Seeder: Somebody who has the full file. Need at least one of these. Leecher: Somebody who is downloading the file. Peers: Total of above.
His or her. Speed in downloading torrents is usually dependant on the ratio of seeders to leechers. Sometimes you get seeders or leechers with a high speed connection who can make your downloads much faster. On my 8Mb connection, I've gotten speeds up to 1.9MB/s from such peers, although I can only provide up to 50KBs upload. DDLs usually give me ~800KBs. EDIT: Also, some private trackers do use special servers to seed their files, although most public trackers don't.
Ehhh... I don't know about that. They can be uploading parts that they already have downloaded. Such as an example: I'm downloading a 1 gig file. I only have 50% downloaded, but I'm still uploading that file.
We have a little something called Ask GBAtemp where questions without discussions can be asked. Seeder: Someone who has downloaded a part of the file and is sharing it Leecher: Someone who is downloading the file, and not sharing it (yet) Peers is the total of Seeders and Leechers.
That's a peer. A seed is somebody that has the entire file and is therefore only uploading. Distinct (and important) job.
I watched a video and it said that instead of the file distributing to the people part by part, it distributes from each person to each person making it faster.
Basically this is what happens. 1. A person makes a torrent file and seeds that file from their own computer (uploading the file to anybody who wants to download) 2. A leecher starts downloading that file from a person. As soon as they have 1 part of any file in the torrent they can start uploading that part to anybody else 3. People start downloading from these 2 and so on until the chain get bigger resulting in faster downloads for all involved.
As Rydian said, seeds are those who have completed the torrent FULLY and are now uploading. And to further explain the difference I'll use a CD as an example: 13 Tracks, a Cover, Back and Insert images -- all as individual files. If I choose to download ONLY the 13 Tracks and skip the images then my torrent program may SAY 100%, but I won't be counted a seed. Because I don't have 100% of ALL the files, I would be a Peer. I'm not sure if you'd still be counted as a Leecher (since you don't have all the files but you aren't downloading), but you will never be a seed til you are 100% complete on ALL files.
I guess you could put it that way.....but honestly the leach to seed ratio is what is a better judge of speed
Typically yes... but not always. Same with "The less Leechers, the faster the download", mostly true, but not always. Example: A). 100 Seeds and 10 Leechers -- This will almost assuredly be your best for speed since it has the most seeds and fewest leechers. B). 50 Seeds and 10 Leechers -- This has a good ratio, 5:1 seeders, so you'll get decent speeds. C). 100 Seeds and 50 Leechers -- This will most likely be the slowest. Even though it has twice as many Seeds as B, the ratio is only 2:1.
The ultimate limit will be your ISP's speed limit placed on your connection. I can connect to a torrent with 50 seeds and then connect to one with 900, and my max speed could be the same on both.
In an extra example, 10 seeds and 100 leechers... speed will be unstable, since you'll mostly be relying on the leechers for the download and not so much the seeds... likely the slowest speed you'll get. Unless you get a leecher with a high upload speed, which is rare but not unheard of.
Seeder: Someone who has the complete file. Leecher: Someone who is just downloading the file. Peers: The above two together.
Torrent speeds are pretty random to be honest. It really depends if the peer(seeder) that you're connected to has a high bandwidth connection capable of uploading and you're paired with them. Like Rydian I've seen some Torrent downloads upwards of 1.9MB/s - 2.2MB/s. Some legal examples would be popular Linux distro's most seed out at an incredibly high speed. Public trackers aren't going to give out great speeds 9/10ths of the time, that's why private trackers to exist. Most users who use Public trackers tend to "hit and run", which is to say that they connect to a seeder, download the entire file, then remove the torrent from their client. Private sites tent to discourage this; saying that you should seed back your file at least 1:1 or for 72 hours. Though, depending on the file size the rules change. Then again, with private sites, most downloads are like lightning anyway. Seeder - Someone who has the entire 100% file. Leecher - Someone Downloading the file. They may upload data, but only data that they've downloaded. For example, say you've downloaded 100MB of a 350MB Fringe episode, you might be able to seed it back out at 500 kb/s, but a [Seeder] is going to be much more efficient at sharing data because he'll have more peers/clients making requests of him whereas you're limited to the 100MB that you've downloaded. Primarily, High-Bandwidth Seeders = Speed. The ratio of Seeders to leechers is probably the most important advice for a newbie. -I2aven
