Linux somehow defies my internet speed limit?

FatRakoon · 17 Dec 2015 at 21:21

I am on Sky BB
In my area, I am supposed to be able to get about 14Meg, but in truth, Im lucky if I ever hit 10.

Now, I am downloading a load of Linux ISOs and as I am going into hospital again any time soon, I have bought some TV Series' and so Im grabbing those ready to plonk onto my Tablets to kill off the boredom in there.

At the same time, I have recently knocked up my new Linux PC andso Im having a good play about with that, and for a giggle, I decide to try out this KTorrent app thats in there... Use that to grab the Linux ISOs.

Now, with the basic settings, intact, I just setup the folders. Downlaods go here, finished ones go there and the torrent files go the other place, and reserve the space before downloading, thats a sensible thing, and thats that!

I click on the first ISO... It starts off, and then fairly quickly shoots up to 1200, wow already faster than I have ever seen it...

I then grab the rest of them, and it does 2 at a time and they are both doing 800-850 each!

Here is the funny thing...

On the Windows PC, I am also, at the very same time, usinf YouTube Downloader, to grab a load of YouTube Videos, and its doing a load of Mock the Weeks at 300MB each

in all, I am going a good 25MB split between both the PCs

Now, when I download torrents using Windows, it eats up the entire bandwidth, and my eldest moans abpout it, saying that he cannot play his ruddy xbox one, and so, I have also done some trials, and I find that I can use ktorrent in Linux, and not only do my downloads come at twice the speed that they come in Windows, but also that my son does not efven know that I am downloading torrents and he has not once yet moaned at me about it.

I think I am going to give up using Windows to download my torrents from now on.

bremen1874 · 18 Dec 2015 at 02:01

Could I interest you in a Linux powered London Bridge?

Sin_Chase · 18 Dec 2015 at 02:45

Are you sure this is just not a configuration difference between your Torrent Clients?

For example - Your windows one is set to make some stupid amount of client connections and your Linux one is not?

Disco_P · 18 Dec 2015 at 07:23

The above is definitely a possibility. I've had issues where a by default my torrent software tried to connect to so many clients that I effectively DDoS'd myself.

Jamauk · 18 Dec 2015 at 07:41

Could this be down to the router. I've found in the past when torrenting it's very difficult to get into the router management, I've put this down to my ageing router (Asus RT-N16). Which like as mentioned above I've put it down to DDoSing myself. I should also mention I've not tried using other computers at the time, but just getting to Google is a very slow process on the torrenting pc.

joeyjojo · 18 Dec 2015 at 08:31

14 Mib/s is 1792 KiB/s, so it's understandable you can do two at 825 KiB/s (total 1650 KiB/s).

As above, could be differences between the torrent programs themselves, their configs, or the system configs. As the Windows machine is disrupting the console though the others are probably right - the Windows client is probably caning the router.

bledd · 18 Dec 2015 at 09:21

Check the max connections and upload limit in both clients.

Generally hammering your upload will screw your pings.

Test it yourself.

open cmd
ping 8.8.8.8 -t

Now open your torrent client. fiddle with connection settings.

Also turn off all of them and run speedtest.net

FatRakoon · 18 Dec 2015 at 20:21

Thanks guys.

I guess what I need to do, is go through all the settings on KTorrent and have a look at them, and then have a look on uTorrent and set them up to how Ktorrent is.

Ktorrent is setup as it comes, so to speak, I have changed nop setting other than the locations of the files, and with the utorrent config, these are the settings that I downloaded from hell knows where now, but it was on a forum and everyone was saying that they are the best settings for that! - Maybe not then?

One thing is certainly true, but utorrent on the PC utterly kills my internet, and downlaods will be at most 900, while ktorrent hardly touches my internet for others and runs at double that of utorrent at least.

bledd · 18 Dec 2015 at 20:51

You could have checked them in the time it took to write that!

joeyjojo · 18 Dec 2015 at 23:28

bledd. said:
You could have checked them in the time it took to write that!

As above pay particular attention to maximum connections, connection attempts per second, and half open connections. I have those set to 250, 20, and 10 respectively for some idea.

Just for fun I tried to work out what the ktorrent defaults are. I didn't want to install it but from digging in the source the "recommended settings" helper seems to suggest

max_conn_glob = upload rate in KBps ^ 0.8 + 50, or 900, whichever is less

which seems a good rule, works out as 286 on mine. You should have good results copying the rest.

FatRakoon · 19 Dec 2015 at 01:05

bledd. said:
You could have checked them in the time it took to write that!

Assuming of course that I had the opportunity I could have yes.

