two different download sizes

[ireland]

There are so many things wrong with this it's hard to know where to start. You don't want to check an exe file, you want to check an ISO.

i thought i was checking the .iso file but using teh command feature along with the md5sume.exe. anyway thats all behind me.
instead of going tor a download manager i went for BitTorrent. this seems to be the right idea. following the advice from the download faq section i went for BitTornado. things seem to be going preety well, slow but steady and there have been a few stops/restarts in downloads but hopefully it'll do the md5 for me and things will be great!

If you have a router (and shame on you if you are running a high speed service without one, consider getting one right away. Tun off your computer now, go out and buy one. I mean this!) then you need to forward a few ports to your BitTorrent system. How you do this is router dependent and covered well here. You can just forward ports 6881 to 6889 to the IP address you will run BitTorrent from. My router, like almost all but the oldest routers, has a feature that lets outgoing traffic trigger port forwarding. This is very handy for me since I can set up BitTorrent as a "triger application" and then no matter what computer I run BitTorrent from, the proper ports get forwarded to it. So I just create a entry in the table that watches for trigger traffic, when it sees an outbound packet on ports 6881 to 6889 it forwards that range to the system that sent the outbound packet. All done.

i do have a router (belkin wifi 54g) i read the link you provided but would the port forwarding increase the speed and is it an aditional extra or a need to have bit of stuff. i just want the download to finish so i can burn the .iso (slowly at 4x) on Nero to get cracking!

[Harry Kuhman]

i read the link you provided but would the port forwarding increase the speed and is it an aditional extra or a need to have bit of stuff. i just want the download to finish so i can burn the .iso (slowly at 4x) on Nero to get cracking!

Port forwarding is important and will speed up your download. BitTorrent is, by design, slow for leechers who are not willing to share the parts they already have with other users. It still allows you to get the file, but very slowly. This is well covered in the BitTorrent faq. Once you forward the ports and use available upload capacity, your download gets faster. Just make sure that you don't swamp your upload channel completely, that can slow your download by slowing your ability to ask for segments. In version 4.x of the official BitTorrent client there is a handy slider right in the GUI that controls your upload speed. I have DSL and have 256k bit upload capacity available. If I push the slider all the way to the right my download does slow. But if I keep it at 24k Bytes/sec or there abouts, my download is very fast, and the uploading has no significant effect on surfing or other activity either.

You can shut down BitTorrent after it says the download is done (not when it hits 100%). But many people leave it up to keep sharing their capacity with others. It really doesn't have an ill effect. If everyone used more download capacity than upload capacity, the system would fail. Fortunately, many people are will to contribute their available upload capacity to help distribute what they got. And you can even shut down for a while, do other things, even reboot and try that new Knoppix CD, but start Bittorrent again later - it can still serve the file that you downloaded. So I frequently download before I go to bed and let Bittorrent run both overnight and until I need to reboot. Then the next night or two (or whenever I think about it) I'll also start up Bittorrent and let it share what I got. As long as people use it this way the system will work well and be very fast. BitTorrent can also, by the way, be shut down durning a download. Don't delete the partial file. When you come back and restart it, it will figure out what parts it has and what parts it needs, will start sharing what it has, and will get the rest of what it needs to complete the file.

[ireland]

thanks for all the help ive now got into knoppix! yet the best bit it yet to come. my hard disk does not appear on the desktop and i cant find it anywhere! i have booted via failsafe

[|enouf|]

hi;
@ireland; how are you making out ?
If rescueing NTFS, there may be more involved than what I can help you with, but I can try to help you rescue any Fat16/32 partitions you have

@Harry;
just want to let you know -- the info you posted is informative even to me - I already knew the md5 stuff (learned from reading awhile back when I d/l Knoppix 3.6 from a mirror) and was a bit leary of BitTorrent and if it's possible to get infected (adware/spyware/malware) from using it (as I'm leary of almost all d/l apps). But you've given a lot oif useful info concerning using BitTorrent - just wanted to say all your explanation wasn't done in vain

[Harry Kuhman]

...and was a bit leary of BitTorrent and if it's possible to get infected (adware/spyware/malware) from using it (as I'm leary of almost all d/l apps). But you've given a lot oif useful info concerning using BitTorrent - just wanted to say all your explanation wasn't done in vain

Thanks. There's been some FUD spread lately (belived by many to have Microsoft behind it because it's recently been identified as another part of the Internet that they ignored and lost control of) about BitTorrent and viruses, trojans, worms and the like. The bottom line is that BitTorrent itself is very safe. However, if you download bad files from dubious trackers and questionable torrents, you can certainly deliver viruses, spyware or worse with BitTorrent just like you can with any other downloading tool. If you download what is supposedly a movie or song but you get an install program and run it, well, shame on you. I use BitTorrent primarily for ISOs. I get them from trusted sources and I still inspect them with a tool like ISOBuster before burning. I often leave BitTorrent up unattended seeding while I'm away from the computer. I feel I'm acting safely.

Don't consider yourself hidden when you download files with BitTorent, even the new "trackerless" version. If you are downloading illegal songs or movies you can still be caught, you are broadcasting your IP address in very trackable ways. But if you use BitTorrent for legal uses and from trusted sources and take normal reasonable precautions, you should be perfectly safe.

I should add that some third party BitTorrent clients do indeed contain adware/spyware or other evil stuff. The original and offical client from BitTorrent.com does not and does not seem likely to in the future. If you elect to use a different client you should at least research if it is known to contain any nasty extras.