Revised 10/16/02 WinMX Netiquette TIPS! #1)PING - PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE use the PING options on your searches. THEY ARE THERE FOR A REASON! Do not bother people who show a (?) or a ping over 300. 90% of the time your transfer rate will be agonizingly slow. Pick people with pings under 100 whenever possible. High ping times mean either the user is very far away, very slowly connected, and/or they are trying to download the entire Internet at one time with WinMX (too many file transfers at one time meaning your transfer speed will be agonizingly slow.) #2)QUEUED - Dont stay in a persons queue day after day, or even hour after hour. Ask if they want to trade and if you dont get a response within 5 minutes or so, move on. Most people with alot in the queue obviously have alot to offer, and are being OFFERED files as well. Most of them have experience and take the time to browse those in their list. If you have nothing they want, you will never start, so move on. If you have something they want, they will have either started you and entered your queue or sent you a message. So keep an eye on your que ... and start them when you see them enter ... and they will more than likely start your file as well. #3)SHARING - If you have nothing to offer at all, either because you dont care to share, you have no hard drive space or dont want to use up bandwidth by uploading, then GOOD LUCK TO YOU! That gets you on a IGNORE list very fast, especially if you are trying to get a large movie file. Those just starting out can find this VERY frustrating. My advice to you is to get many files going (even if you dont want them) as fast as you possibly can. Do searches for any of the latest popular movies and/or music and keep them for trade bait. Theres alot of users so you can always find something if you try. Then, once you have stuff that others need getting what you want comes much easier. Also, alot of people just use the "whois" button, which doesnt show what you are offering it only shows the number of files you have available. So make SOMETHING, ...*ANYTHING* available so that when people use "whois" it wont show a goose egg. Of course if you have thousands of CRAP files shared most experienced users will note that if noone is downloading from you, you probably have crap files. It is also better to share the same types of files you are looking for....most people share only Music Files and Music Videos which don't usually interest those that have plenty of MPG and JPG files shared. No matter how many MP3's you have shared you will probably not be moved ahead of the Que when you are trying to get the latest AVI file, at least not as fast as when you have similar material for the person you are trying to download from. Major TIP: Don't share or only share your default downloads folder. The reason for this is manyfold. When you delete a file that sounded interesting but turned out to be crap and don't refresh your share database a user trying to download that file from you will recieve a File/User not found error. Sometimes this will send you to the Ignore List. Another reason is that it shows you have more experience if you have your files organized in some manner. And another big reason is all your incomplete downloads and currently downloading files are listed if you share your downloads folder. When I see someone with 90 files with 80 incomplete or downloading files....they will not be moved up my que. This is usually becuase I have found that they are more than likely downloading 60 of those 80 incomplete downloads at one time....so their transfer rate from me will more than likely be very slow....even if they have high speed access. #5)MESSAGING - Messaging services should be allowed or you will probably end up on an IGNORE list. When you que up a number of files in a row from one user they will more than likely browse you. If you have files of no interest to them, few files or nothing shared they will probably cancel you, but may try to message you to see if you have anything to trade. When I get a messaging not allowed due to Privacy Settings I will usually cancel the users files after the second or third time they enter my que they will be IGNORED. #6)BE NICE - Calling someone a asshole or constantly sending messages saying "START ME NOW!!" in all caps will not get you the file any faster. It gets you, once again, on the IGNORE list. Asking nicely or explaining that you need to resume a file and are almost finished can sometimes get you in. But once again....make sure you have something shared. #7)BROWSE - When you are trying to get a small music file, and end up queued#, browse that person to see if they have alot of large movie files. Movies take a LONG time. Being queued 1 when the person ahead of you is getting a movie is the same as being queued 30, you will wait for eternity. Also, IF they have a file named: TRADES Only on Files over 4megs.txt that is probably a message to Those that don't share....if they let you download a file feel very priviledged....otherwise share something that they may want. #8)DOWNLOAD SPEED The reason there is a setting in WinMX for the total number of files you can download at a time is that you only have a finite amount of bandwidth from which to download all your files at. If you have high speed or low speed connections, downloading/uploading more files than can be transferred at a reasonable speed of 2k/s or more per file will PISS Off seasoned WinMXer's like myself....and will get your download cancelled and you ignored if you continue to enter the Que. The following is the top transfer speeds your modem can reasonably acheive and the recommended number of concurrent file transfers: Total Transfer Speed Transfer # Limit ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Modem 28.8K ............ 