am I correct in assuming that if I want to fart around on the net, I will make it easier to do that by temporarily setting the download/upload rate lower? Am I making sensible adjustments here?

I left the setting for maximum uploads at 6, although I don't get this. It's 'one' file I'm downloading/uploading-?

Later good people...

[Theinfamousone]

There's probably a lot of people that have the whole file so I imagine that you'll get it. The main thing about suprnova is that you can get full movies in real time, you can get thousands of TV shows that you can't get on any other network. You're kind of late to the game, but I've gotten every episode of Lois & Clark through season 3 episode 6 now.

[Arby]

Okay. I trust you. I guess I just have to relax and read around and it will get clearer. I think my question about average completion was stupid. To give myself credit, I figured out that it was stupid on my own, shortly after posting it. An average isn't a peak, or topmost limit. What I was focussed on was the disappearance of the 'seed'. I keep reading and hearing that BitTorrent files come and go quickly, and you've got to get em while they're hot. I guess what you're saying is that a seed will most likely hook up with us. However, If the seed has the whole file already, Why would he download/upload on it again?

Am I driving you folks nuts?

[Krell]

Am I driving you folks nuts?

You'll have to get in line, take a number.


j/k

[btnh187]

(version: S-5.4.2) -- A modified version of the "experimental client", which is a modified version of the original. its called "shadow's experimental" and works great, but it doesn't have anything spectacular over the originals

[Arby]

Well now, I've finished downloading (I will NEVER mention a file name again) . Unfortunately, I haven't yet got it to play. I wonder why.

I assume that as long as I don't click on finished, I can then serve as a seed. I've got the process paused right now, which I am sure won't prevent me from resuming and seeding.

[mp3MaStA88]

personally, i like bitorrent ++. It has many more features that the original bitorrent doesn't have such as, an easy to use interface which shows you all of your downloads in one window, and download resuming etc,.

[moneoa]

yeh if you keep it open you are a seed, remember though
if there are no seeds the average completion rate you see will be the highest percentage you can download. Therefore it is always best policy to download a file with at least 2+.
Usually if a file is popular you wont have to worry about all your seeds vanishing.

Even if you do loose all the seeds there is the possibility someone can come back and reseed it but the only way you can tell is to check torrent info (as in suprnova) or use torrent spy. (you can reseed by clicking on the link and saving it to the same file like you did when you downloaded it the first time. BT will check it and put it up as a seed.

With the sharing, the file you are downloading once it is on your machine is broken up into bits and then shared as soon as you get it. This is why the more seeds and donwloaders you have attached to a torrent the faster it goes (like multiple sources in kazza)Finally if you want more torrent sites go to google and type in torrent links or sites ect,ect one good place to find other sites with torrents is
http://www.torrentlinks.com/index.ph...laycat&catid=1

updated frequently with status of site beside link (if a site is down for example)

Cheers!

[Arby]

Don't get old folks. The mind goes. Sorry Krell!

A quick question: I just clicked on a file at Suprnova, the second such I've clicked on. It loaded my Shareaza. Now, I only used both BT and Shareaza for the first time a couple of days ago. Initially, I downloaded/ installed the previous, hence 'safe', version of Shareaza. But when I mentioned that it was scanning and processing (hashing?) my files slowly, someone recommended that I download the latest (beta) version of Shareaza.

I read that the latest Shareaza somehow works with BT, as well as a few other popular networks like eDonkey and a Gnutella network. So, When my Shareaza loaded, I thought, 'Okay. Possibly my selected file is in my 'transfers' pane, downloading.' But it wasn't. And I see no sign that I even clicked on the file I clicked on at the Suprnova site. If I'm reading my settings correctly, I'm not out of downloading capacity. I'm only downloading two other files at present. I'm set to download a max of 6. The default setting was 8, which I changed. Granted, I don't understand most of the settings I'm looking at here.

Thanks.