Striving to get the most out of your bandwidth? Struggling with slow BitTorrent download speeds? The first step is to see if your BitTorrent client is properly configured through the settings - a simple tweak here and there can drastically improve the download speed. Here are some other suggestions to fine-tune your downloading to maximize those torrents:

 — Do not ‘Force Start’ your torrents. While doing this seems to ’start’ all torrents when some are waiting in a queue, this in fact spreads out your upload capacity over too many connections thus impacting your download speed. You are better off to change your settings to allow more current simultaneous connections/downloads.

— Do not operate torrents in ‘Super-Seed’ Mode. Super-seed mode is NOT recommended for general use. While it does assist in the wider distribution of rare data, because it limits the selection of pieces a client can download, it also limits the ability of those clients to download data for pieces they have already partially retrieved. Therefore, super-seed mode is only recommended for initial seeding (ie. new torrents from the original uploader), or for re-seeding.

— Setting a proper upload limit:

Another thing you can do to optimize your speed with BitComet (or any other BitTorrent client), is to set a proper upload speed. With BitTorrent, you need to upload in order to maximize downloading, but you don’t want to set the Upload settings too high or else now it starts to eat into your download bandwidth. And you don’t want to set it too low, or else the trackers will recognize this and your downloading speed will be reduced. First, set your “Global Max Download Rate” to NO LIMIT. Second, set your upload speed to be about 80% of what your total upload bandwidth is. Do NOT ask your Internet Service Provider to tell you the upload limit, since there are too many variants involved. They can tell you what bandwidth package you subscribe to, but they can’t tell you the real number. Go to www.dslreports.com/tools and click on the ‘Speed Tests’ link there. 

MAKE SURE that you stop all Internet activity first (P2P, online games, file downloading, etc.) or else you will get false results. Choose one that is nearest your city, or experiment with them. What you’re looking for here is consistent “upload” speed results. Run the test a few times until you see a similarity between all results and the upload speed. For this example, my upload speed is “743 Kbps” or 743 Kilobits/second. But what I really need is the number measured in Kilobytes (not Kilobits), so I must multiply 743 by 1/8 to get it into Kilobytes. 743 X 1/8 (or 743 X 0.125) = 92.9 KB/s. Now I need 80% of 92.9 (or 92.9 X 0.8) which is 74 KB/s (I have mine set at 65 since I run other Internet programs). But the most important thing is for me to keep that setting under 92.9, or it’ll hog some of my download speed.

For Azureus users, there’s a built-in speed tester right in the program itself. Go to TOOLS > Speed Test… and select either ‘BT Upload’ or ‘BT Download’. However; we found the Azureus results to be about 30% lower than the DSLReports tests (even with an idle connection) so stick with the latter for more accurate ‘overall’ bandwidth results.

Another thing you should change is the “Max Simultaneous Download Tasks Number”. This is the number of tasks that BitComet can run at the same time - change this to a higher number. Most BitTorrent clients, if not all, allow (and require) an increase in these connections. The default settings are usually set very low to accommodate lower-end PCs and PCs with minimal Internet bandwidth.

Some users of the BitTorrent client report experiencing slow downloads when sharing P2P files. This is most likely to occur on computers behind a home router or software firewall.

Being behind firewalls, the BitTorrent client may block incoming Bit Torrent network connections. Given the load balancing and "swarming" nature of the BitTorrent network, clients unable to take incoming requests for uploads will naturally be allowed less bandwidth for downloads.

To solve this problem, consider the following:

• When a user starts a BitTorrent client, the client sets up a network resource called a "port" to allow other Bit Torrent clients to connect ot it. Each port possesses a unique number called the "TCP port number."
  
  
• A BitTorrent client normally associates the TCP port number 6881. However, if this port is busy for some reason, the client will instead try successively higher ports (6882, 6883, and so on up to a limit of 6999). In order for outside BitTorrent clients to reach this one, they must be able to connect to the correct port.
  
  
• When connecting to another BitTorrent client, the requesting client will first try port 6881, then 6882, and so on. However, if the computer is on a firewalled network, the incoming request may not reach these ports. On the other hand, if these requests succeed, the accepting client will be able to download faster.
  
  
• Firewalls can block nearly all of the ports used by P2P clients. To ensure the BitTorrent ports are made available to requesting clients, a home router or firewall can be manually configured to accept them. Most home routers possess a feature called "Port Range Forwarding" to do this. This feature allows the administer to tell the firewall where traffic for a given port number should be directed.
  
  
• For BitTorrent, many home users set up port forwarding on the TCP range 6881-6889. These ports must be directed to the computer running the BitTorrent client. If more than one computer on the network may run BitTorrent, a different range such as 6890-6899 or 6990-6999 can be used for each. Remember that BitTorrent uses ports in the 6881-6999 only.
  
  
• Many people don't realize that Windows XP computers include the built in Windows Firewall. If port forwarding is set up on a home router, but Windows Firewall is running on the BitTorrent client computer, incoming requests may still fail to reach the client. Ensure the Windows Firewall is either disabled or is set up to allow the appropriate BitTorrent ports to pass through. The same recommendation applies to other software firewalls.
  
