# A Guide to BitTorrent [P2P]



## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

Hello Friends!

As BitTorrent is considered one of the best P2P, I just collected some data from other sites that may be of help to people new to BitTorrent...

*What is BitTorrent???*

BitTorrent is a free speech tool.

BitTorrent gives you the same freedom to publish previously enjoyed by only a select few with special equipment and lots of money. ("Freedom of the press is limited to those who own one" -- journalist A.J. Liebling.)

You have something terrific to publish -- a large music or video file, software, a game or anything else that many people would like to have. But the more popular your file becomes, the more you are punished by soaring bandwidth costs. If your file becomes phenomenally successful and a flash crowd of hundreds or thousands try to get it at once, your server simply crashes and no one gets it.

There is a solution to this vicious cycle. BitTorrent, the result of over two years of intensive development, is a simple and free software product that addresses all of these problems.

The key to scaleable and robust distribution is cooperation. With BitTorrent, those who get your file tap into their upload capacity to give the file to others at the same time. Those that provide the most to others get the best treatment in return. ("Give and ye shall receive!")

Cooperative distribution can grow almost without limit, because each new participant brings not only demand, but also supply. Instead of a vicious cycle, popularity creates a virtuous circle. And because each new participant brings new resources to the distribution, you get limitless scalability for a nearly fixed cost.

BitTorrent is not just a concept, but has an easy-to-use implementation capable of swarming downloads across unreliable networks. BitTorrent has been embraced by numerous publishers to distribute to millions of users.

With BitTorrent free speech no longer has a high price.


*Well guys, add up to whatever you can and feel free to clear your doubts if any...*


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## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

*How To Use BitTorrent???*

*1) Download a BitTorrent Client*

The first thing you will need is a BitTorrent Client. This is a program that will manage all of your downloading and uploading you do using torrents.
There are many clients out there, each offering different pros and cons. Only use one client at a time, as using more than one wont make your speeds better or anything.

Here is a list of clients we here on the forums recommend that you use:
Azureus - more complex, but lots of excellent help available for n00bs
uTorrent (aka ÂµTorrent)


*2) Find a torrent to download*

TorrentSpy is a search engine for torrents. Torrents are small files containing information about the file(s) you wish to download such as the file names, the tracker you will use, and other information.

A Tracker is a server which directs uploading and downloading of packets of data on BitTorrent. It contains the information of who is currently downloading and seeding the torrent.

To find a torrent to download, use www.TorrentSpy.com and type in the name of what you want to download and click the Search button. You will be given a list of torrents that are ranked in order of how well seeded they are - i.e. how easy/fast it is for you to download them.

Seeds/seeders are people that currently have a full copy of the file(s) you want. If there are no seeders, you are very unlikely to ever complete your download.


*3) Download the torrent!*

Once you have selected the torrent you want to download, just click the "Download Torrent" button, open the torrent with your BitTorrent Client, and save the file to your hard disk. Once you have connected to seeds/peers, you're downloading!

*4) SEED the torrent!*

Once your download is complete, DO NOT exit your BitTorrent Client. Leave it running until the torrent has uploaded (at least) the same amount as you downloaded. That would give you a share ratio >= 1.0, meaning you're sharing! Remember, BitTorrent works by people like you sharing files, so by giving as much as you take, you will be benefiting and expanding the community!


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## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

*What Do You Mean By Seeding, Uploading, Peers etc...*

Here is a brief list of words associated with BitTorrent and their meanings.

*torrent*
Usually this refers to the small metadata file you receive from the web server (the one that ends in .torrent.) Metadata here means that the file contains information about the data you want to download, not the data itself. This is what is sent to your computer when you click on a download link on a website. You can also save the torrent file to your local system, and then click on it to open the BitTorrent download. This is useful if you want to be able to re-open the torrent later on without having to find the link again.

Each torrent receives a unique Info Hash identifier.

In some uses, it can also refer to everything associated with a certain file available with BitTorrent. For example, someone might say "I downloaded that torrent" or "that server has a lot of good torrents", meaning there are lots of good files available via BitTorrent on that server.

*peer*
A peer is another computer on the internet that you connect to and transfer data. Generally a peer does not have the complete file, otherwise it would be called a seed. Some people also refer to peers as leeches, to distinguish them from those generous folks who have completed their download and continue to leave the client running and act as a seed.

