Full Speed

[ August 13, 2003 ]

Faster Downloads with BitTorrent

I’m typically an early adopter when it comes to hardware, but with software, there are always far too many new projects for me to jump on the bandwagon of each one. Yesterday I decided that there had been enough buzz around BitTorrent that I should give it a shot. To my surprise, getting it up and running was incredibly simple. The NSIS-based installer required minimal interaction. Within minutes, I was downloading a CD image from a site that had been slashdotted. But this wasn’t the normal kind of slashdotted download. Instead of 1Kbps, I was getting about 150Kbps. That was sweet. BitTorrent works by forcing users to upload chunks as they download chunks. That way, all users form a web amongst each other and the downloads just scream. Once your download is finished, you can give back to the downloading community by leaving your BT “seed” running so that others can continue to download from you.

While I was waiting for my downloads to finish last night, I was reading up on all that has been going on in the BT community recently. One interesting discovery was the BT Experimental Client. This new client offers some great improvements over the stock client. In particular, I like all of the extra stats that it lets me monitor. Whether you are a new or experienced BT user, this client is definitely worth a look.

© 2014 Scott Johnson (info)
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