Typically, the missus was having a nag at me, cos she was putting the ferrets away and then we were going to sit down and watch Scorpion and Mock the Week, and by the time that was done, I went back onto the Linux PC, forgot all about the torrents, and got side-tracked because for some reason, some of the games that I am running fine on the Linux Laptop, Im having trouble getting running on the Linux PC and so, I have decided to go back to Sabayon to give that a shot on the New Linux PC and I havd moved all the info I wanted to keep, onto an external, and by the time I had finished, it was silly Oclock and I went to bed.

Today, I had the District nurse come round to give me my antibiotics and redress my wounds etc, and the missus woke me up for that, and then I was going straight to Liverpool hospital to find out what the next stage in my line of operations are, and then by the time I got back, I went to bed cos my leg is killing me, and I just got up now, read my emails and among them, was the note about OCUK and I got to this one, realiseed that I had not yet gone and checked ktorrents settings, and so I have switched on the Linux PC on, only for it to fail and then I had to sort that out, and then I remembered about moving half the stuff over and not just copying it etc etc etc etc.

So, yeah, I could have done it by the time I posted it... But I could Never have done it by the time I posted this one! LOL

joeyjojo said:
As above pay particular attention to maximum connections, connection attempts per second, and half open connections. I have those set to 250, 20, and 10 respectively for some idea.

Just for fun I tried to work out what the ktorrent defaults are. I didn't want to install it but from digging in the source the "recommended settings" helper seems to suggest

max_conn_glob = upload rate in KBps ^ 0.8 + 50, or 900, whichever is less

which seems a good rule, works out as 286 on mine. You should have good results copying the rest.

I have written most of the settings down, and there is a lot of things that utorrent has that ktorrent simply does not show. I have changed the more obvious ones, such as connections up and down, seeds and so on, and what I have also done, in some weird hope that it will help, is I am downloading the same file on both.

The only other thing that I am thinking of, is the port, but I will not set that to the same while I am downloading on both, as that would more than likely cause an issue for 2 PCs to share the same port, but I will change it, to be the same if I am only going to use the one PC to do torrents.

Right now, I am downloading CentOS and on the Linux PC, its downloading at fairly steady 740-760M and the Windows PC its at 370-450 which is very much all over the shop, and a great deal lower too!

What I will do in a short while, is stop one because it is clear, that things like whoever is uploading it to me will also make a difference and so with me trying to grab it twice, it wont give me a good reading will it?

I dont know, but I need to do a few things, but it does seem to me, that everything I do on the Windows PC, the linux one is about double the speed no matter what?

bledd · 19 Dec 2015 at 06:32

bledd. said:
You could have checked them in the time it took to write that!

FatRakoon · 19 Dec 2015 at 07:05

Pmpl yeah yeah I know.

But, I have checked all the settings that i can but the win pc is still much slower than the lnux one?

I have now setup ktorrent wth utorrents settings and ktorrent is STILL quicker!!!

Im just going to use Linux more then until I work out what on earth I am missing??

I have also been considering a fresh install of Windows a fair bit over the last few weeks due to a few things, but I have kept putting it off. I may do it anyway now... Maybe its just that, that is all it needs? I dunno?

joeyjojo · 19 Dec 2015 at 09:45

Running them both at the same time is bound to give weird results as they're competing for bandwidth, so I'd say now you know the linux client is fast, stop doing any downloads on it and test the windows one alone.

You're right about the ports, they need to be different, and make sure they're both getting forwarded properly.

Makes me wonder though, why not just have an easy life and only use the linux box for torrents?

FatRakoon · 19 Dec 2015 at 12:12

joeyjojo said:
Running them both at the same time is bound to give weird results as they're competing for bandwidth

I did just say that... I didnt think at first, but yeah, its bound to!

joeyjojo said:
I'd say now you know the linux client is fast, stop doing any downloads on it and test the windows one alone.

I also said this too!

joeyjojo said:
You're right about the ports, they need to be different, and make sure they're both getting forwarded properly.

And this

joeyjojo said:
Makes me wonder though, why not just have an easy life and only use the linux box for torrents?

I decided this right at the start.

I was just wanting to know why this was happening? it was just incredible to me, that the Linux PC was fully able to not only download torrents at a much higher pace, than the Windows machine does, but also at the same time, it was not affecting other machines that badly either.... My son was fully able to play on his xbox, and my PC was never affected by it either.
On the Windows PC, just running utorrent even without any actual torrents doing anything would render the LAN unuseable.

Anyway...

I am installing a fresh Linux onto it, I am having issues with Sabayon 15.11 and so I tried 15.6 and Im still having a headache, so Im giving Kubuntu a shot before I go back to Mint and see how the torrents all play under those.

Its all fun though... Im enjoying all the sillyness really.