*leech*
A leech is usually a peer who has a negative effect on the swarm by having a very poor share ratio - in other words, downloading much more than they upload. Most leeches are users on asynchronous internet connections who through either ignorance or choice do not leave their BitTorrent client open to seed the file after their download has completed. However, some leeches intentionally hurt the swarm to avoid uploading by using modified clients or excessively limiting their upload speed. 

The term leech is also incorrectly used to refer to what should properly be called a peer, a member of the swarm who has not yet downloaded the complete file. 

*seed*
A computer that has a complete copy of a certain torrent. Once your client finishes downloading, it will remain open until you click the Finish button (or otherwise close it.) This is known as being a seed or seeding. You can also start a BT client with a complete file, and once BT has checked the file it will connect and seed the file to others. Generally, it's considered good manners to continue seeding a file after you have finished downloading, to help out others. Also, when a new torrent is posted to a tracker, someone must seed it in order for it to be available to others. Remember, the tracker doesn't know anything of the actual contents of a file, so it's important to follow through and seed a file if you upload the torrent to a tracker.

*reseed*
When there are zero seeds for a given torrent (and not enough peers to have a distributed copy), then eventually all the peers will get stuck with an incomplete file, since no one in the swarm has the missing pieces. When this happens, someone with a complete file (a seed) must connect to the swarm so that those missing pieces can be transferred. This is called reseeding. Usually a request for a reseed comes with an implicit promise that the requester will leave his or her client open for some time period after finishing (to add longevity to the torrent) in return for the kind soul reseeding the file.

*swarm*
The group of machines that are collectively connected for a particular file. For example, if you start a BitTorrent client and it tells you that you're connected to 10 peers and 3 seeds, then the swarm consists of you and those 13 other people.

*tracker*
A server on the Internet that acts to coordinate the action of BitTorrent clients. When you open a torrent, your machine contacts the tracker and asks for a list of peers to contact. Periodically throughout the transfer, your machine will check in with the tracker, telling it how much you've downloaded and uploaded, how much you have left before finishing, and the state you're in (starting, finished download, stopping.) If a tracker is down and you try to open a torrent, you will be unable to connect. If a tracker goes down during a torrent (i.e., you have already connected at some point and are already talking to peers), you will be able to continue transferring with those peers, but no new peers will be able to contact you. Often tracker errors are temporary, so the best thing to do is just wait and leave the client open to continue trying.

*downloading*
Receiving data FROM another computer.

*uploading*
Sending data TO another computer.

*share rating/ratio*
If you are using the experimental client with the stats-patch, you will see a share rating displayed on the GUI panel. This is simply the ratio of your amount uploaded divided by your amount downloaded. The amounts used are for the current session only, not over the history of the file. If you achieve a share ratio of 1.0, that would mean you've uploaded as much as you've downloaded. The higher the number, the more you have contributed. If you see a share ratio of "oo", this means infinity, which will happen if you open a BT client with a complete file (i.e., you seed the file.) In this case you download nothing since you have the full file, and so anything you send will cause the ratio to reach infinity. Note: The share rating is just a number that is displayed for your convenience. It does not directly affect any aspect of the client at all. In general, out of courtesy to others you should strive to keep this ratio as high as possible, of course.

*distributed copies (AKA availability)*
In some versions of the client, you will see the text "Connected to n seeds; also seeing n.nnn distributed copies." A seed is a machine with the complete file. However, the swarm can collectively have a complete copy (or copies) of the file, and that is what this is telling you. Referring again to the "people at a table" analogy, consider the case where the book has 10 pages, and person A has pp.1-5 and B has pp.6-10. Collectively, A and B have a complete copy of the book, even though no one person has the whole thing. In other words, even if there are no seeds, as long as there is at least one distributed copy of the file everyone can eventually get a complete file. Meditate on this, the Zen of BitTorrent, grasshopper.

*choked*
This is a term used in the description of the BitTorrent protocol. It refers to the state of an uploader, i.e. the thread that sends data to another peer. When a connection is choked, it means that the transmitter doesn't currently want to send anything on that link. A BT client signals that it's choked to other clients for a number of reasons, but the most common is that by default a client will only maintain --max_uploads active simultaneous uploads, the rest will be marked choked. (The default value is 4 and this is the same setting that experimental client GUI lets you adjust.) A connection can also be choked for other reasons, for example a peer downloading from a seed will mark his connection as choked since the seed is not interested in receiving anything. Note that since each connection is bidirectional and symmetrical, there are two choked flags for each connection, one for each Tx endpoint.

