Download Still Slow With Azureus Green Smileys

[Bhoy]

After days spent pulling my hair out with port forwarding/firewall config etc, I finally managed to get my head round it all and can get "OK!" on Port Testing with my BT Client Azureus (was always getting "NAT error" before). When I try to download a torrent (tried quite a few) my smiley almost always goes green within 30 secs (sometimes blue for a bit, then green). The problem is that my download and upload speeds are typically <10kbps!! I've been trawling various forums looking for advice on how to improve speeds but the general opinion seems to be that if I'm getting green smileys all is well and I should be getting at least 25kbps (all the way up to ?00's of kbps!). Any ideas on how to increae my download speed?

P.S. I have a 2meg line ,so I don't think that's the problem.

P.P.S. It's probably quite apparent from my ramblings above, but I'm fairly new to all this BitTorrent stuff (fairly new to having my own PC and internet connection in fact!) so please keep it simple.

[Krell]

Are there many seeders for the torrents?

What are your upload speeds?

What 2mg line, where?


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[Bhoy]

Some torrents I've tried have 30+ seeds & >100 peers.
Uploads the same as downloads @3-10k. I've tried limiting upload speed but no effect on download.
When I run a bandwidth speed test on my internet line connection (tool on ISP website), it says 1867kbps (sorry, not quite 2Mbps but my point was that I've got a decent broadband connection).
Told you I was new to this!

[shawners]

Your speeds should be around 50kbs with 30 seeds and 100 peers.. But remember, your upload shouldnt be limited, but set to 80percent of your upload speed. How fast can you upload, I can upload 50kbs, but set it to no more then 35. And speeds increase.

[Bhoy]

Problem Solved???

My ISP has just admitted in an e-mail response that they restrict P2P speeds "during peak times" !!
This is rubbish because the speeds are slow ALL the damn time! I now hate them with a vengeance as this wasn't made clear when I signed up just a few weeks ago. I'm now tied in for a year (or have to pay big fees to get out) and sitting with a top end PC and 2Mbps connection but can't get more than @8kbps on down/upload on P2P :-(

AVOID PLUSNET AT ALL COSTS IF YOU WANT TO USE P2P!!!!!

[Krell]

Well you saw where I was headed with this, and it may not be the end of your road.

One possibility, not a strong one, but one to try, is to see if using a P2P app that uses RANDOM ports will do. Also, port 80 may still be an option.

My guess is that there is bandwidth shaping software like that from Cisco, and you prob can not get around it.

Also, I doubt theres nothing that you can do about your contract.


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[Bhoy]

Thanks for the port 80 tip Krell. I'll give it a go tonight. Hope Plusnet's monitor isn't sophisticated enough to detect this. Fingers crossed. By the way, are there any additional security issues using port 80 instead of another port? Am I more likely to catch a bug/get hacked etc?

[Bhoy]

No joy with port 80 (except everything on internet now goes slow!). Looks like my only option is to upgrade my account.

[Darkrose]

Hi, I also switched to plusnet a few weeks ago and did not know that they had this p2p downloading. I mean the whole point for me to gain the speeds was for downloading! have you contacted them? I am seriously p********d off with them now.

Does anyone know a way around this problem. I am tied to plusnet and have to pay big fees to switch. :icon_scra

[Carrie]

OK, this is probably going to get me nailed, but I don't care. The other day I had this huge slow down on Azureus. I couldn't figure out why, I checked the speeds etc (in my active window), both were set to unlimited.

Later that day I just happened to right click on my Icon in my task bar, and it said it my max up was set at 75kbs. I changed it there to unlimited, the speeds took off and I got an 80mb file in about 7 minutes.

I have 3MB DL speed.

[zpman]

Is your bandwidth down completely during these hours or does it seem only to be so for P2P apps. You do know that your download speeds depend on other things like the uploaders bandwidth right? Also, during peak hours, you will always notice increased latency. One more thing, your bandwidth is not the same as your actual throughput. Bandwidth is what your line is capable of. Throughput measures how many packets you are able to send/recieve at a certain time. In other words throughput is the actual measure of data transmission from point a to point b. These are things to consider. Also with BT, you download/upload packets in random chunks, rather than sequentially. You will usually not get the same speeds in BT as you will with downloads from your browser, for instance. If only a few people have the chunk you need, you have to wait, either until more have it, or it becomes available to you. This is why sometimes your upload speed in BT can surpass your download speed. When a 1000 people are waiting to download packets of the same sort, there can also be increased latency. Hope this clears it up a bit.

If your ISP is really blocking you from the download speeds that are advertised, I would ask them particulary which protocols this 'rule' specifically falls under. Perhaps you might be better off using newsgroups to download large files rather than BT.

[Bhoy]

Quick update :-

I upgraded my account with PlusNet to remove the P2P cap and now get MUCH faster speeds. Depending on the number of seeds/leeches etc (and their upload speed!) I typically get 25-40kbps. Quite often much faster though and have even seen the fabled three figures on a few torrents. Max download while I've actually been watching is @140kbps! Who knows how fast it gets through the wee small hours when I'm tucked up in bed and traffic is light.
Although PlusNet said they only capped my old account during 'peak times', I reckon the cap was always on.
Unfortunately Darkrose the moral of this story would seem to be; upgrade account for fast BT with PlusNet.