2.25 to 2.75 combined 1 file never exceed 2 Modem 33.6K ............ 2.50 to 3.00 combined 1 file never exceed 2 Modem 56K .............. 3.00 to 5.00 combined 2 files never exceed 3 ISDN 64K ............... 5.00 to 7.00 combined 3 files never exceed 5 ISDN 128K ............. 10.00 to 14.00 combined 6 files never exceed 8 Recommended Transfers Download Upload Download Upload ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Cable\ADSL 512/128 .... 64.00 ... 16.00 8 files 4 files Cable\ADSL 1024/128 ... 128.00 ... 16.00 12 files 4 files Cable\ADSL 1512/256 ... 187.00 ... 32.00 16 files 6 files Cable\ADSL 2048/256 ... 256.00 ... 32.00 20 files 6 files Cable\ADSL 2048/512 ... 256.00 ... 64.00 20 files 10 files T1 .................... 187.00 ... 187.00 20 to 35 Total files T3 .................... 3500.00 ... 3500.00 A fairly large number You will note the Cable\DLS speeds do not usually significantly affect one another. This is becuase you have a certain amount of bandwidth for downloads and another amount for uploads, you cannot download through the upstream channel and vise versa. I highly recommend downloading not more files than will lower your per file bandwidth below 5k/s and limiting the # of uploads to allow your users to download from you at 5k/s or more, if everyone did this the que's for you favorite files would cycle much faster. NOTE: These speeds are based on MAXIMUM Modem Efficiency. If you lower your Bandwidth Limits for any of the reasons explained below, you should also lower your Transfer Limits. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 100+K/Sec TIPS Will increase bandwidth for Dial-Up, DSL, Cable, T1, T3 and any connection speed. Be Careful Some of these settings do not work as well with WinMX 3.3 or later. Read the following but be aware that WinMX 3.3 behaves differently than earlier versions with regard to the 100 Million 50 Million setting. Follow advise for WinMX 3.3 or higher below. Click the SETTINGS button then go to BANDWIDTH THROTTLE. Place a check in both boxes. Set download bandwidth to 100000000 bytes per second. (100 million) Set upload bandwidth to 50000000 bytes per second. (50 million) Double check to make sure you have the correct amount of 0s. For WinMX 2.6 users: Set your Bandwidth Throttle Cycle to 50ms. This give WinMX more CPU Time and increases transfer speeds. It will hinder you while using other applications at the same time unless you have a fast PC with lots of RAM. (Haven't found this all that effective at increasing speed. Maybe that's why its not in 3.x) Click CLOSE. You will NOT need to restart WinMX to see this improvement at work. For some reason those exact numbers increase your speed more than other numbers, even higher numbers dont work as well. If we can get everyone to do this, we will all be cranking right along at high speeds. You can DL/UL off people with LOW PINGS in the 100+k/sec area now. I have seen downloads on my DSL as high as 100k/s with two or more uploads totaling in the 30k/s range. Before this 40k/s downloads and 20k/s uploads were the MAX. and very far between. This Just In: 163k/s on a 9.1meg MP3 from a T1 source in less than 60sec. WOW! News Flash: 170k/s on an 11 meg file from someone claiming to have DSL...Must be SuperDSL. Maximum Speeds you can Expect(In Our Dreams): DSL: 1.5mbit down 256Kbit up ..... roughly 187KByte/Sec Down and 32KByte/Sec Up Cable: 1.5mbit down 512Kbit up ..... 187KByte/Sec Down and 64KByte/Sec Up ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Speed Tweak for WinMX 3.3 The above settings do not seem to work as well for WinMX 3.3. I have had better transfer speeds by setting the BandWidth Throttle to a more normal setting which can be seen in the following chart based upon your connection speed: Incoming Outgoing Bandwidth Bandwidth ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Modem 28.8K ........... 3000 1500 - Modem 33.6K ........... 3500 1700 -\ Modem 56K ............. 6400 3200 --> Uploads and Downloads Share Bandwidth ISDN 64K .............. 6400 3200 -/ ISDN 128K ............. 12800 6400 - Cable\ADSL 512/128 .... 64000 12800 Cable\ADSL 1024/128 ... 128000 12800 Cable\ADSL 1512/256 ... 187000 25600 Cable\ADSL 2048/256 ... 256000 25600 Cable\ADSL 2048/512 ... 256000 51200 T1 .................... 187000 64000 --> Uploads and Downloads Share Bandwidth T3 .................... 3500000 1500000 --> Uploads and Downloads Share Bandwidth These setting are not set in stone and should be adjusted downward if you intend to use your computer for other purposes while WinMX is active. Browsing the web will require it's own bandwidth so lower the setting until you feel the webpages are loading at a resonably adaquet speed. Operations like Media Player or other MP3 and MPeg players require a good amount of CPU time and will lower the average file transfer speeds. