Thread: Get Connectable

I found this in another forum on a private tracker that i am a member of

first let me THANK YOU *unnamed* original writer/poster of this guide. I found it very useful and decided to bring it here for my fellow

"TI'ers"

I have re-worded and edited some of the original info in it mainly because it pertained to that tracker. I have also added a bit of info of my

own.


the source of this guide is: https://forums.fuckyeahtorrents.com/...t-connectable/



First of all don,t assume you are connectable.


Many people assume they are connectable, because they are successfully torrenting. That however is not always the case.


What does it mean to be connectable?


Being connectable means other peers in the swarm can make connections to you, you can make connections to other peers without being

connectable your self, IF the other peers in your swarm are good enough torrent citizens to be connectable.


Why does it matter?




Well, Many private trackers restrict people who aren't connectable, no seed bonuses are credited to people who aren't. most

importantly people who aren't connectable hurt the swarm. Each peer that isn't connectable is limited to sharing with only peers who are

connectable. If the number of peers who aren't connectable is low the result is unnoticeable, But the higher the percentage goes the slower

the swarm becomes until it dies at the point when all peers are unconnectable. There's no one left to connect to.


Why am I unconnectable? Well maybe...


-Lack of proper port forwarding.

-TURN OFF DHT, PEER EXCHANGE, LOCAL PEER DISCOVERY

-Bandwidth oversaturation, incoming or outgoing.

-Too many torrents started at once.

-Too many connections per torrent, or total.

-ISP blocking chosen port

-Router not P2P friendly

-ISP modem contains router features

-ISP proxying or firewalling your connection


What can I do about it?


Sometimes nothing. for instance if your ISP has you behind a proxy server that blocks incoming requests. If their only blocking certain ports

you can change the port you use, and if their throttling (this has nothing to do with becoming connectable.) you could use uTorrent or

Azureus and enable encryption. It may be that you are trying to torrent from a place of business with routers, proxy servers, firewalls, and/or

traffic shaping software, or appliances like websense. If your even lucky enough to get a torrent running at all, but being connectable is out of

the question.



However, most cases being connectable is fun, easy and can be done without spending any money at all.



First, make sure any anti-virus software you use isn't blocking any ports you use for torrenting



Second, set your firewall to give full access to your torrent program, don't block it in any way.



Third, set your bandwidth limits in your torrent software, if you let it use all your bandwidth to share information with your peers there may

not be enough to browse the internet or communicate with the tracker. Not being able to communicate with the tracker in a timely fashion

may cause the tracker to list you as unconnectable when you are in fact connectable. Run a speed test at Speedtest.net - The Global

Broadband Speed Test to find your up and down speeds, set your client for around 80% outgoing and 90% to 95% incoming. These numbers

aren't set in stone so feel free to play a little but make sure you are connectable first and be prepared to change them back if you run into

problems.



Fourth, Don't shutdown or start your software with a lot of torrents running. whats a lot? I think 3 would be OK, but 10 is out. The point is

shut down and start your torrents individually or groups of 2 or 3 with a pause between, and if you shutdown your computer wait for your

start up programs to finish before starting your torrents back up.



Fifth, limit the number of connections per torrent and total connections. defaults will usually work but maybe shrink it down more if your still

showing up unconnectable.



Sixth, Make sure your modem doesnt have routing features. Some newer modems have features but are not heavily configurable so the

easiest thing to do is to turn these features off if possable.



Seventh, Your router may just not be good at handling P2P protocalls like bitorrent which require many connections made over a short time.

All routers have a limited number of connections they can handle being open at any one time, some leave connections open for too long, most

notably LINKSYS WRT54G/GL/GS routers. There are fixes for this but it involves upgrading to beta or possibly third-party firmware, which

always carries risks. If you think this applies to you follow the faq on uTorrent's site but proceed with the utmost caution.




Eighth, Try using ports between 65,000 and 65,500 this works better for most people, and do not use software like PeerGuardian2. TURN OFF

DHT, PEER EXCHANGE, and LOCAL PEER DISCOVERY



Finally, and this can be the hardest part for most people, follow one of many very good guides concerning port forwarding.

Port Forwarding Guides Listed by Manufacturer and Model - PortForward.com is a good place to start.



1. Setup your computer to a static ip there are very good guides for this at portforward select the link below for your operating system and

follow the guide.



Setting a Static IP Address in WIndows Vista - PortForward.com


Setting a Static IP Address in Windows XP - PortForward.com


Setting a Static IP Address in Windows ME - PortForward.com


Setting a Static IP Address in Windows 2000 - PortForward.com


Setting a static IP in Windows 98 - PortForward.com


Setting a Static IP Address in Mac 0S X 10.4 - PortForward.com




2. Next you need to setup your router to forward the correct ports to your computer. A step by step guide for just about every router is

located at PortForward's Other Guides - PortForward.com , scroll down and select port forwarding guides by router. Just select your router, and

then click on your bit-torrent client for specific steps on how to correctly configure your setup. Remember to use the IP address you assigned

your computer in step one. Also, the port number can be almost anything you want, but I suggest using something over 50,000.



3. If you run a firewall you'll need to set it up to allow the correct traffic.

go to Port Forwarding Guides Listed by Manufacturer and Model - PortForward.com select the firewall you have and follow the steps.



4. Once you've set up all of that, make sure your client is running, then go to Open Port Check Tool

enter in the port you're using.

This page will tell you whether your port is open, stealthed, or closed.

If it is open, then you should be Connectable.




Whats the reason for all this?



Why have your computer set to a static IP?



On networks where DCHP (Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol) is running you get an IP address issued automatically when you connect.

In theory this is great but until you connect you don’t know what this IP address will be. Most routers have a set range of IP addresses to use

but how these are issued depends on the make/model of the router.




So if you set up port forwarding for the IP currently issued to your PC today, will it work tomorrow or even after a reboot? Maybe but if the

PC gets issued a different IP address your PC will never see the data on the ports you forwarded.



How can you be sure of always having the port forwarded to the right computer port – simple set up a static IP address. That way every time

the computer restarts it will be the same IP address and the port forwarding will work perfectly.



Why be connectable (or what happens when you are not)? -



A 1gig torrent is uploaded. The uploader starts seeding. 9 leechers jump on to the torrent. The torrent is going very slow. He has already

seeded 5GB but no one has completed. Turns out – they are all unconnectable. This means that the uploader needs to send 1gig of data to

each of them. If he stops seeding before they have completed the torrent it will dry up and no more data will be transferred.



You find the torrent. There's 10 seeders. You're hopeful for good speeds. Your PC starts looking for bits. The speed is slow and you only

seem to be connecting to 1 seeder.... WTH!!! Well if 9 are not connectable -this

means you'll not be able to leech very much from them and at very slow speeds.



The essence of this guide is not to get you individually faster download speeds but the reverse; faster upload speeds. The more people that

are directed to this guide and follow it properly the faster the swarm will become which means faster download speeds for everyone.



****this may not pertain to everyone but when setting up the router i had 3 different settings to choose from for my forwarding service; TCP

or UDP or BOTH but when setting the firewall i had to set 2 exceptions 1 for each so i back tracked and setup my router with 2 services as

well. Also i found a setting on the WAN settings page for the router to accept ping's from the internet....

The reason for this when i finished setting the router i downloaded the port checker available at portforward and ran the test but couldnt get

both TCP and UDP to work and i couldnt ping my router.



I hope you find this as helpful as I did.