This book is dedicated to all my predecessors on whose

Knowledge, Observation, Experience, Thoughts and Assumptions

I based my own and
All my successors who would do the same.

© Parvesh Singla, all rights reserved

This is the first edition of the book, for any clarifications, comments, or
Suggestions, please contact: parvesh2002@rediffmail.com
Maximizing BitTorrent Speeds with uTorrent (Guide / Tutorial)
This article explains how to get up and running with Bit Torrent technology efficiently. It shows how to battle ISPs
throttling bit torrent speed and other ways to get the best optimization of your bandwidth.

DISCLAIMER

Proceed at your own risk! The information here is accurate to the best of my knowledge. I will not be held responsible if
this document causes your computer to explode or burst into flames. In real serious terms, if any corruption of data,
hardware damage or any other kind of damage/losses/etc. arises from the use of this document, I will not be responsible
for it. If you don't like this, please don't read any further.

INTRODUCTION

This is a tutorial step by step guide on setting up uTorrent. It details all the steps from downloading to optimizing your
settings. Many people have used Bit Torrent and think they are running with optimized settings, even then, it is advised
to read through this guide and see what you may have missed to better optimize your settings.

Starting Off with Bit Torrent

My top 3 recommended bit torrent clients, in order of preference is as follows

1 µTorrent ( http://www.uTorrent.com/ ) (the number one choice)

2 Azureus ( http://azureus.sourceforge.net/ ) (slow, java based, but very popular too)
3 BitComet ( http://www.bitcomet.com/ ) (popular but banned by some trackers due to incorrect reporting)

This guide will focus on the top most client, uTorrent. A quick rundown of its major features and we're talking
SPEED here

1 Peer Exchange Obtains more peers for your downloading torrent in addition to trackers. Peer exchange checks
with other peers to see if they know of any other peers. More Peers = More Speed! (provided the peers are seeds and are
not choked)
2 Protocol Encryption This is the major speed booster if your ISP throttles bit torrent traffic. It can do wonders
on torrents with high seeds and can give high speeds especially if your peers are using the top 3 clients I mentioned
above, as those are the popular ones that support this standard.
3 Capping Upload Speed Uploading data to other peers at full throttle will severely limit your download rate.
This is one key element we have to adjust for a good download / upload ratio. Unless you are purely seeding and not
using your computer for other tasks, limit your upload to 80% of full bandwidth.
4 Distributed Hash Table (DHT) Similar to Peer Exchange, it also obtains more peers for you to download
from. If the tracker is down, and the torrent is not private, you can depend on DHT to continue to download!
5 Local Peer Discovery Searches for peers in the same ISP as you. Connecting to a peer in the same network (or
ISP) means you can get the maximum speeds from that peer, assuming he is generous with his uploads.

WHAT WE NEED

1 An Internet Connection and its maximum download and upload speed. If unsure, visit
http://www.speedtest.net/ to run a speed test. Note: Minimum Flash 7 is required. Remember to select a download
location closest to you, especially if you are outside US. The Recommended Server works out most of the time.
2 Patched TCPIP.sys to allow more concurrent half-open connections. Windows XP SP2 and Vista limits the
number of half-connections to 10. This limitation can impact your Bittorrent experience. To increase the limit,

Windows XP Users (NOT Vista users, see next step for Vista users)
1 Go to this site -http://www.lvllord.de/
2 Click on Downloads.
3 Right-click the link and click "Save Target As".
4 Save it in your Desktop.
5 Open the file and run the program located inside the archive, agreeing to the security warning.
6 Some text should scroll by in a MS-DOS window, after it ends, type C.
7 Enter 100 for the number of concurrent half-open connections and press Enter.
8 Type Y and the file should be patched. Cancel any Windows XP warnings that should appear, it is part of
Microsoft's way of ensuring its files are not tampered with (the utility tempers them to break the limit on purpose).

Windows Vista Users (NOT XP users, see above for XP users)

1 Go to this site -http://www.yaronmaor.net/repair.htm

2 Look for the item named -EventID4226Fix for Windows Vista (Line 2)
3 Right-click the link and click "Save Target As".
4 Save it in your Desktop.
5 Extract all contents of the file to a folder
6 If you are running 64-bit Vista, double click on InstallPatch64.bat. If you are running 32-Bit Vista, double
click on InstallPatch32.bat. Unsure? Run InstallPatch32.bat.
7 Some text should scroll by in a MS-DOS window, after it ends, type Y and press Enter.
8 After the restart notice appears, press any key and restart your PC.

