What is your favorite P2P client?

[megalomania]

Not everybody likes P2P clients, but I think they are the wave of the future. I use kazaa exclusively. I recently tried to install both edonkey and overnet on my computer, but both crashed on install. I remember I may have tried them like a year ago but you needed some sort of 20 MB windows pack to go along with it? I don’t quite remember. I am using win 2000 with Mcafee viruscan if anyone can suggest something I may have done wrong.

I tried Direct Connect some time ago, but with only a 2 GB hard drive I didn’t exactly qualify for any of the nodes. The user interface sucked anyway.

I have used morpheous and bearshare, but I never did get any successful downloads.

There is that new one by the Palestinians which worked good, although it is still small. It has the ability to stealth your connection for what that claim is worth. I forget what it is, I don’t have it since I reformatted my hard drive a months back. There is a thread around here somewhere about it.

I know there are many more. I occasionally visit a website called zeropaid.com which keeps tabs on all of the P2P clients out there, the theme being zero paid (get it, all the free stuff you can download?). I think they are promoting some Fuck the RIAA shirts nowadays, so you know where they stand :)

Since obtaining my CD-RW drive I have been acquiring more software. I have an almost complete collection of all Adobe software, not that I will ever use it, and none of the video stuff can run on my slow ass PC, but I may need it one day. Lately I have been trying to get the game Call of Duty. I have only downloaded a few games in my life, they are too big and disappear too fast. Since I anticipate a new PC over the holidays, and I like the commercial for the game, I thought I would try and get it. Despite there being many people on Kazaa who have it, I have yet to download so much as a single bit :( This is distressing since at 1.4GB it will take me some 60 hours on my crappy dialup, and even then only a few hours a day. To not get anything is no good, no good at all. If anybody would care to hook me up… (I’ll need the greater part of 2 full weeks to get it).

[photonic]

My favorite peer-to-peer client is Direct Connect. But, you're right, without a large share it's useless because you can't get into any of the good hubs. There are a number of reasons why I like Direct Connect, the main one being that it's supported on my platform. Also, DC(Direct Connect) is not very good for small files(i.e. mp3, pictures,...), but it's excellent for larger files such as full videos, software, or games. The learning curve for DC is steep though and it can be hard to get accustomed to. Gettinga connection can be troublesome as well. However, if you can find your way onto a good hub(such as a private university hub on inet2 :) ), it's the best client. Nothing like downloding at 999 KBps. I wouldn't recommend it for anyone with less than 30GB to share though. Most decent hubs have a min of 30GB and the better hubs have minimums of around 100GB. Luckily, I qualify for both. So, it works for me.


EDIT:

I apologize. I was thinking of P2P in traditional sense. The unequivocal *BEST* peer-to-peer client is BitTorrent. The protocol is ingenious. The only negatives to it are finding what you want and not being able to preview partially downloaded movies. Other than that, it is definately my favorite way to get files. I regularly get speeds of over 150KBps and, unlike other peer-to-peer clients, it forces you to share for at least a time. I recommend it to anyone who's not an ass(leave your torrents open after you're finished and help the community).

[darkdontay]

For the amount of files and the amount of user bandwidth and lower download times
-Kazaa or other Shaman Networks client.

For ease of listing a file to download
-ED2k

[Nihilist]

For security and protection from RIAA and such, undoubtedly it's ES5. BitTorrent is a good idea, but it would be greatly improved by a larger user base. eDonkey and Overnet are good for searching for the rarer stuff that isn't anywhere else. Kazaa seems to be the best overall, except it's popularity(and thus quality) has declined due to the RIAA attempting to sue everyone on it. However, www.sharelive.com was the best resource to find files, until it became a pay site(i'm sure it's still good, but i'm not gonna pay $$ every month to find out =p)

[IDTB]

I haven't been too much in experimenting with different P2P software as of the past year. I've tried Morpheus, BearShare, and Kazaa. Kazaa comes with alot of baggage, so I've been using K Lite K++ for the past year(about). I really can't complain much.

RANT: I really try to use P2P as a last resort. I tend to get incredibly pissed off when I spend 12hours downloading a 2GB file to find out it's junk and the community at large refuses to delete the file after they've spent their own 12hours downloading the 2GB file of junk.

http://doa2.host.sk/ for K Lite K++.

[crackedchemist]

Well a recent court proceeding stated that the RIAA cant sue to get the IP address's of the people sharing files. Since thats the only legal way they can find it and now that they cant even do that i think your pretty safe. If they sue you just say "well howd ya get my IP?". That should end that case pretty soon. Now as for P2P and file shareing i like IMesh I nearly maxed out my cable modems transfer limit or whatever on it so i think its pretty fast.....

[Skyscraper]

Originally posted by crackedchemist
Well a recent court proceeding stated that the RIAA cant sue to get the IP address's of the people sharing files. Since thats the only legal way they can find it and now that they cant even do that i think your pretty safe. If they sue you just say "well howd ya get my IP?". That should end that case pretty soon. Now as for P2P and file shareing i like IMesh I nearly maxed out my cable modems transfer limit or whatever on it so i think its pretty fast.....
What?