  
• On home networks without a router, the software firewall (Windows Firewall, ZoneAlarm, or other) must be set up to provide the equivalent forwarding or pass-through capability as needed.

Port forwarding, also referred to as tunneling, is essentially the process of intercepting traffic bound for a certain IP/port combination and redirecting to a different IP and/or port. This redirection may be accomplished by an application running on the destination host, or it may be performed by intermediate hardware, like a router, proxy server or firewall.

Normally, a routing device will look at the header of a packet and simply send it to the appropriate interface to reach the destination it finds in the header. In port forwarding, however, the intercepting application or device reads the packet header, notes the destination, but rewrites the header information and sends it to a another host destination, different from the one requested. That host destination may be a different IP using the same port, a different port on the same IP, or completely different combination of the two.

In the example below, 10.0.0.1 sends a request to 10.0.0.3 on port 80. An intermediate host, 10.0.0.2, intercepts the packets sent by 10.0.0.1. It rewrites the packet headers and sends them on to 10.0.0.4 on port 8080:

The host 10.0.0.4 responds to the request, and sends the response to 10.0.0.2. The host 10.0.0.2 rewrites the packet, indicating that the response is from 10.0.0.3, and sends them to 10.0.0.1:

As far as 10.0.0.1 is concerned, it has sent a request to 10.0.0.3 on port 80 and received a response back from 10.0.0.3 on port 80. This is not what has happened; the traffic has never actually touched 10.0.0.3. However, because of the way the packets have been rewritten, 10.0.0.1 sees that it has gotten a response from 10.0.0.3.

The important thing to remember in port forwarding is that the destination is always from the perspective of the requestor. Even though 10.0.0.4 is the destination for the traffic from 10.0.0.1 in the diagram, the destination for all traffic from the requestor's perspective is 10.0.0.3.

Port forwarding is extensively used to keep unwanted traffic off networks. It allows administrators to use one IP address for all external communications on the Internet while dedicating multiple servers with different IPs and ports to the task internally. This is very useful for home network users, who may wish to run an FTP server, a Web server and a gaming server on one network. Users with this type of need can set up a single public IP address on the router to translate requests to the proper server on the internal network. This arrangement has the advantage of hiding exactly what services are running on the network, using only IP address to accomplish multiple tasks, and dropping all traffic at the firewall that is unrelated to the services provided.

Web proxies also provide a port forwarding service. Like the above home network example, Web proxy servers use port forwarding to prevent direct contact between clients and the Internet. A Web proxy will inspect and rewrite packets moving to and from Internet destinations, allowing network administrators to control access to restricted sites, log accesses and protect internal clients from external threats like port scanning.

Port forwarding can additionally be used send otherwise insecure TCP traffic through a secure SSH connection (also called a tunnel). This connection can be used to encrypt any type of TCP traffic, including HTTP, POP3, SMTP and FTP. A client on the requestor connects to a service running on the destination host, and this creates an encrypted tunnel through which traffic may pass securely.

Port forwarding is an excellent way to preserve public IP addresses, protect servers and clients from unwanted access, "hide" the services and servers available on a network, and limit access to and from a network. It has the benefit of being transparent to the end user while adding an extra layer of security to networks.

Imagine being on the autobahn with the accelerator down and then you realize that you are driving a wrecked car. The plight is not so uncommon on the information superhighway too.

Torrent users would attest to the fact that half of our time is spent looking for ‘healthy’ torrents and the other half trying to download (and a bit of upload too) at the maximum speed. The former is mandatory; the latter thankfully is within the realm of tweaking.

If you are the one who thinks that your torrent download speeds could do with a boost then keep reading. Below, you’ll find a few tips on how to speed up torrent download speed.

1. Your ISP is where it starts

Check the maximum download and upload speeds allowed by your ISP. Most ISP’s have specific bandwidths for both uploads and downloads. Obviously your torrent download speed won’t cross the cap set by the ISP. Go over to this article on Speed.io for broadband speed test and this one by Tina on ways to increase your connection speed. There are many other bandwidth testers like DSLReports which is included in the speed test within uTorrent.

2. Choosing the right BitTorrent client

Use the better clients out there like uTorrent, Vuze or the BitTorrent client itself. Wikipedia lists about 51 of them supporting the BitTorrent protocol. The choice of client used should always be updated to the latest version. The screenshots here depict uTorrent. The settings should be similarly configurable for other clients too. Mac users shuld also check our Transmission vs. uTorrent post

3. Go for healthy seeds and peers

A peer is any computer participating in the download and upload of a torrent file. A seed (or seeder) is anyone who has one complete copy of the file being shared across the torrent network. A leech (or a leecher) is the person who does not have the complete file yet but has joined the network to download it. A leecher becomes a seeder when he downloads the entire file and then shares it across the network.