1 A Bit Torrent Client -I recommend uTorrent. This guide uses uTorrent for the tutorial.
2 And finally, some torrents to kick off the download. A sample torrent file will be provided later.

DOWNLOAD

As of October 2007, the latest version is 1.7.5.

Getting to the file:

1 Click on this download page -http://www.uTorrent.com/download.php
2 Click "Get µTorrent 1.7.5 Stable (214 KB)". Choose to RUN it.
3 If any security dialogs appear, click Run as we know this is a safe file.

Configuring uTorrent
The configuration part is where most people mess up. Most of us will just click through the dialogs accepting the default
values. This may apply to some of us, but not the majority.

1 Run the program. Ignore the security warning (Click Run) -we know perfectly well that the file is legitimate.
2 It will give the following dialog:

You want the program to be easily accessible, don't you? Click Yes and the shortcut will be created in your desktop
and start menu.
3. And the next dialog box is the most important step Now the value that we are interested in right now is the Upload
Limit in kB/s (aka KBps). If you have trouble understanding your speed, consider this: Internet Explorer shows
download speed as KBps when you download a file.

There is a big difference between 5Kbps and 5KBps. Make sure you got the right values in KBps (not kbps, the
case of 'b' matters) . Use Google Calculator if you need help with conversions.

4. Click Current Settings The authors of uTorrent have been very helpful in providing a list of predefined values. Your
connection should be near to one of the above categories. "xx/384k" means that your download is unlimited and your
upload is limited to 384kbps (which is 48KBps by Google Calculator).
 With your results of the speed test you did above, select the closest upload speed from the list. uTorrent
immediately adjusts the "Affected Settings" area with recommended values for your upload speed. We're not
finished yet.

Note: The default download speed in utorrent is Unlimited. Even if your download is limited, it is always better
to leave it at unlimited to get maximum download speeds. However, if you need to limit your download speeds,
right-click the utorrent icon on the system tray (bottom right), click Download Limit and set accordingly. You can
also set this in the Preferences dialog.

Note: uTorrent randomly generates a port number in Current Port. This guide assumes the port number to be
55641 -but you can substitute it with the number uTorrent shows.

5. Port forwarding is also important. Click on "Test if port is forwarded properly" to run the test. If you have trouble
running the test, it could be due to one or more of the following reasons:

1 Home Router If you are running a router (sometimes called wireless access point) at home, you will have to
configure it to route all TCP / UDP bit torrent traffic to port 55641 to your computer. If so, visit this page for a guide on
how to port forward. Click the router you are using and follow instructions.
2 Personal Firewall If you are running a firewall software such as Norton Internet Security, Norton Personal
Firewall, ZoneAlarm, etc, then configure your firewall such that uTorrent has access to port 55641. This is normally
accomplished by starting up utorrent, and the firewall should spring up an access alert. Simply select the option to
"Always Allow" the program to access the Internet.

Windows Firewall Users

uTorrent will automatically configure Windows Firewall for you so there is no action needed from you.

1 Corporate Firewall Are you running this software in a corporate network? Bad news -you have to inform the
admin that you want the port to be directed to your computer. The good news -you can still go by without port
forwarding, but speeds will not be optimal.
2 Utorrent.Com Port Forward Checking Website has a problem Yes, especially if you are accessing the
Internet through a transparent proxy that your ISP forces you to use. This simply means that the website is reporting false
info, and the best way to verify that your port is forwarded is to proceed into the next step. This case is very unlikely as
utorrent.com uses a different port for checking.

Having done all the above, if the website still says that it has problems accessing the port, the ultimate test
will be when we do a test file downloading. Let's click on Use Selected Settings.

6. Now you see the full uTorrent window in full glamour.

Starting a simple torrent
We need to start a simple download, and the one that will be using is a 650MB file of Ubuntu! It is a perfectly legal and
free file to download. We will be downloading this file purely for testing and delete it later on (as it is of no use to us)

1 Minimize uTorrent for now. Notice it resides on the system tray (bottom right) automatically.
2 Click to http://torrent.ubuntu.com:6969/.
3 Look at the column labeled "complete". Find the row with the largest value. A quick way is to scan for a 4 digit
value.
4 Now download the torrent -click the link in the 2nd column of that row
5 You should get this dialog:

This is the metadata file, it contains information on the file you want to download eventually. That is why it is so
small. We want uTorrent to automatically start downloading it, so click Open.