They can't SUE TO GET THE IP? I think you mean, they can't sue to get the customer's name that's associated with the IP at that time from the ISP. And as far as that goes, most of the time they don't even have to, many ISP's will buckle to legal pressure and just give the name away.

------------------------
Don't quote whole posts!

Rhadon

[Voyager]

I recently switched from KaZaA w/ K Lite K++ to eMule and I am very happy.

eMule checks my entire share, not just the download directory, to prevent me from downloading duplicate files.

[krimmie]

I've tried Kazaa, but deleted the bastard after too many slow downloads(I have DSL). I have since been using Limewire with much better results.

[T_Pyro]

Kazaa Lite used to be my favourite, but I gave it up after getting fed-up with the recent upsurge in the no. of bogus file.

I now rely exclusively on "Ares", which has a user interface that is similar to, but far better than Kazaa's. The download speeds are off the scales (and I'm not kidding, netstat reports peaks of 18 Kbytes/sec!), and till date, there's been no file that I couldn't find on the network.

Ares 1.81:
http://www.softgap.com/setup.exe

[Anath]

You know Mega, I'm sure that if you got yourself a P.O box somewhere, and posted the address on here, all sorts of mysterious and wonderful stuff might appear in it, like warez CDs/DVDs, cash donations, interesting textbooks for scanning...

And if none of it is solicited, you can't possibly get into any trouble.

[glith]

dc++ is good in many ways, but i think it takes all your bandwidth... so then you could use something like pDC... but then you want get in to some hubs. since they dont like pDC.

bit torrent is pretty good, though i like burst! (torrent) more... k-lite is nice if you want just a special song, but not for downloading movies...

the best alternative though is ftp.

btw, anyone who use hotline? used it some years ago when it was free...

[zaibatsu]

Any advice for P2P programs for people behind firewalls? It's nice having a fast connection, but little use without P2P.

[Jacks Complete]

zaibatsu,

the obvious question is, can't you tweak the firewall settings?

Most firewalls reject unrequested data packets, but P2P requests them, so you should be ok. Certainly KazzaLite works through both my home firewall, my uni firewall, and via both Blueyonder (Telewest) broadband and BT broadband.

Where/what are you connecting from?

[zaibatsu]

Kazaa, edonkey, winmx, even IRC don't work here, which is behind a university firewall

[Fencer]

Currently i'm using DC++. I have tried Kazaa and didn't like it. It take forever to download a file and when you get the file it is most likely corrupted. Only disadvantage of using DC++ is, like photonic said, that small files like mp3-files are downloaded quite slowly.

[Skyscraper]

WASTE is EXCELLENT for getting data through firewalls like yours, but it's not really a full-fledged P2P client, as the network is small, unless you join the large central mesh. But if you have a few friends, it's super for being able to share libraries with each other. It also uses public key encryption, which is nice.

[Voyager]

eMule seemed to survive my NAT/firewall well, even before I added port configuration just for it.

But... it all depends on how your firewall is configured.

What inbound and outboung ports are open?

Try eMule and tell us what you find.

[T_Pyro]

Which firewall are you using? ZoneAlarm, I've seen, strangulates Kazaa as well as Ares, but Sygate Personal Firewall works fine with both. No amount of tweaking that I tried could get ZoneAlarm to work with P2P clients.

[Rhadon]

Zaibatsu, try to change the ports of your filesharing programs to something they allow, e.g. 80 (HTTP) and 21 (if they don't block FTP).

[wrench352]

The first time I ever used ZoneAlarm I had a problem with emule. Now Im using ZoneAlarm 2.6.362 and Im running both kazaalite and emule at the same time(on dial up no less) with no noticeable difference.

[zaibatsu]

Bear with me, I know very little about these kind of things. I went to eMule preferences, clicked connection, and under clientport changed the TCP to 21, and it still says all the servers appear to be dead. I think FTP is ok as far as they are concerned, as I've downloaded programs from FTP servers already.

[Rhadon]

Strange... perhaps they managed to ban P2P protocols from their network. The only thing I can imagine you could try is playing around with the TCP and UDP port settings a bit. Try to enter the values 80, 20, 21, 22. Or, if you're willing to use a less conventional filesharing program, you could use DC++ (http://dcplusplus.sourceforge.net/). Don't know if it will work, but it's quite different from Kazaa, eMule and the like.

[zaibatsu]

Unfortunately DC++ doesn't work, and neither does eMule on any of those settings. Does anyone know if KazaaHTTP will help me out? Downloaded and installed it, but can't figure out how it works.

[Fencer]

Unfortunately DC++ doesn't work

Did you use Active or Passive mode? I can't get any search results when using Active mode but when using Passive mode, the search is succesful. It has something to do with my ISP, most likely i'm behind NAT and that's why it wont' work in Active mode.

Here is some info how you can switch between different modes:
http://www.finx.org/en-index.htm

[zaibatsu]

Finally managed to get something that works behind this damn firewall! If anyone else has problems, using Filetopia, while pretty crap itself, should work.

[Corona]

For small files.. or the occasional pirated movie.. I use Kazaa-Lite (the one without the ads and stuff).