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Tweak for Fewer Time Outs: Works with all versions of WinMX though directions to find are for WinMX 3.3 If possible (you're not behind a firewall that blocks it and have no way of opening the port) use the Listen on Port XXXX for incoming TCP connections and the Send and Recieve UDP Datagrams on port XXXX in Settings, Internet Connection, Incoming TCP Connections and In/Out UDP Packets Settings. This will greatly reduce the number of Lost Connetion and TimeOuts waiting for incoming connection. This of course all depends on what the other user has set. If everyone has these setting we probably will not see Timeouts again. If you use Zone Alarm it will show two MX Icons in the programs area, the one you see when using WinMX and the other if you move your pointer over it will say something like Listening on port XXXX. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Hope it works for you as well as it has for me and many others. LHtr AKA Some other Leech Hating Name ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The following information is provided by dB. It is an excellent explanation that will help you understand some of the inner workings of WinMX regarding Bandwidth Limitations with more depth than the above. =========================================================================================== =========================================================================================== A Guide to using WinMX v.3.0 ---------------------------- Bandwidth Limiters ------------------ The bandwidth limiters are the WinMX'ers best friend, they can be accessed through the 'bandwidth' window in WinMX by clicking the 'adjust incoming and outgoing bandwidth throttles' button. Here you'll see 2 tickboxes, one is labelled 'Limit Incoming Bandwidth' and the other 'Limit Outgoing Bandwidth'. The 'Limit Incoming Bandwidth' Function ------------------------------------------- The 'Limit Incoming Bandwidth' function is usefull for restricting the amount of bandwidth your connection uses for incoming files, eg, when you are downloading. You may find that when you are downloading that you can't access webpages, or they are very slow, this is because WinMX is using nearly all the capacity of your connection, its unlimited. Now if you find that you want to be able to browse webpages etc whilst also downloading in WinMX then you can limit WinMX to use only upto an amount you specify in here. The values that can be entered are shown in bytes per second, so a value of 12000 represents 12 thousand bytes per second (12KB/s), so, if you have a Cable connection that can download upto 64KB per second, then to prevent your downloads from using all of this capacity you would enter values below 64000 in the 'Limit Incoming Bandwidth' field. Lets say for example your download is coming in at a nice 50K per second, yet you find that your internet webpages are very slow to open, its simply because you are using to much of your bandwidth to download in WinMX, so at this point it would be wise to limit WinMX from using so much bandwidth. A good value here would be around 45000 (45K) or lower, a value of 45000 would leave you with at least 5K worth of your bandwidth free, so you can browse the web easily as WinMX is restricted to using 45KB per second. If you find your webpages are still slower than you would like, then simply reduce this value until you are comfortable, try to balance it between maximum download speed in WinMX, and a nice fast webpage browsing speed. This rule also applys if you have any downloads in progress outside of WinMX, for instance if you were downloading a game update, programs, music, etc from the internet and you found WinMX was causing it to move to slow, here you can restrict the amount of bandwidth WinMX uses to free up bandwidth for your other downloads. The 'Limit Outgoing Bandwidth' Function --------------------------------------- This function is even more important than the 'Limit Incoming Bandwidth' function. The 'Limit Outgoing Bandwidth' function is important because it is used to restrict how fast you are willing to allow people to download from you. If you leave this function unticked then anyone who downloads a file from you will have access to as much of your bandwidth as they can get. This can often have an adverse affect on your download speed, and here's the reason why... Lets assume you have a Cable internet connection, and its rated as 512/128 Cable. The 512 value here represents your maximum download capacity in kilobits per second, and the 128 represents the limit of your upload ability. Now to make sense of these kilobit values you need to divide them by 8, as there are 8bits in 1byte, this will tell you how fast in kilobytes (KB) per second your Cable connection is capable of. The result will look like this... 512kilobits / 8 = 64kilobytes (512Kb divided by 8 = 64KB) 128kilobits / 8 = 16kilobytes (128Kb divided by 8 = 16KB) As the above shows a 512/128 Cable connection is in reality limited to a maximum of 64kilobytes per second download, and 16kilobytes per second upload. Now, this is where we get into the limiters, by