*interested*
Another term used in the protocol specification. This is the corollary to the choked flag, in that interested refers to the state of a downloader with respect to a connection. A downloader is marked as interested if the other end of the link has any pieces that the client wants, otherwise the connection is marked as not interested.

*snubbed*
If the client has not received anything after a certain period (default: 60 seconds), it marks a connection as snubbed, in that the peer on the other end has chosen not to send in a while. See the definition of choked for reasons why an uploader might mark a connection as choked. The real function of keeping track of this variable is to improve download speeds. Occasionally the client will find itself in a state where even though it is connected to many peers, it is choked by all of them. The client uses the snubbed flag in an attempt to prevent this situation. It notes that a peer with whom it would like to trade pieces with has not sent anything in a while, and rather than leaving it up to the optimistic choking to eventuall select that peer, it instead reserves one of its upload slots for sending to that peer. 

*optimistic unchoking*
Periodically, the client shakes up the list of uploaders and tries sending on different connections that were previously choked, and choking the connections it was just using. You can observe this action every 10 or 20 seconds or so, by watching the "Advanced" panel of one of the experimental clients.


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## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

*Using Torrents*

Once you have installed your torrent client you then need to download a .torrent file. These are small files (typically around 1 or 2 kb) that tell your client where it needs to look for the different files for the game, film or album you are looking for. When you download them put them in a folder labeled â€˜.torrent filesâ€™. This will make everything easier for later. Torrent files can be downloaded from all over the place. Lots of companies release demos of games via torrent (F.E.A.R. did this with an official torrent of both the single player and multi player demos).

Click the "DOWNLOAD TORRENT" button on the TorrentSpy detail page. Your BitTorrent Client should automatically open to start processing the torrent.

*Where will my file(s) be saved?*
[list:d22274ba15]
Most BitTorrent Clients will save files into the directory you selected during the installation process. The torrent will have started automatically, and will be downloading into that folder.
Some BitTorrent Clients (like BitComet) will give you a screen with the save location that you want to save the files to. Click browse and then choose which folder you want to download the files into. For example you could put any mp3â€™s into your music folder. 
Next click ok and you will start downloading your desired files.
[*]*But what if I only want to download SOME files in the torrent?*

This allows you to decide what files from the torrent you want to save to your hard disk. This is useful if you only want one song from an album but could only find a torrent for the whole album. Or if you want to see the sample of a movie before you download the whole thing.

In some BitTorrent Clients (like BitComet) there will also be a bunch of tick boxes with file names next to them. Only files which have an X in the box next to them will be downloaded.
In other BitTorrent Clients there should be similar facilities to select only certain files for download
[/list:u:d22274ba15]


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## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

*So what sort of file should I be downloading?*

Always check the COMMENTS and the health of the torrent before you start a download.

One thing that does happen very frequently with torrents is that people put large files into what are called .rar files. These are essentially archive files so that the single larger file is broken down into many smaller files. This helps prevent loss of large chunks of data if you get corruption which is sometimes inevitable. To use the files contained within these archives you need to download a copy of WinRar which is free. When you download these multiple .rar files you will get a file called nameofmovie.rar and a bunch of files called nameofmovie.r00, nameofmovie.r01, nameofmovie.r02 etc. You need to extract the .rar file not any of the .r00, .r01, r02 etc files as they wont work. If there is no .rar file at all then open the first numbered .r00 instead and it should work

*Music*
You have 2 main choices. The first is real CD audio which weighs in at around 700mb per CD, or the second is mp3â€™s which are much easier and smaller. There are other types of audio encoding such as AAC (apple audio codec â€“ used for when someone encodes a CD using I-Tunes), WMA (Window Media Audio â€“ when you use Windows Media Player) and Ogg Vorbis (a better quality encoding system than mp3 but not so widely used, often used for 5.1 surround sound encoding on video files).