But for serious stuff the thing I've found most useful is a Torrent client. The best torrent client, in my opinion, Shadow's Bit Tornado:

http://bittornado.com/

The quality and quantity of stuff available is unmatched by any other kind of P2P. And, of course, you only share the file you are currently downloading... no large share folder needed. But its for broadband users only (the files shared are usually pretty large). I find it very nice.

For support, you can find all the info and more here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/torrent-talk/

This thing is not stopped by ZoneAlarm Pro.. well, for me even Kazaa runs fine with ZoneAlarm...

[festergrump]

I put Kazaa on my HD about a year ago and consequently removed it a week later due to the extremely slow downloads and all the ads. As it turns out, the slow downloads were directly related to all the ads and adware they're throwing at you.

There's a 100% free download (it's only about 700+ kb if my memory doesn't fail me) that I got from Download.com (http://download.com.com/3120-20-0.html?qt=diet+k&tg=dl-2001) called "Diet K". They're not affiliated with Kazaa and really make it work like it was originally intended (much to Kazaa's chagrin!).

After downloading the regular (ad-littered) Kazaa package and installing it, install Diet K and it removes all the adware and spyware first, then blocks all the ads and pop-ups while running Kazaa. It makes those downloads extremely fast! (I use a 56k dial-up, and I'm getting comparable speeds to my friend with DSL). Kazaa does slap the spyware on the HD, read the disclaimer... :mad:

Needless to say, I'm back at the Kazaa again, but after giving the bitch a diet I don't mind one bit. It's the best P2P in my opinion.

[Zerstoren Sie]

Among p2p apps. I've tried, I really like soulseek the best. Of course, it is mostly centered on music, but a great deal of other stuff is there too. Music wise, it's the best I've seen since Audiogalaxy, maybe better, I've found stuff I never knew existed, and all in album format.

Other apps I've ran include DC++, Kazza K++, Emule, Shareazza, and of course, audiogalaxy, when it existed.

Soulseek can be used to share any file type you wish, and it has limited ability to change the port settings for use with a firewall. Emule seemed to have the best capabilty to change the port settings to run behind a firewall that cant be configured by yourself (college, etc..)

As for a firewall, I use Kerio personal firewall, I've found it to be my favorite. Running it along with Norton AV 2004 professional, and the spybot, spywareblaster combo, plus a router, I've found that my system runs beatifully, I can run for a month or two straight and not get a single piece of sypware (at least not ones detectable by my spyware soft. ) I can honestly say, that I've never had a computer run so good as the one I use now.

Oh, also, if anyone is interested in the soulseek p2p app, it can be found at http://www.slsknet.org/ I believe that site may only have version 152, there is 153 out, and can be found by looking in the links or faqs and tutorials area.

[darkdontay]

Since no one [including me till now] has stood up to represent shareaza I will

Shareaza is a damn nice program it will runs many networks: EDonkey2000, Gnutella, BitTorrent and Shareaza's native network, Gnutella2 (G2).

http://www.shareaza.com

[akinrog]

Since no one [including me till now] has stood up to represent shareaza I will

Dear Darkdontay,
I tried the program and I am really surprised to have transfer speeds of 60+ kb download and 10+ kb of downloads. I am very grateful for your hint on your P2P networks. :) Thank you very much.

[passhahkhan]

many of my friends and i feel that *Kazaa Lite Resurrection* is the best p2p client out there. With a lot of users there are great chances to find what you are looking for with many sources for excellent speed.

BUT make sure that you use *Diet K* with it for more speed and sources.

I personally use *Kazaa Lite Resurrection* with *Diet K* and *Kazaa Download Accelerator Pro* all runing simultaneously and it works just fine and fast.

I've tried *eMule* and *overnet* and it finds the file but it is usually unable to download and if it does then downloads at dead speeds.

[utax]

I think that best P2P program is DC++ from dcplusplus.sourceforge.net.
It uses direct connect hubs. Of course u will need good share.

[Davo]

Another P2P program that looks promising is Mute (from sourceforge.net). It might seem simple and maybe a little slow but the programmers seem to have gone to great lengths to keep users anonymous. (should piss the RIAA off alot)
As for Kazaa, i would only use Kazaalite 2.4.x and no other version.
DO NOT use earthstation5, that has been proven to contain malware
Kazaalite is turning crappy because there's too much porn and fake files being shared and not much useful content

[FUTI]

I can only agreed about P2P being a future step. I know little about programs involved...like WinMX, BearShare, eMule, Kaaza etc. Main purpose that it is used for is of course as mentioned here a mp3 download. BearShare and Kaaza heve large problem with virus and security issues. WinMX works fine, my friend is satified with eMule. I also tried to use some gnuttela like programs but didn't make it work. Rest of the programs you guys mentioned are obscure to me (or untested jet:)). If you guys at the end make a multi-node ftp network that will make this forum live I have a sugestion. I'm sure most of you know about Gutenberg project. Well long time ago when I find it I also downloaded a program
that make your job easier. When you won't to download electronic book you start a program, pick a server close to you and search for the book to be downloaded. It's a small and handy tool that I liked very much. I'm not sure that it will work here since I used it only for txt type of files. :D

[-=thrasher=-]