knowing how fast your connecton is will really help in setting the best values to use for the limiters. What happens is this. Lets say you have an download in progress and its coming in at a decent 30K per second, then someone connects to you and starts downloading one of your files. What often happens is the upload that you are sending will use nearly all your available upload bandwidth, anything upto the limit of your connection which using the example above is 16KB per second. This will often have a dramatic effect on your download, which will slow down rapidly when you start uploading. Why does this happen though? In order to understand why this happens you must first learn a little about how your computer sends and receives data across the internet. An Explanation of TCP/IP Protocol Data Transfer ----------------------------------------------- What we need to understand here in relation to the bandwidth limiters is how data transfers take place. To visualise this you can imagine how letters are sent through the postal system, although TCP represents a secure postal system. If i was to send a letter (data) to a friend, and on my friend receiving the letter he sends a letter back to me saying 'i got the letter thanks' then thats very similar to how TCP data transfer works. What happens is when you download a file, the computer you are downloading from sends a small packet of the data, upon receipt of the data your computer sends an acknowledgment back to the computer to say 'i have the packet of data ok, you can send another one now'. These are known as 'ACK' packets, they simply confirm (ACKnowledge) the arrival of any data that gets sent between 2 computers. When the machine that sent you the data receives your acknowledgement of receipt then it can send you another packet of data, and when your computer receives the second packet of data it simply sends another ACK back to say it received it ok, and this goes on and on and on until you finally complete the download of all the packets of data that make up the file. Now what happens when you start uploading to someone and you have no limits on your upload speed? The answer is that your downloads will slow because even though you are receiving the data ok, your computer struggles to send back the ACKnowledgement packet to say you are ready to receive more data. This is because your upload is using all the capacity of your connection, your ACK packets have to wait for a while before they can squeeze into the upstream of data. The computer you are downloading from has to wait for you to acknowledge that you received the last packet of data ok, and whilst it waits it can send you no more data, therefore your download speed stalls. Limiting Your Connection! ------------------------- The answer to this is to limit your outgoing connection speed, lets say that you can upload at a maximum of 16KB per second, if you don't limit and you upload a file to someone at 16KB per second then you can't send out your ACK packets quickly so your download can continue smoothly. What you must do in this situation is limit your upload speed to prevent it from using up all of your 16KB bandwidth. The way to do this would be to set the limiters below 16000, a good value here would be 12000. This means that you will restrict the speed you upload to a maximum of 12KB per second, which leaves you a nice 4KB to send out your ACK packets fast, and thus your download speed should increase. The computer who you are downloading from no longer has to wait as long for you to send the receipt, as your connection has 4KB reserved entirely for sending the acknowledgement packets. This system is part of a term reffered to as 'handshaking' in TCP/IP connections, and the faster the handshake takes place, the faster the transfer of data. Summary ------- Hopefully from the above explanation it will start to make sense to you why limiting is such a big deal in WinMX, its important to understand this so you can get the most out of your connection, and optimise your transfers. The above example is exactly the same for any TCP based transfer of data over the internet, so you can use it to understand why your uploads often slow down when you start downloading etc, its that ACK thing again! Recommended Values For The Outgoing Limiter (upload limiter) ------------------------------------------------------------ Modem 28.8K ............ 2250 to 2750 (recommended 2500) Modem 33.6K ............ 2500 to 3000 (recommended 2750) Modem 56K .............. 2500 to 3000 (recommended 2750) ISDN 64K ............... 5000 to 7000 (recommended 6000) ISDN 128K ............. 10000 to 14000 (recommended 12000) Cable\ADSL 512/128 .... 10000 to 14000 (recommended 12000) Cable\ADSL 1024/128 ... 10000 to 14000 (recommended 12000) Cable\ADSL 512/256 .... 20000 to 28000 (recommended 24000) Cable\ADSL 2048/256 ... 20000 to 28000 (recommended 24000) Cable\ADSL 2048/512 ... 40000 to 56000 (recommended 48000) The above examples are good values to use for all of the connection types shown, even at the maximum values shown here it will reserve a portion of bandwidth for your ACK data, your uploads will never use your maximum upload capacity, thus your general downloading speed will operate at the optimum speed given your connection. dB.