continued computer woes

Dave.

Dave.

Member +
Alright Hutch, what is your ISP?

You might find they operate a traffic shaping policy, or Fair Use Policy (FUP). Failing that, get BitComet, (the best bittorrent client out there, by a fair bit). Also get Avast! antivirus, it'll work wonders, and its free for a home license :)

Check them on here -> http://www.azureuswiki.com/index.php/Bad_ISPs

Dave

*edit* I should also say, that Using bitcomet's encryption, and by choosing a random listen port, you can improve speeds tenfold if your ISP is to blame.
 
HutchGlanzaV

HutchGlanzaV

Member +
cheers Dave, i'm using utorrent as i've used it before. However i can't remember for the life of me how to set it up properly. I checked to see what port utorrent was using, went into my router services and set it up in there, then into my firewall rules to sort that out. However utorrent was still only d/l'ing 2kb/s at best! Thats with plenty of seeds and not many peers. Basically I'm having the same problem my desktop was having but on my laptop instead! i fecking hate computers. Any suggestions?
 
Dave.

Dave.

Member +
No bother mate, I'd try getting BitComet, its a piece of piss to use mate, no messing about (unless you have a router? Then you'll normally have a fair bit, although you should still get alright speeds!)

I'd try with BitComet (ultimate leeching client, so if its because you've been leeching a lot, you should still get ok speeds), see how it goes, and take it from there?

Dave
 
HutchGlanzaV

HutchGlanzaV

Member +
Had my firewall set as tcp not tcp/udp. Downloaded bitcomet and I'm getting 20+kb/s. Alot better but still not as fast as it could be. Any hints or tips on speeding it up?
 
T

TD04_5EFTE

Member +
Your ISP will be throttling your traffic, during busy peak times it will slow down on non http downloads (such as torrents) you'll find come around midnight it'll go upto high speed since hardly anyone will be surfing the internet.

BT do this alot due to them not investing money on connections so everyone is sharing the bandwidth so they start to throttle at busy times.

If i remember Sky uses the BT phone line through the ADSL so your problem will be throttled traffic.
 
HutchGlanzaV

HutchGlanzaV

Member +
Yeah thats right, I do need a BT line for Sky internet, although Sky wasn't on the bad ISP list that Dave posted earlier, BT were though...
 
T

TD04_5EFTE

Member +
That will prob be your problem then, your line is getting throttled for fair usage.

Not 100% sure on how the whole sky/bt thing works but i'll give you a tip, watch what you download as BT monitor everything you click on and keep records for a few months since they are now cracking down on illegal downloads.

Watch ur speed at night and at the weekends i'll start to go up slowly when people drop off from your bandwidth.
 
Dave.

Dave.

Member +
Not correct TD04_5EFTE mate :(

BT and Sky are separate and independant of each other. Their internet is no exception, the throttling/shaping takes place at the ISP servers, not in the BT lines.

http://torrentfreak.com/how-to-encrypt-bittorrent-traffic/

^ That'll show you how to encrypt the BT traffic, and then just use a random listen port (easily found option) and you're ISP won't be able to identify the bittorrent traffic, and it'll pass through un-throttled and un-shaped :) IF that is the source of the problem.

As i said, it depends on the ISP and the exact deal you have chosen on whether or not you'll be shaped/throttled :) Amost everything I've read on sky has been good, I dug up a little more and it seems all good.

Dave
 
T

TD04_5EFTE

Member +
dave-gtturbo said:
Not correct TD04_5EFTE mate :(

BT and Sky are separate and independant of each other. Their internet is no exception, the throttling/shaping takes place at the ISP servers, not in the BT lines.

http://torrentfreak.com/how-to-encrypt-bittorrent-traffic/

^ That'll show you how to encrypt the BT traffic, and then just use a random listen port (easily found option) and you're ISP won't be able to identify the bittorrent traffic, and it'll pass through un-throttled and un-shaped :) IF that is the source of the problem.

As i said, it depends on the ISP and the exact deal you have chosen on whether or not you'll be shaped/throttled :) Amost everything I've read on sky has been good, I dug up a little more and it seems all good.

Dave
Click to expand...

Encrypting the Bit Torrent traffic doesn't always work as sometimes you need to enable non-encrypted traffic options and this enables your ISPs to find out if your using bit torrent traffic or if you want to risk trying to get connections you can disable it and only leech from encrypted sources and due to the RC4 encryption been around for a while now there is prob a chance most isp's know what to look for.