Crappy names, but the ed2k (and the included kademelia serverless network) network and clientset is in many ways a step ahead of its brethren in the P2P world.
I hope not to spam the thread, but here is a summary of my observations:
Good hashing and filename management - prevents dupe downloads, shows alternate source filenames.
Comment system - rate files and attach comments to mark fakes, good etc.
Speed, tcp/udp throttling - You don't have to give up your whole bandwidth just to run P2P. Control aggregate upload/download bitrates, sources per file, tcp/udp new-connection-per-second control (avoid busting NAT tables), port definitions, detection and communication of firewalled or live ip status (allows passive exchange to allow firewalled clients to serve)
Corruption-proof - detects and reacquires corrupt chunks
Rare-file optimised - Prevents the "missing-last-10%" problem
Credit system - reward uploaders
Automatic server management - ranking, hopping, querying
Dual networks - server-based, and serverless. Operates on both, simultaneously.
Stats that make your eyes bleed :p

It is an open-source SourceForge hosted project, which means no Kazaa nonsense, spyware, system-hogging. It's set and forget.
Seems to be used for large files, and its complete indexing system (compared to others) means if it's out there, you'll find it.

http://www.emule-project.net/

[Zerstoren Sie]

Among p2p apps. I've tried, I really like soulseek the best. Of course, it is mostly centered on music, but a great deal of other stuff is there too. Music wise, it's the best I've seen since Audiogalaxy, maybe better, I've found stuff I never knew existed, and all in album format.

Other apps I've ran include DC++, Kazza K++, Emule, Shareazza, and of course, audiogalaxy, when it existed.

Soulseek can be used to share any file type you wish, and it has limited ability to change the port settings for use with a firewall. Emule seemed to have the best capabilty to change the port settings to run behind a firewall that cant be configured by yourself (college, etc..)

As for a firewall, I use Kerio personal firewall, I've found it to be my favorite. Running it along with Norton AV 2004 professional, and the spybot, spywareblaster combo, plus a router, I've found that my system runs beatifully, I can run for a month or two straight and not get a single piece of sypware (at least not ones detectable by my spyware soft. ) I can honestly say, that I've never had a computer run so good as the one I use now.

Oh, also, if anyone is interested in the soulseek p2p app, it can be found at http://www.slsknet.org/ I believe that site may only have version 152, there is 153 out, and can be found by looking in the links or faqs and tutorials area.


I didn't think of it while writing this post, but Soulseek may actually be a decent option for sharing with forum members. There is a user list, and the software is easily configured so only those on your list may download. It is a direct connection however, but as long as everyone watches who they share with, it'd be no problem.

[Bugger]

I have had good results using Winmx, at least up to version 3.31, and the file-sharing content in the way of scientific-related files is generally good. However, a problem I have encountered, since getting DSL broadband over a year ago, is that it is almost impossible for other people to connect to me for uploads to them on Winmx, even after numerous tries. Can anyone suggest a remedy?

Bugger.

[akinrog]

Bugger, I don't know if that product's web site provides instructions for that. However, you must open certain (i.e. necessary) ports on your router through configuration app. I am also using Shareaza, and I opened all the ports that the app uses. In this manner you may use it properly.

In addition you must also use internet security applications to prevent abuse of these ports.

[Bugger]

Thanks, Akinrog. I will look into the ports question.

Bugger.

[PTLIS]

Sorry to bump this thread but I feel it's worth mentioning that the eMule p2p network now supports the KAD peer-peer network as well as the traditional client-peer network that we're all used to with eMule; giving it some of the benefits of the fasttrack network used by the likes of kazaa (totally distributed network with no need for servers to coordinate everything) and the benefits of the gnutella/bittorrent networks (leechers are penalised and seeds are given benefits such more bandwidth being used to upload to them and in the case of eMule a default higher position in ques). More detailed information on the Kademlia algorithm used for this can be found on this (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kademlia) wikipedia page including some of the security benefits when compared to the likes of the fasttrack network (IP addresses are not used to identify clients, instead a virtual network is created where nodes are given a random ID number).

[Jacks Complete]

PTLIS, can you not still get the IP address by looking at the packet headers? Or does it encrypt the data?

I've tried the torrent solutions, but they are pretty crap for anything except the really popular files, since all the torrent lists are now "register and pay" crap. Hence you cannot find anything! (I only installed it to try to get the torrents from here, but they still don't seem to work, since the .torrent files aren't being sent out.)

I got a copy of Ares, and it seems pretty good. Fast downloads, certainly, and lots of content.

[Nano]

I am useing eMule. It is free and popular and also has a lot of people sharing.

[Larry the 1337]

NObody here uses bearshare? Bearshare has a gay name, but its a good program.. bearshare lite gets rid of the stupid adware that comes with the normal version.

Definately worth checking out.

[tmp]

I started off with Kazaa Lite then I downloaded and installed Diet K to
run with it. Diet K does indeed clobber the adware and spyware sent
through my ISP.

[megalomania]

I have been using emule this past week and a half, and I must say I enjoy it. It is about as fast as Direct Connect, but it has many more files, and of course no annoying connecting to hubs all the time. My individual connection speeds are pathetic, but I make up in volume what I lose in individualism by having dozens of files in my queue.