*Videos*
If you want to download a movie, TV show, or video clip them it can come in all sorts of different file types. Primarily you will end up with files with these sorts of extensions: AVI, WMV, MPEG, RM, RMVB. These are media files will all happily play straight away using windows media player if you have to correct codecs, .rm files need real media player. You should get both the Xvid and DivX codecs by clicking the links provided. This will let you see far more types of films. If you have trouble viewing a particular file I advise that you get hold of the Video Lan media player from here. This is an awesome bit of software that will play almost any type of media file you try with it (I have never had one it couldnâ€™t handle) and its open source.

If you go to download a movie and you find that you have downloaded a .bin and a .cue file, a .mdf and a .mds or an .iso file then what you have got is a copy of the data off the CD/DVD. These are known as image files and can be viewed by mounting them in a program such as Alchol 120% or Daemon Tools or they can be burned to a disk using a program like Nero. These types of files are designed to be burnt to disk and then played back using a DVD player hooked up to a TV. If you downloaded an .iso it is probably a rip of the exact image of the retail DVD of the film you want. This is best for replacing a damaged DVD that you own. They normally are either 2.85 or 4.6gigabytes in size which is very large and can take some time to download. If you get 700megabyte files then they are either VCD or SVCD and will play in most resent DVD players. Most movies which come as .cue and .bin or as .mdf and .mds are either VCD or SVCD.

As a general rule the bigger the file the better the quality however a 700meg dvd rip will be better than a 1.4gig â€˜camâ€™.


*Games*
Games are just the same as with movies except that you normally get an .iso or a .bin and .cue along with a crack and a readme.txt file.

*Problems that occur when using torrents...*
Occasionally you will download a torrent that is in multiple .rar files and it will claim to be 100% complete overall. Then when you try and unrar it, it will say that it is unable to because one of the rar files is incomplete. What you need to do is select the file in the bitcomet and select files from the list which goes summary, trackers, files, peers, chat, log, statistics. You will then find that one of the files has got to 99.99%. This happens because some ****er has sent you a bit of corrupt data and the file has been unable to finish itself but it thinks it has finished. What you have to do is delete that file and then let it download the file again. This is the only major problem I have ever come across and is easily solvable once you know how. To delete the file right click on it and go to browse download directory and then delete the corresponding file out of the download directory.


*Some tips and common courtesies...*
When you download a file please make sure that your download to upload ratio is 100% or higher. If everyone only uploaded half as much as they downloaded then the whole thing would fall over and stop working. Its about file sharing people not taking data and not giving anything back. Torrents work by limiting your download speed in direct relation to your upload speed so the more you upload the faster you download.


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## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

*Downloading Problems*

*Bad Data from Tracker or Bad Tracker Data*
This means the tracker is having problems.
Either it is down and returning an error page, or is overloaded with requests.
Simply leave your client on for a while and see if the problem resolves itself.

*Connecting to peers*
Maybe there are no users to connect to. Leave your torrent open and maybe the bittorrent client will connect (it may take some time).

*Windows cannot find... "C:\Documents and Settings\<YOUR LOGGED IN NAME HERE>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\Content.ie5.....*
It is an error that can sometimes occur in Windows XP; either download the torrent to your Hard Drive and launch it from there.... or clear out your temp internet files. This will generally resolve the issue (XP starts compressing temporary internet files once it reaches certain number of files or 1/2 the allotted drive space and that's what causes the error).

Just let the torrent run in your client and the client will keep checking the tracker and should resume eventually.

*No space left on device*
The client allocates the space needed to store the file on your Hard Drive, you get this error when you don't have enough space on your hard drive for your bittorrent client to fully allocate the file.

*Problem getting response info - [errno2] No such file or directory*
The directory of C: /// is probably causing your problems; it's most likely a temporary directory that Internet Explorer uses when you left click on the torrent file. Try right clicking on the .torrent and selecting "save target as" . Then save the .torrent file to a directory of your choice. Keep them all in a folder exclusively for your torrents and your life will be much easier. Then when you start your bittorrent client and you're ready to download the files you can navigate to that folder and double click on the .torrent file to start downloading in your bittorrent client.

*(IOError - [Errno13] Permission denied)*
Sometimes your bittorrent client is still running in the background from your last session, and if you start more than one instance of the client, it will try to download the same torrent twice, and it will give you permission denied, startup Task Manager and close down all instances of your bittorrent client. Start your bittorrent client again and everything should work fine. Restarting your pc will also fix this.