If you would read closely at no point did i say BT and sky were connected i said this "If i remember Sky uses the BT phone line through the ADSL so your problem will be throttled traffic." Which means in order to have sky broadband you need a BT phone line and your internet will come through this phone line, so it's going through the BT phone exchange anyway. And i also did say i'm not 100% sure on how the whole BT/Sky thing works since there is alot of ISP's that need the BT phone line, and since the BBC did the whole bandwidth wars report more and more isp's are cracking down on bit torrent traffic with throttling and traffic shappers to stop people hogging the the bandwidth.

And i know from experience BT do employ throttling techniques due to their exchanges not handling the volume of traffic and they do have shapers deployed to detect torrent traffic so people are not hogging all the bandwidth so chances are all the isps that require a BT phone line will be forced into the same regulations as BT use due to them using the BT line.


****************************
Edit

Found some information that will prob clear it all up for you.

Sky is a communications provider (CP) who rent wholesale products from Openreach (the ring-fenced line of business of the BT Group that owns, maintains and provides connections between the CP and the End User, you!).

Voice/Broadband products from "BT" are actually from BT Retail. They rent products from Openreach in the same manner as Sky or any other provider do.

There are two core products that Openreach provide for voice and broadband. These are Wholesale Line Rental (WLR) and Local Loop Unbundling (LLU).

WLR is a complete phone package available to the CP which can be customised. Sky Talk use WLR. You can take a calls only option (call revenue to sky, line rental to BT Retail). Or you can take your full service from your CP - this is Sky Talk with Line Rental.

I believe currently Sky do not offer a new line direct from them - you have to order a BT Retail line and then switch to Sky Talk Line Rental to them. You can do this because it is exactly what I did.

There are two types of LLU. Shared Metallic Path Facility (SMPF) and MPF. Sky employ the SMPF setup - that is they put their broadband equipment in the exchange, provide the BB with the LLU and then you take a WLR for your calls. Whether you opt to stay with BT Retail for your calls or move to sky, you are still on WLR.

Pipex/Bulldog differed in the the fact that they provided ALL of your services through LLU. They provided their own dialtone through they LLU equipment and did not rent a WLR package from openreach. This is why you may have had the option of broadband only without phone on bulldog/pipex.

To summarise, SMPF LLU is a shared facility with the phone aspect provided with WLR (more common). MPF where all your services are provided by one operator.

And some information on your potention low download speeds on torrents.

Sky connect uses traffic shaping, Sky LLU services (Mid, Max) do not.

That information was available on a Sky tech forum.
 
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Dave.

Dave.

Member +
TD04_5EFTE :

Some good info there, I just thought it was a little misleading, and wanted to clear up how I misread it. It's still a little confused I think, but if you bear in mind that BT (unless you have that BT yahoo, who are different technically, internet of course) are merely providing the line, and have nothing to do with its contents, or with any restrictions in the line (other than the 8mb or whatever cap, and even then, only if its the max speed the line can cope with, yuour actual ISP can still cap it at whatever they want).

Also, encrypted traffic never needs to be set to unencrypted unless, say, the tracker doesn't allow encrypted connections or something similar. There is no way there is "prob a chance most isp's know what to look for" as encryption is exactly that... Hidden behind the encrypted code... If they could see what it was, it wouldn't be encrypted.

And... BT wholesale of ADSL lines is entirely separate from your ISP, and, as mentioned above, is not subject to any form of throttling/shaping. That all takes place at your ISP's servers.

Also, the "throttling" you're talking about is isn't "throttling" - it's contention, i.e. a contention ratio of 5:1 for businesses would be the normal, and probably 20:1 for home users. This means that, at most, 5 (or 20, dependant on your service) users are sharing one 8mb line. This is what you get when you purchase a regular 8mb service. if you have 2mb, you share the 2mb line with x number of users.

This is how the contention ratio scheme works, totally separate from the ISP.

Contention Ratio : http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=de...avclient-ff&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1B3GGGL_enGB283GB284

Finally, I wasn't having a go, I just wanted to clear up some of the really hazey points you had made.

Hutch:

Nope :) It means, like i said, that you have to use the encryption, If BitComet gives you the choice to choose the level, then try it on varying levels and see which if any work for you :)

If they can't identify the traffic as bittorrent, either by the port (random port selection where you can), or by the content of the packets (encryption where possible) then they can't discriminate between bittorrent and any other service :)

Then the speed is down to your ADSL speed, and the speed of the torrent (seeds/leecher ratio, or however you want to work it out :) )

Rep please! I feel I've earnt it :p

Dave
 
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Gryzor

Gryzor

Admin
other tips.