[Mumble]

I've been using a program called "Warez" lately. It's not horrible. The content is there, expecially if you LOVE porn. There isn't so much on the warez side despite the name. They claim no adware or spyware, but I don't believe it. There are reports of it being added to users computers. I almost wonder if it is from files they download though. My connection is a bit slower through this than through Kazaa or Scour. My only real gripe is the program really sucks up the resources. I usually queue up a few dozen files and go to bed so it doesn't bother me though.

You can get the program through download.com.

[Gedi]

I usually use the old style P2P of usenet binaries groups. It usually has a load of stuff both old and new. And its free as well with most cable/dsl services. I usually use Grabit for newsgroup services.

I had used e-donky, kazza, direct connect, and others in the past. Even did some private FTP trading with different groups. So far usenet has been the most consistent for me.

Still trying to track down that darn rogue science explosive torrent ;)

[nuclearattack]

For me eMule is simply the best! I found everything on it also docs on HEs and similar arguments, now eMule has been improved with kademlia protocol that makes it more stable even if a server crashes becouse this protocol is serverless like winmx, it needs only one server for the startup then it is indipendent.
I use also Bittorrent, it's very fast but also weak because it depends by trackers placed on sites (RIAA and other fucking companies are trying to close that sites) and you cannot find docs on HEs and so on.
Anyway Bittorrent is improving with Exeem...it's a bittorrent protocol that doesn't need a tracker on a site and it has also the fuction "search" like eMule, maybe this will be the future of bittorrent.

[Silentnite]

MPAA released a new program for parents that searches for Illegally downloaded music. But not suprisingly it just searches for anything *.mp3, *.mpeg, *.avi, *.music, and *.movies.... It doesn't distinguish between your legal ones and illegal ones. :eek: It displays it in a list and asks you to delete them (even your windows media files). It shows up with a checklist so you can check which ones to delete. Then it asks if you want to search for P2P clients. If it finds them it asks if you want to uninstall and then without waiting starts the uninstall.

It supposedly doesn't contact the MPAA or anything with the list, but people have been catching odd transmissions from it.. so its not likely. :mad:

BTW, I personnally still use Bittorrent. The Pirate Bay (www.thepiratebay.org) is a good one. I think I've said that before....

[newcastle]

I have been advised not to post for a while but i feel this is a great topic to be my first and I apologizes if this has already been stated i merely scanned through this topic. I have come across a program made to make p2p shairing a bit safer for all who use it. It is mady by a group or company by the name Phoenix labs.It is a program called peer guardian 2.In my opinion it is amassing.A must have if you use a p2p client.I use azureus as well as limewire pro((edit if necessary)i can tell you how to get it free if interested)

Info on the program is here...
http://phoenixlabs.org/pg2/

the direct download link from source forge is here...
http://sourceforge.net/project/downloading.php?groupname=peerguardian&filename=pg2-050918-nt.exe&use_mirror=easynews

-newcastlescott-

[Frunk]

BitComet coupled with Torrentspy as the site where I get my torrents...

BitComet is easier to customize and I'm not forced to share, therefore I can choose what needs sharing and not blow my 15gb/month upload limit.

Torrentspy.com is just great, they've got the latest episodes of Stargate up two hours after it's aired while other torrent sites need a few days for them to show up.

[atlas#11]

I use Shareaza, if only because it's opensource.

I like alot of the filter features, allowing to filter based on file size is a big plus, plus the multi-network conectivity makes for very diverse search results.

[sbovisjb1]

PeerGuardian uses proxies... not that safe. Use I2P, which is an application layer for a darknet. The best out there is IRC. If you know where to go, you can get almost anything and currently the idiots at iDefense and such other agenceys are not worried. Bittorent is nice, but there are better ways to get information.

Also change some grammer, namley i/I and it is advised to have posted this in the watercooler, instead of FTP and P2P section.

[megalomania]

I have been using peerguardian for about 2 years now, and I rather like it. As far as most appz go it does not seem to crash or conflict with anything. What PG is is essentially a blacklist of known anti-P2P organizations, media companies, government IPs, and other evil ne're-do-wells intent on enforcing immoral and illegal copyright laws.

HBO is known to poison torrents of episodes of Rome and The Sopranos. Using PG seems to improve your chances. I have heard of many people who try to download these torrents getting their firewall pinged for days afterwards by evil HBO criminals. PG keeps those IPs from ever learning your identity.

The true usefulness of PG may be debatable, but it certainly does not hurt to add this layer of security.

[2ndamendment]

If your very comfortable with torrents and making a few modifications to your internet connection. Azureus is not a bad one. You can get high speeds with a firewall and without a correct mapping port(UPnp.) Or at least i can. ;)

[chemdude1999]

I agree, Azureus is a good torrent client. It has tons of options and extra plugins from the cool to the functional. It uses the java runtime environment, so it takes a bit more time and effort to set up, but it is worth it. There are multiple FAQs that can help one optimize it. For example, use high-numbered ports to beat any download restrictions.

http://www.azureuswiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

I like PeerGuardian if for the simple fact that it has actively updated block lists.

Mega is exactly right about HBO. I've heard of others doing this, too. So, tread carefully if you are downloading a recent and/or popular show. Just a tip: Rent the shows or movies using Netflix or Blockbuster (Blockbuster has a better deal) and rip them with RipIt4Me. Then just burn them. It'll only cost you about $10-$20 a month and you can get upwards of 30 movies. Buy your own cases, go to CDCovers.cc, print the covers and you're good to go.

