Is anybody getting good BitTorrent rates with Comcast?

[Bill Mullen]

On Fri, 2005-07-22 at 17:14, Bill Freeman wrote:
> 	I've tried changing away from the default ports.  I've fiddled
> with max_uploade_rate (in hopes of better tit for tat).  It could be,
> I suppose, my netgear router (I don't go on the Comcast segment
> "bare").  Or it could be Comcast.
> 
> [Here's where it starts to tie into Linux:]
> 
> 	Or maybe the Knoppix 4.0 DVD torrent I'm using is poor.
> 
> 	Or do I need to fiddle some of the Linux firewall settings to
> let connections happen at a good rate?  (FC2 2.6.10 kernel.)
> 
> 	What rates do other folks see?

You need to configure the router to forward ports 6881-6889 (TCP & UDP)
to the internal system where you're running the BitTorrent client. That,
in combination with setting the max upload rate to a reasonable value so
that you don't saturate your upload bandwidth, gives the best results.
You also need this same port range open on the client system's firewall.

I use Azureus (a java BT client), which allows you to set u/l caps for
individual torrents, as well as an overall one. I cap the overall u/l
rate at 20, and then can run two torrents each capped at 10; this gets
me rates that will vary considerably from one torrent to the next, but
90-130kB/s is not unusual to see with the fastest ones, and the average
ones usually come in at around 40-60kB/s. And yes, that's on Comcast.

The one I have running right now - 11 seeds (8 connected), 21 peers (17
connected), 707MB file, 8% completed, u/l limited to 10kB/s - is coming
in at an average of about 55kB/s, with bursts up to around 80kB/s, FWIW.

-- 
Bill Mullen
RLU# 270075