*Rejected by tracker - Your IP is not registered to use this tracker for this file*
You have to register with the site that hosts this torrent and be logged in when you first start the torrent downloading.

*Piece XXX failed hash check, re-downloading it*
BitTorrent downloaded a wrong packet, so it's redownloading it, just ignore it.

*Upload failed: The tracker that hosted your torrent is listed as 'dead'!*
It wouldn't surprise me if they were all full.
If your site had to temporarily shut down the trackers, everyone has gone to the other trackers for now.

*MsgCodexxxxxxxx::add_torrent::dead_tracker::395*
That error is pretty straight forward. The tracker you are trying to use is currently not available.
Just because you used it before doesn't mean it's working today.
It's currently down for whatever reason; I don't know why it's down.
To solve this issue you either have to find a different tracker, one that is up right now.

Or just wait and see if that one comes back.

*\"Error on Line xx\" or \"Cannot execute free Script\"*
Do you have any ad blocking software running? Some firewalls like NIS and Agnitum Outpost have such options built into them.

There is also at least one pop-up-stopper that now supports ad blocking.

If you have any of those turn them off and try again.

You also might like to check your security settings in your Browser.

Perhaps you have very aggressive security and privacy settings that are causing it?

*Missing/Can't See Categories*
Disable your ad-blocking, it may be part of your firewall.

*No known mirrors*
That normally means the mirror hosting the tracker is too busy or is having problems.

*Web page is frilled with errors*
Means the torrent is dead, down or overloaded. You really can't tell which of the three.

It only means it can't get a connection with tracker, so anything that caused the tracker to be non-responsive during checking could be causing that error message.

*"rejected by tracker - Port xxxx is blacklisted"*
Your client is reporting to the tracker that it uses one of the default bittorrent ports (6881-6889) or any other common p2p port for incoming connections.

The tracker in question does not allow clients to use ports commonly associated with p2p protocols. The reason for this is that it is a common practice for ISPs to throttle those ports (that is, limit the bandwidth, hence the speed).

The blocked ports list include, but is not necessarily limited to, the following:

Direct Connect 411 - 413
Kazaa 1214
eDonkey 4662
Gnutella 6346 - 6347
BitTorrent 6881 - 6889

In order to use the tracker you must configure your client to use any port range that does not contain those ports (a range within the region 49152 through 65535 is preferable, cf. IANA). Notice that some clients like Azureus 2.0.7.0 or higher use a single port for all torrents, while most others use one port per open torrent. The size of the range you choose should take this into account (typically less than 10 ports wide. There is no benefit whatsoever in choosing a wide range, and there are possible security implications).

These ports are used for connections between peers, not client to tracker. Therefore this change will not interfere with your ability to use other trackers (in fact it should increase your speed with torrents from any tracker, not just ours). Your client will also still be able to connect to peers that are using the standard ports. If your client does not allow custom ports to be used, you will have to switch to one that does.

The more random the choice is the harder it will be for ISPs to catch on to you and start limiting speeds on the ports you use. If we simply define another port range on the forum, your ISPs will start throttling that range also.

Finally, remember to forward the chosen ports in your router and/or open them in your firewall, should you have them.

*"Invalid passkeyâ€?, â€œmissing passkey", or â€œUnregistered Torrentâ€? error?*
Some torrent sites have started individually keying torrents to individual members. There is nothing you can do about it, apart from registering with the tracker's site and getting your own torrent from them.

*Requested download is not authorized for use with this tracker*
Usually that means the torrent has been removed from the tracker (or was never placed there properly). 

If this is your first torrent, that MAY mean you have not configured your internet/proxy or BitTorrent Client settings correctly. Try another torrent that other users have been able to download successfully (check for recent positive comments)

*7, 'getaddrinfo failed' (aka 10007)*
That means that your client can't get a connection to the Tracker's IP address.
Here are some possible reasons:
Your client can't get through your firewall.
Your ISP's DNS server is down.
Your ISP's DNS server can't resolve the trackers domain to an IP address.
The Tracker is down and isn't responding.
*47, 'address family not supported' (aka 10047)*
This error is generated only because of incorrect network settings in Windows.