[DirtyDan]

I personally use uTorrent, which is quite comparable to azureus but it much more lite. PirateBay and isohunt are the main torrent sites I visit.

Does anyone have any experience running P2P through torr? I've read a few things, and recognize it is slow and bottlenecks the network, but it's still interesting.

[nbk2000]

I use µTorrent too.

Used to use Azurues, but it would sometimes freeze up my computer from using all the available RAM.

Using a P2P client through TOR is an abuse of the service that will cause it to collapse if enough people do so.

[Corona]

As BitComet is busy ruining itself (the last good version was .70... get that and sit on it), I decided to give uTorrent a try. I've used it before and it is a great client.

Unfortunately, they seem to have been sold in the slave bazaar to the MPAA.

http://slashdot.org/articles/06/12/07/2138208.shtml

Not good. Again, download and sit on the current version. Newer versions *might* be donkey'ed with in some way.

[Atra]

By far the best p2p client I've ever used is bittorrent using the uTorrent (Micro Torrent) shell. While its not great for single songs this client really shines when downloading programs, movies, CD's, or even entire discographies. The more people downloading the faster it goes. Unlike Kazaa which slows as the numbers of downloaders increases. I just like the fact that I can download 9 seasons of a show in under an hour.

[chemdude1999]

I just switched over to µTorrent based on the previous recommendations. Azureus is great, but NBK is right, it does hog the system resources.

µTorrent is great. It's very lightweight but still feature-rich. I have a 13.5 GB torrent coming down that was petering along at 1 KB on Ktorrent (my linux torrent program). I loaded the same torrent on µTorrent and it's humming at 100 KB. Thanks for the heads-up.

[DirtyDan]

I use µTorrent too.

Used to use Azurues, but it would sometimes freeze up my computer from using all the available RAM.

Using a P2P client through TOR is an abuse of the service that will cause it to collapse if enough people do so.

Gah, there I go getting my mmHg mixed up with my p2p again :) .

I know that Azureus has some built in functionality so that it can be used with TOR; it's only for communication with the tracker though or something, I'm not sure how it's supposed to work. I'm working on sifting through all the Google results.

[sbovisjb1]

If you want guides on all the different types of file sharing goto http://www.slyck.com/guides.php. They are a large sharing community which is one of the most respected. (Informatively).
PLEASE
Personally I like IRC the best. Its easy to use (once you get the hang of the commands) and files generally circulate better. Just use www.packetnews.com to search for xdcc networks and you are golden.
USE
I have a spur of the moment idea. We could set up a gigatribe. It's a secure network, where you can share files with your friends and it uses a 128 bit blowfish encryption to keep you secure.
PARAGRAPH
If anyone has found a opensource client which has the same idea... post it please. (I don't trust closed source as you don't know what they will be runtime patching.) Another alternative, could be to set up a node using http://www.apexdc.net/. PM me if you are interested.
BREAKS.
Go here: http://www.gigatribe.com/tour/accueil.php.

[hydra]

A few years back, I used the original Bearshare; which worked quite well.

Then that went to hell.

About the same time, I started using WinMX; which remains to this day my favorite user-interface. Simple and fast to use.

Unfortunately, the originators got legal-whacked and that whole network went down. It has since been brought back up by user-groups; but I don't find as much for books and software on there. Since I can't get DSL here, and don't care about movies etc. anyway, I don't know how good it is for those.

A year ago, I installed Shareaaza to try and access the gnutella/limewire network again (what Bearshare used); because the Shareaaza page hyped how "bloat free" and "fast and clean" it was. Bullshit. Shareaaza is a pig. If those guys would spend half the effort on the engine as they spend on stupid shit like 'skins' etc., then it might be a good product.

The search filters -look- like they'd be useful, but they're actually junk, because the program only allows certain ways of using them. Oh well. I still use it sometimes, but not much any more.

I installed eMule a few months back, and overall it works reasonably well.

Of course, on 28k rural dialup, -none- of these programs acts real snappy... :D

Like a couple other guys said, IRC is tops; for books anyway. There's the #bookz channel....and there's a tech books channel now too...although there aren't many people on it yet. And really, 99% of the so-called "tech" books on -all- these networks are the same old computer-related crap. Even if you look for engineering stuff, it's all computer-related. Like RF or microwave....what you find is all RF or microwave -data comm- books. sigh... :D

The mention of newsgroups was interesting. I did all my stuff that way 5-10 yrs ago...using Agent. But then got out of using NG's for anything for a number of years. It was just too damn cumbersome with dialup, and the software that was available at that time. And too frustrating....I always seemed to end up with 42 of 43 pieces; and never could find the 43rd.

But I might give it a try again. Sounds like there is some better auto-put-together software now.

I have not used torrents yet; because very few of the things I've searched for have shown up as torrents; and because the few things that did look interesting were all mega-bloat multi-hundred-MB files; which are effectively impossible to download for anyone on dialup.

Anyway, that's been my P2P experience over the past 5 years.