For high torrent speeds, the best bet is in numbers. The greater the number of seeders, the healthier the torrent and the better the chance of higher speeds. The rule of thumb says to choose the torrent files with a high number of seeders and preferably lesser number of leechers i.e. a higher seed-leecher ratio.

4. Get through the firewall

Firewalls can block all incoming BitTorrent connections coming through. To ensure otherwise, a firewall should be manually configured to accept the connections and let it through the client. Windows XP has the Windows Firewall. Configure the firewall installed to accept the connections by checking the BitTorrent client on the allowed list i.e. Options – Preferences ““ Connection – check Add uTorrent to Windows Firewall. Also, check the Windows Firewall exception (if you keep it enabled) in your client too. Shutting down the firewall is not recommended as it leaves the computer open to attack.

Note: If the home computer is behind a router, it also should be configured through the feature called Port Range Forwarding to enable torrent traffic. The router documentation should have specific information on this.

5. Limit your upload rate

A peer to peer network is all about sharing alike, but an unlimited upload rate hits the download rate too. Using the speed tests, find out your maximum upload speed and then set your client’s upload rate (Global Upload Rate in uTorrent) to about 80% of your maximum upload speed. You can also try varying your upload speeds ““ keep it high initially and then gradually bring it down towards the middle of the download.

Note: Mind the speed units ““ it may be given in kilobits per second (kb/sec) or kilobytes per second (kB/sec). 1 kilobyte = 8 kilobit

6. Go to a different port

The default port for the BitTorrent protocol is any between port numbers 6881-6999. ISPs throttle traffic on these ports as BitTorrent sharing involves high bandwidth usage. It’s easy to configure a different port in your torrent client. Use some number above 10000 to get around ISPs and also avoid problems with other applications. By default, the uTorrent port is randomized each time it starts. Set a specific port by not enabling the Randomize Port setting.

7. Increase the number of Max Half Open TCP connections

This figure specifies how many connections a torrent client should attempt to establish simultaneously at any given time. Windows XP with Service Pack 2 (SP2) or newer, limits this to a default of 10 as a barrier against virus multiplication. But that’s a bummer for torrent speeds as torrents too need a large number of simultaneous connections.

A patch has been available for a while from LvlLord which modifies the TCPIP.sys file in Windows to allow a higher number of TCP connections.

After running the patch, you have to set the number of connections in your torrent client. For example, in uTorrent go to Options ““ Preferences ““ Advanced – net.max_halfopen. Set any number from 50 to 100. But see that net.max_halfopen is set lower than the value set in TCPIP.SYS. Always check if it is still patched because Windows updates sometimes overwrite it.

8. Experiment with Protocol Encryption

Some ISPs love to act like Big Brothers and constrict bandwidth for P2P protocols. Protocol Encryption in most of the torrent clients helps to override this bandwidth shaping. Enable outgoing protocol encryption and put a checkmark on Allow Incoming Legacy Connections.

With protocol encryption, ISPs find it difficult if not impossible to detect that the traffic is coming from BitTorrent. Experiment with enabled, disabled and forced options because you could be getting better speeds with encryption disabled. Non-encryption makes a torrent connection compatible with someone who is not using encryption but as a minus it makes the torrent detectable to an ISP with a bandwidth restricting policy.

9. Bandwidth and connections

Your BitTorrent client’s settings options will let you enter figures for ““

Global maximum number of connections gives the maximum number of connections that a BitTorrent client can make for any P2P exchange. Setting this too high does NOT mean higher speeds. Setting it too high would take up useless bandwidth and too low a figure would miss out on peers. For my 256kbps connection, I have a setting of 130.

Maximum number of connected peers per torrent gives the maximum number of peers that a BitTorrent client can connect to for any P2P exchange. Experiment by setting this number close to the available peers for a particular torrent. For my 256kbps connection, I have a default setting of 70.

Number of upload slots per torrent gives the maximum number of peers that a BitTorrent client will upload to for any P2P exchange. A low setting may affect downloads. For my 256kbps connection, I have a setting of 3.

uTorrent has a Speed Guide which handily calculates the figures for a particular connection.

10. Some common sense

Most BitTorrent clients allow us to view the individual files in a download. You can selectively disable the download of files you don’t think necessary.

Familiarize yourself with the customization settings of your particular client available in the Help files or at the website FAQs.

uTorrent FAQ
Vuze FAQ

1. Tixati

Tixati is a slick new torrent program authored by the architect of the WinMiX OpenNap program.  Definitely a sophisticated and forward-thinking client, Tixati is already embracing the shift towards trackerless torrent swarming:  magnet links, PEX, and DHT swarming works very well in Tixati.  The throttling features and wide range of priority adjustments will make any fussy P2P user quite happy, and you'll find that download speeds are at least as fast as Vuze and uTorrent.  The bitfield graphs and 'executive dashboard' display is very professional, and this product easily earns itself a spot amongst the best torrent clients today.  Definitely try Tixati for torrent P2P needs.

http://www.tixati.com/

2. uTorrent