Make sure you:
Have "Client for Microsoft Networks"
Install the Microsoft version of "TCP/IP"
You're logged in and have a current IP address. You can use "winipcfg" or 'ipconfig/all' from the Command Prompt.
Test other network applications for proper operability
If you get the error on a non-windows system, I have no ideas at all.

*54,'Connection reset by peer' (aka 10054)*
This occurs when an established connection is shut down for some reason by the remote computer, just ignore it.

*55, 'No buffer space available' (aka 10055)*
A lot of routes in your routing table (due to a misconfigured router, or misconfigured default route)

Or lots of stale connections in your connection table

Or a lot of data that is pending for sending or receiving on a current connection(s), which can't be sent or received for some reason (destination System dead or unreachable, for example).

Or opening too many sockets at the same time.

Or maybe you don't have enough free space on your hard drive.

*60, 'Operation timed out' (aka 10060)*
That error means that the tracker is down or too busy to process your request. Just keep trying - leave your torrent open, if it doesn't see some action in about 20 -30 minutes try again later, the tracker may just be busy that's all.

It may also be your BitTorrent client, try a different client like Azureus.

If after a few days your download still does not start or continue and you are sure you have correctly configured your environment (i.e. made sure you have read all the FAQs about configuring your client), then you can safely assume the tracker/torrent is gone.

*61, 'Connection refused' (aka 10061)*
This means that you cannot for whatever reason establish a connection to the Tracker needed to download a file.

This is commonly caused by firewalls/routers, trackers/servers going down or being too busy, or your net connection going down.
You may also be banned from using this tracker because of leeching from it.
More often than not with this error you can simply leave your client window open and it will sort itself out, or you can close the BT Client and try resuming the torrent.

If the problem is persisting make sure the Tracker you wish to connect is operating, and make sure your firewall/router is not interfering with TCP traffic on the BT ports.

If after a few days your download still does not start or continue and you have correctly configured your environment, then you can safely assume the tracker is gone.

*65, 'no route to host' (aka 10065)*
This can be caused by the remote host appearing to be down (which could be the port chosen being blocked at the said host).

This could also be down to a system admin at work having noticed unusual traffic and blocked a port or banned an IP then.

I would say try connecting for a couple of days, if you are still having problems with the same error message then I suggest you find another .torrent.

*111, 'Connection refused' (aka 10111)*
Just let the torrent run in your client and the client will keep checking the tracker and should resume eventually.

*HTTP Error -1*
Leave your torrent running in your client. The client will keep checking the tracker and it should resume eventually.

*HTTP error 404: Page cannot be displayed/found The requested site is either unavailable or cannot be found. Please try again later.*
It might be that the server the .torrent file is stored on is busy. Try it again in a few minutes.
It could be an old .torrent file. Try to find a new link to the torrent.
Your internet address may have changed since you downloaded the .torrent file. Did your line drop? Did you have to disconnect? Simply re-download the .torrent file. If necessary, restart your machine. Your BitTorrent Client will re-check anything it has download so far and then resume from where it left off.
You may also encounter this message if your internet connection uses a proxy
*HTTP error 503: service unavailable *
Have you tried using TorrentSpy to check on the tracker's status? Maybe the tracker is down for a rest or something bad happened.


*1. You're Still Getting Good Transfer Rate (But More Hash Fails)*

What's happening behind the scenes in your BitTorrent client (if you look at the console or other debugging info) is that a particular piece of data is being detected as bad by the integrity checking function ("hash failure").

The most common cause of this problem is a bad router that is consistently corrupting a specific piece-data packet.

Some routers employ a routing trick called "game mode," where they rewrite the internal and external IP address bytes found within the payload of incoming and outgoing packets. This allows older games, which hard-code IP addresses within their messaging format, to function from behind a NAT setup.

However, when such an address byte sequence is coincidentally present within a file (and that doesn't mean an IP address), when that file is sent via BitTorrent protocol, the router mistakenly rewrites the data matching the "IP address" it found. This changes the actual received piece data contents, causing them to fail hash checking.

Any incoming packet that has a byte sequence that just happens to match the address byte sequence is susceptible to corrupting, which is estimated to randomly happen about once every 4GB of data.