NOTE: The "Name and Type" may differ on your system. This is normal, as Ubuntu is frequently updated

6. The file opens with uTorrent which automatically pops up this dialog (scaled for easier viewing) All values are
automatically filled in for you. Here is also where you select files that you don't want to download -if the download
has many files which in this case is not. Remember where the file is stored in "Save As", or save it in a different
location that is more convenient for you.
 All looking good, click OK.

Progress of the Download

Click on the Ubuntu torrent (the only item in the list) to view more information on it. Suddenly all the values begin
filling up!
Looks like the torrent has a total of 2703 seeds and 247 downloaders. 2703 seeds is a lot and it means you should get the
full file in no time! A seed is a term used to refer to peers who have downloaded and sharing the complete file.

However, after running for 5 minutes, the speed refuses to go above 20 KB/s, which is not possible for a highly
seeded torrent. Could it be my ISP throttling?

Enabling Protocol Encryption and Increasing Max Half Open Connections

uTorrent by default disables protocol encryption. We need to enable this so that the ISP's packet shaping hardware will
detect our bit torrent traffic as normal traffic and hopefully let it pass.

1 Click on Options, Preferences.

2 Click on BitTorrent.

1 You should get a dialog similar to one below

2 The one we are concerned about is Protocol Encryption. Set the Outgoing to Enabled.
3 Click on Advanced.
Change the "net.max_halfopen" value to 50 by selecting the line, changing the value at the bottom to 50 and clicking
Set.

NOTE: It is normal for a asterisk(*) to appear. This is to indicate that the value has been changed from the default value.
6. Click OK. Stop all torrents, wait 10 seconds, and Start the torrent. Now let's watch the speeds.

Hopefully, the above changes will improve speeds. Ultimately, it depends on the number of seeders and peers with high
upload rate. Remember, you must upload to enjoy good download rates, but not so high that it affects download speed.
Experiment.
Further Things You Can Try For Optimum Speed
Pointers 3-7 below have the potential to affect your speeds positively and negatively. Experiment.

1. There should be a green tick at the bottom, not a exclamation mark as below.

If uTorrent keeps showing this even after 5 minutes, check the possible causes.

1 To get more peers, right-click the entry on the list, and click Update Tracker. Do this especially if you are on a
private tracker before you exit the application, so that your ratio is maintained.
2 Setting a high upload can sometimes slow down a fast torrent. For example, in my ADSL connection, if I do
upload at 10KB/s I can get up to 350KB/s. If I upload at 30KB/s, the download speed gets limited to 200KB/s. The total
upload available to me is 60KB/s.

This is where you have to experiment by setting a low upload rate (from 10 at Preferences > Network) and
watching if the speeds increase for 5 minutes, especially if the torrent is heavily seeded.

But remember, you must upload in order for peers to share their downloaded data with you. It is possible to set a
very low upload, but the chance of peers sending you their data will decrease, pulling down your download speed.

1 Some people have reported speed increases by setting the peer.lazy_bitfield setting to false in Advanced
Preferences. However, in my case, it lowered the speeds.
2 Change the Protocol Encryption (Options, Preferences, Bittorrent) to Forced. This will force encryption on all
outgoing packets and will not fallback to un-encrypted mode if the peer refuses to co-operate. Good to connect to only
encryption-enabled peers. Avoid doing this for torrents with low peers/seeds.
3 Remove the check for "Allow Incoming Legacy Connections" (Options, Preferences, Bittorrent). This will
make all your outgoing and incoming packets fully encrypted, except for tracker communications. Peers who are using a
torrent software that doesn't support encryption are dropped. Avoid doing this for torrents with low peers/seeds.
4 Avoid private trackers, especially those with torrents that specifically tell utorrent to disable DHT (effectively
disabling Peer Exchange and Local Peer Discovery too). You can tell if the torrent is private by selecting the torrent and
looking at the DHT value. If it says "disabled", it is a private torrent.

That said, the main reason private trackers exist is because they enforce sharing rules that tries to prevent a person
from downloading a torrent and running off without uploading back the same amount of data he downloaded.

For new and popular torrents on such trackers, you may be able to get good speeds as everyone will be trying to
increase their upload/download ratio. Again, experiment. The key point here is the seeds/leechers ratio and the
popularity of them in public and private trackers.
8. Check the Availability column for the torrent. If it is less than 1, chances are that the torrent is new and the original
uploader is still uploading. However, if it remains at a value less than 1 (eg, 0.98) for more than a day, either the
torrent does not have seeds or it is fake. (Thanks TTbarDJ)