What the heck are torrents?

[curlesw]

I used to be able to keep up with this computer stuff...what the heck is this?

Wayne

[gprsh924]

It is a way of sharing data files. Large files are broken into packets and sent from seed computers to the people that are downloading. Rather than one person hosting a large file, a user can download bits and pieces from many different people/machines.

[HardDrive]

Lets suppose you want a movie, and you don't want to pay for it. Well you could find someone who has the movie, and using Peer To Peer (P2P) software, you could download the movie from them.

The problem with that is that his internet connection gets killed while you are sucking the file off his computer. So instead of getting the entire file from one person, a torrent allows you to grab the nessecary pieces of the movie from many computers at the same time. Instead of hitting one computer to get all of the pieces of Star Wars, you might hit hundreds. The amount you download from each client is much smaller. And as more and more people get the movie, there are more sources available.

There is a torrent file that you download to get the process started. This file contains the instructions for where to find the pieces and how to put them together.

[HardDrive]

Hmmmm....to be more consise, its a new way to steal schit.

[campbellcj]

To clarify, there are lots of legitimate files and programs distributed this way. It is not just for pirate movies and software...

[m21sniper]

Originally Posted by campbellcj

To clarify, there are lots of legitimate files and programs distributed this way. It is not just for pirate movies and software...

Just mostly.

You can get almost anything here:
www.ISOhunt.com

[curlesw]

ah, thanks guys, makes sense...just another app to download and use...

Wayne

[jeffgrant]

Originally Posted by campbellcj

To clarify, there are lots of legitimate files and programs distributed this way. It is not just for pirate movies and software...

+1

I release new versions of my software (http://benchkeeper.com) via bit torrent, and most of my clients (Harvard, Stanford, etc) seed them for me. It means that they get faster downloads, and it sure saves my network from being totally saturated and keeps costs down when a new release is made.

[Craig 930 RS]

Speakin' of which - I understand Top Gear is available this way - where?

[slodave]

Originally Posted by Craig 930 RS

Speakin' of which - I understand Top Gear is available this way - where?

www.finalgear.com

Click "shows" at the top.

[curlesw]

ok, so I downloaded a file via torrents. After the file was downloaded, the program seeding to x of y peers...what's going on now?

Wayne

[Won]

You've been "leaching" from the swarm while you were downloading. Now you're "seeding" and contributing back to the swarm by uploading to other leachers. It's a good practice to upload as much as you download. Obviously torrents don't have a "server" and therefore it can only survive as long as there are people seeding the file.

[TechnoViking]

The problem is most people's upload speed is a lot slower than their download speed. So if you are trying to download something form a peer, it will be slow. Now, if you download from many peers then you are only constrained by your (higher) download speed.

[curlesw]

ok, got it, thanks. That's pretty cool. At one point I was downloading from 20 peers. Still slower than other forms of downloading a large video, e.g. iTunes, but nonetheless, very slick.

Wayne

[slodave]

Originally Posted by curlesw

ok, got it, thanks. That's pretty cool. At one point I was downloading from 20 peers. Still slower than other forms of downloading a large video, e.g. iTunes, but nonetheless, very slick.

Wayne

Yes, it is slower, but free (sort of ). That's why a lot of people get a list of things to download the night before.

[the]

Isn't Pelican in Torrents? No wait, it's El Segundo.

[Pazuzu]

Originally Posted by curlesw

ok, got it, thanks. That's pretty cool. At one point I was downloading from 20 peers. Still slower than other forms of downloading a large video, e.g. iTunes, but nonetheless, very slick.

Wayne

Depends on what you're grabbing. If it's well know, and has been around a bit, you might find hundreds of sources. If it's a TV show from last night, you might only find 1 or 2.

[id10t]

You'll get faster downloading if you are seeding at the same time. Not sure about you windows users, but on my Linux box that means I had to open up the incoming ports on my firewall and forward them in from my router to my internal IP. Only thing I use it for is Linux releases, but I can peg my line while I get 'em...

[widebody911]

http://thepiratebay.org FTW

[stealthn]

Hackers playdough....