There are several ways to fix or get around the problem:
Do not run your router in DMZ [Demilitarised Zone] mode (where packets not explicitly forwarded are routed by default to a single machine), as many routers seem to employ game mode-like corrupting by default for DMZ-bound traffic. Instead, you should enable explicit port-forwarding on your router for the your BitTorrent client's incoming port;
If your router has such a game mode option (many do not, even though they corrupte anyway), turn it off;
If you have done the above two, try connecting directly to the Internet (i.e. bypass your NAT router entirely, by switching to bridge mode or by taking out your router if it's seperate from your modem) to finish off the last piece. Be sure to have all your latest OS patches and make sure you have a decent firewall otherwise your computer will get compromised in minutes.
Also, make sure you use the latest version of your BitTorrent client.

*Please note:* There is a possible solution that will only work once for every download and only when your ISP assigns a dynamic external IP address to you. Simply disconnect / reconnect to the internet and hope that the IP changes. If that happens, your router will corrupte another (different) byte sequence and you might be able to finish the download. But the next time a block contains the new byte sequence that'll happen again, thus it's only a temporary solution if you can't disable game mode / DMZ on your router.

*2. Your Transfer Rate Has Dropped; Hash Fails No More Than Usual*

This is probably an anti-leech protection feature to make sure that you share your pieces of the file with others. Some BitTorrent clients may do this.

*3. Your Transfer Has Stopped Completely*

Some routers / firewalls detect data that matches address byte sequences as IP Spoofing. Check your router / firewall security log for IP spoofing entries. If you find entries for the incoming port of your BitTorrent, you need to disable IP spoofing detection. You may need to disable the firewall function entirely.

*4. Other Possible Solutions*

- Check what the remaining 0.1% is. Open up the torrent details and go to the Files tab and see what files are incomplete.

- If the file is Thumbs.db, desktop.ini, or .DS_Store, choose not to download them. Check the Help / FAQ / Manual of your BitTorrent client to see if and how this option is supported. Operating systems sometimes will generate these files automatically when you browse the directory. Because they are hidden system files they are protected and can't be replaced with the 'correct' versions your BitTorrent client downloads, so it will discard it, fail the hash check, and download again -- forever.

- If the file is a textfile/readme file that you don't need to use the product, you can do the same thing if the file is not essential.

- If all else fails, try stopping and starting the torrent again, and if that doesn't fix it, stop all transfers, shut down your BitTorrent client, turn off your computer and modem / router, wait a couple of minutes, turn everything back on, restart your BitTorrent client, and start only that torrent for completion.


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## vijay_7287 (Jan 24, 2006)

why dont u put all this in one post
anyways , i was lookin for this
so thx


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## go4saket (Jan 24, 2006)

As and when I am getting more data, I am adding it up. Moreover, I guess it's more convinient to read muliple posts rather than a very long post, but thats just my view.


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## tuXian (Jan 24, 2006)

cool man... thats exhaustively awesome... thanks for sharing


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## go4saket (Jan 27, 2006)

Guide updated... 
Check the 6th post of this forum...
Subject : Downloading problems...


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## wastebag (Jan 27, 2006)

Simply great tutorial... I was desperately lokking for something like this. Everything related to Bittorrent seems to be here.

Hey go4saket, thanks a lot for taking all this effort...


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## Milkshake (Jan 27, 2006)

Source??


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## wastebag (Jan 27, 2006)

Incase if we keep our Bittorrent client open, which are the files we are going to share. Is it that any file present in our computer gets shared or available to every one. If yes, nothing could be worse than this and if not, what does it mean by sharing or seeding?


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## theraven (Jan 27, 2006)

sharing is always on  in torrents ...
anything u are downloading ... is always open for sharing
while u are downloading , someone is downloadin from you as well ...

seeding is u continuin to share after ur download is done ...
if u use a torrent like azureus ul see the torrent appears in the lower half of the screen .. with the status of seeding

in any other client as well u will see the "seeding" status very clearly ..


no, Not ANY file on your computer is shared ...only the file that u are downloading with the existing torrent active is shared.

seeding starts automatically after ur download completes ..and as decent practice u should keep a share ration of 1:1 .


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## desertwind (Jan 27, 2006)

Please give credit to the original source, while ripping off from other sites.

Source Here

Post Reported.


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## it_waaznt_me (Jan 28, 2006)

Ripped tutorial. Hence locked.


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