[chemdude1999]

I have not used torrents yet; because very few of the things I've searched for have shown up as torrents; and because the few things that did look interesting were all mega-bloat multi-hundred-MB files; which are effectively impossible to download for anyone on dialup.

Once you open the torrent file in the torrent client, you can select and deselect the files you want. You don't need to download the whole thing. Pick and choose.

[nbk2000]

That's assuming, of course, that the Torrent isn't a single RAR file, requiring that the entire thing be downloaded before you can extract the one file you want.

[megalomania]

Bitcomet has finally gone too far. I downloaded and installed the latest update, I missed a few version changes... Well, now the damn thing is riddled with advertisments.

I should have done this sooner, but I didn't want to disturb my downloads. I downloaded utorrent months ago, but i never used it. Now I switched over, and boy does it make a difference. I am getting downloads at several times the rate I was getting with bitcomet. I was about ready to bitch out my ISP for putting me on the lite plan. Now I am getting DL speeds like I was in years past.

Listen to me, I sound like a commercial :)

[Silentnite]

Please watch which programs your using. Of them all lately I've been using azureus coupled with a firewall, and PG. I had been using Utorrent and as soon as they were sold I got hit with a cease and desist letter. Bearshare is known for its spyware/adware. Emule and eDonkey networks have been subverted for the most part, and its hard to find decent prog's.

Bitcomet is bloated. So is azureus but my computer can handle it. I've heard that the early versions of uTorrent are still safe, just hard to find.

[swoonpappy]

I'm sure it has already been said, but I really enjoy LimeWire Pro (attainable through the regular limewire ;) ). Always super fast downloads (40k+) and usually has a good selection of media. Personally though, nothing beats good ol' Bit Torrent.

[nbk2000]

I've got version1.6.1 of µTorrent, and can upload it if that's a 'safe' version.

I always turn off auto-updating on any software I use (if at all possible), since you never know when they'll get sneaky and change it on you into something less desireable.

Enabling encryption and auto-randomizing of ports helps too.

[Silentnite]

I had forgotten to include a website thats good for finding out the latest in p2p torrent news. http://torrentfreak.com/

If you search there's an article on enabling encryption in Azureus, uTorrent, and bitcomet. It also ran the article on uTorrent selling out.

[Thothmez]

Few years ago, when I began using the P2P Kazaa, it didn't work as I expected, so I jumped to Morpheus which also didn't work as I expected, then I found Shareaza that worked very well until I found eMule that by far worked better than all previously mentioned above. The sequence was:

1 - Kazaa
2 - Morpheus
3 - Shareaza
4 - eMule

But it would be very important to understand how to connect them and where to connect them ( Gnutella 1 & 2) and what and how to configure those P2P to get their maximum download speed.

There are many place in the internet where you can download the Shareaza or eMule, sure there are more advanced and fast ways to share and download big files. The superNZB is one of then go to wikipedia and read about I am sure you going to like it.

I hope the information here can help those that are looking for it.
"The map is not the territory" - Alfred Korzybski

[Gimlet]

I've got version1.6.1 of µTorrent, and can upload it if that's a 'safe' version.

I always turn off auto-updating on any software I use (if at all possible), since you never know when they'll get sneaky and change it on you into something less desireable.

That's always good advice! I have 1.6 build 474 and I haven't detected anything nasty in it yet.

Enabling encryption and auto-randomizing of ports helps too.

Auto-randomizing of ports is not possible if you use a router and have the port forwarding set up properly but it should be safe enough if you don't use any of the common ports, I use a fairly high number usually.

[ca8680]

This is my first post since i joined (Hope i don't get in trouble, but I'm not asking for anything so i shouldn't worry), The programs i currently use are Utorrent 1.6.1 Build 490. Its super fast an i always get 60+ sometimes even 300+ if there are lots of seeders. Thats what i recommend for Torrents.

But for a simple P2P i have found ares. It is a great little program it doesn't kill your resources like limewire or morpheus does.

++++++++++++

The letter I is always capitalized, when used in reference to yourself.

Take a week off to memorize this fact.

NBK

[Keserian]

I tend to use the Torrent system for all of my downloads. I've found that it's faster than most of the "Kazaa" style file sharing networks out there. I'm sitting behind a 20mb/s cable line, so I'm really only limited by the upload of my peers.

As for the client I use, I'm partial to BitComet, I've found it to be less resource hungry than the JAVA based Azureus. I've been thinking about other clients, but to be honest, it's too much of a pain to switch. I use the demonoid.com site for my torrents, and they force you to seed to at least a 1:1 ratio, and getting the old torrents back can be a pain.

About the ads on BitComet, I personally don't find them that annoying. They're ads. I look at my BitComet screen about three times, 1. When I download the torrent, 2. When I check the speed, 3. when the task completes. So, the ads aren't that much of an issue. Now, if it was full-blown spyware/adware, I'd have a fit.

I think that P2P clients are a little bit like Operating Systems, each to his own. I'm a gamer so I like Windows and Linux, a friend of mine is a graphic designer, so he likes Macs. I've seen people get pretty vitriolic about P2P clients. They all do roughly the same thing: allow us to get stuff for free. Enough said.