1. If your using toxxxxts I'd put on peerguardian 2 gets rid of some tracing.
2. Use a toxxxxt tracker site to list good toxxxxt so u don't waste your time.
3. Increase the number of shared connection Xp limits these see Link
4. Use a clean toxxxxt apps like utoxxxxt.
5. toxxxxt apps usually force u to share so if your up is 0K/s you'll be lucky to get 10k/s down.
 
S

Si-W

Member +
sometimes torrent just goes screwed, i had same problem with my previous pc torrent speeds of 100+ down to like 1kb a second checked all ports on router firewall everything second i plugged in on laptop fast..

just do what i do.. if its video's stream online much faster, if its software dont use torrents find direct files
 
GTti

GTti

Member +
Sky use servers with interleave which are pants for online gaming due to the packet overhead. Faster and more reliable download speeds though.

Most routers and applications support UPnP which will map the ports for you, I don't even use port forwarding on my home up and get full download speeds.

The slowness in donwloading your torrent doesn't really have any relation to the spead of your ISP as you are relying on other uses to share their upload speed. If you're trying to download a torrent with a small amount of seeds then it's not going to come fast!

Go on to your router, and view connection status - you should be able to see if the ADSL is 'UP' and also if it's connected to the ISP.
 
T

TD04_5EFTE

Member +
Dave-GTTurbo

I beg to differ about a few points

"Also, encrypted traffic never needs to be set to unencrypted unless, say, the tracker doesn't allow encrypted connections or something similar. There is no way there is "prob a chance most isp's know what to look for" as encryption is exactly that... Hidden behind the encrypted code... If they could see what it was, it wouldn't be encrypted."

According to a few guides about Bit torrent encryption it is said that some ISP's can detect encrypted traffic I'll cut out a bit of the text to save you reading a long boring page.

"Some ISPs are now using more sophisticated measures (e.g. pattern/timing analysis or categorizing ports based on side-channel data) to detect BitTorrent traffic. This means that even encrypted BitTorrent traffic can be throttled. However, with ISPs that continue to use simpler, less costly methods to identify and throttle BitTorrent, the current solution remains extremely effective."

So even know you encrypt it you do run the risk of your ISP tracking it down, you have to remember most ISP's don't want you to do peer to peer as they know whats going on and what people are sharing or leeching.

You have to remember ISP's will get suspicious when they see traffic on the line which isn't HTTP downloads or packets for online games.

Bit of text copied to show how ISP's detect this and how Bit Torrent Traffic works.

"The BitTorrent protocol has a distinct handshake. To control uploading by seeders, ISPs have learned to look for this handshake. The recent releases of both µTorrent and Azureus/Vuze include a "Lazy Bitfield" feature to hide seeders from ISPs. When Lazy Bitfield is enabled, the handshake is changed to make a BitTorrent seeder initially appear to be a non-seeding peer (sometimes called a leecher). This is done by sending a bitfield indicating missing pieces. Then, once the handshake is done, the client notifies its peer that it now has the pieces that were originally indicated as missing."

If you really want to stop your ISP from detecting that your downloading from Bit Torrents then your best to use an Encrypted Tunnel like Commercial Virtual Private Network (VPN) from providers such as Relakks, BTGuard or SecureIX. This will stop your ISP from seeing what your doing but again some ISP's throttle this traffic as they've clocked onto what their being used for.

As far as torrents go it's a never ending battle.

Hutch read through this website that i found on my bookmarks for when i used to use Torrents.

http://suprbay.org/showthread.php?t=15636

But as previous people have said it's down to your ISP, seeders vs leechers ratio, upload ratio, shared connections (this is a big one cause if you open too many connections you can kill your connection.)

But don't go believing that if you "encrypt" your Bit Torrent traffic it'll be ok cause as proved there is ways to detect it all you need to do is do a bit of research and you can see all the information. ISP's ain't stupid.

There is a website that tests your ISP and also the usual bit torrent stuff to see if it is being affected at ISP end.

http://broadband.mpi-sws.mpg.de/transparency/bttest.php

Even if you don't use Azureus you can use this guide to setup your Bit Torrent client to make sure all your connections and upload and download settings are correct.

http://www.azureuswiki.com/index.php/Good_settings

This debate can go on and on and on about whats proper and whats not, no one really knows what will work, things might work for one person but not another there is many if's and buts, you just have to try them all.

Just do your research and you'll find the pro's and cons.
 
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