[mbplay37]

Azurues for torrents and Bearshare 5.2.5 for smaller files. Most bearshare distros are loaded with spyware but this was the last release before they turned "legal", and has no spyware attached.

[Kaydon]

I use LimeWire for my music needs, and uTorrent for my movie/television show needs.

However, I've been noticing uTorrent slows my computer down, and restricts the speed of my browser (firefox) often resulting in "page cannot be found" errors upon multiple refreshings.

Haven't figured out why.

I've had great success with it, as well as Bit Torrents client.

[chemdude1999]

I still use uTorrent under Wine on Linux. It's faster than all the others for Linux right now. I tried QBitTorrent for a week and it worked but it sucked my RAM.

Last night I got 1.2MB/s on one torrent! It was sustained for a few minutes. I forget what it was (I'm a torrent whore). I tried seeding, but no connects so I removed it. That happens with massively seeded torrents.

On another note, I found the biggest torrent I've seen so far on Demonoid: 26 years of Dr. Who. It was over 200 GB. I'm not a Dr. Who fan thank god.

I have noticed more of an aggregation of information into larger and larger torrents. This is actually a good thing, if they don't zip or rar the damn things. This topic is of great interest, considering how hard certain factions are trying to dissuade such freedom. Can you imagine, one day, having access to what is for all intents and purposes the world library? And you can download it to your petabyte harddrive. A paradigm shift is occurring right now.

[Unsunghero]

I personally like bitlord, I run it under debian with cedega, it's nice and fast. For music however, I use limewire (though I will say java was NOT fun to install).

[IrishSkinny]

Kaydon: In my experience in programs such as uTorrent they all bog down your internet bringing up refresh screens like that. I can't say for sure why yours does that, however, as for my internet, if I allow the download speed to get to a higher level of KB/s then there is only so much bandwidth I'm allowed. Keep in mind I have a poor internet (not by my choice). Luckily for you, uTorrent (out of the ones I've seen and used) gives the least amount of interference with your internet browsing.

As for the original subject at hand I've found Limewire to be decent for individual songs, but seeing as how I prefer to download entire albums or discographies, I tend to stick almost entirely with uTorrent.

Seeing as how this seems related, in my mind anyway. If you do use a torrent program, http://www.scrapetorrent.com is a great torrent search website. It has it's dead torrent, and doesn't have everything, but if what you search has any form of popularity, that's a good place to start.

By the way, I run on a Windows XP Pro system, with SP2 in case it matters.

[BiasedPerfection]

As far as P2P goes I primarily use a modded emule client called morphxt which is known for it's corruption handling abilities. I previously had many corrupt files on emule and it was preventing me from fully taking advantage of the network.

Many people complain about ed2k network b/c of the slow speeds but I think it is the best p2p application because of the amount of users (almost all of china uses ed2k net), the asian and european release group scene releases, and finding obscure/rare ebooks.

In order of preference for getting what I want private ftp > usenet > torrents > ed2k > *

[Gammaray1981]

Usenet is great... but I've yet to find a decent free server. It's tiny amounts, mind, just 50p ($1) a month or something, but paying for anything online irks me.

[tmp]

Recently, I went to Overnet and a page was displayed telling me that it's
illegal to download movies/music and to do so legally. It further displayed my
internet address and informed me that the address has been logged. Are
these jerks becoming becoming snoops for MPAA/RIAA/FBI ?

I downloaded the latest version of Kazaa(3.2.7 ?) and in the setup it looks at
the files in your sharing folder to determine if any or all of them are
copyrighted material. It mistakenly identified one brief video clip as in
violation - the CNN footage of WTC 7 imploding on 9/11. How is that
"copyrighted" material that I recorded from CNN ?

I'll try the torrents next. IIRC, Overnet ran eDonkey. Well, I have a new
name for them - eDoucheBags !

[iHME]

Well Kazaa is so well known that it was sued to oblivion years a go.
Torrent, Direct Connect, ed2k and FTP/FXP are the ones to use in my opinion.

[s255]

I use torrents, I really like rtorrent, which is a text based torrent client on freeBSD and other *nix systems.

[hatal]

Did you use Active or Passive mode? I can't get any search results when using Active mode but when using Passive mode, the search is succesful. It has something to do with my ISP, most likely i'm behind NAT and that's why it wont' work in Active mode.

Here is some info how you can switch between different modes:
http://www.finx.org/en-index.htm

It was quite the opposite when I used DC. Only Passive mode, no active.

[megalomania]

I just read a story about this recently on the torrent news site TorrentFreak. Check out the article at http://torrentfreak.com/isp-level-anti-piracy-system-neutralized-by-bittorrent-081028/

This sounds very similar to the “Copyrouter” technology described in the article. This software looks at what you download on Gnutella, LimeWire, DCC+, Soulseek, and KaZaA and redirects you to some warning page, or a spam advertisement to trick you into buying something.

Notice how the gist of the article focuses on how this scumware is rendered completely obsolete with torrents.

[Alexires]

As I have said before I tend to use Azureus, because you can pick and choose which files you want....unless the ass has seeded it as one giant zipfile, but hell, I didn't pay for it so I won't complain (much).

I also like it because it has the most options buttons that I can fiddle around with. Oooooooh, shiny! :D