So let me start off with a very basic subject "BitTorrents" or "Torrents" as it is more commonly known. Few years back I had no idea what torrents meant and when I got to know about it I was like how come I never had heard about this before??? During a blink of an eye I practically became a worshiper of torrents and was crazy enough to use it for even 1MB freely available software downloads. But here I am straying away from the topic.
So what are torrents? Without getting all technical about the matter as in Wikipedia I'll try to give a brief explanation as possible. Basically this is a way of transferring data among computers. So what's different between a torrent and a direct download? Torrents is an easier way of sharing a large sized file than a direct download as it won't consume the bandwidth or the hardware of the hosting server or sharer. What basically happens is that one user will share a file through a torrent and make the torrent available for other users. This first sharer will be called the "initial seed". The other users can download the .torrent file (a small file containing the details) that has been shared and this will start downloading the larger file in small small parts. During the the downloading phase the downloader is called a peer and a peer can share the completed small parts of the file. After the file has been completely downloaded the peer becomes a seed thus sharing the whole file themselves. This way the stress on the initial seed's resources becomes less and the availability of the file becomes higher.
So what are torrents? Without getting all technical about the matter as in Wikipedia I'll try to give a brief explanation as possible. Basically this is a way of transferring data among computers. So what's different between a torrent and a direct download? Torrents is an easier way of sharing a large sized file than a direct download as it won't consume the bandwidth or the hardware of the hosting server or sharer. What basically happens is that one user will share a file through a torrent and make the torrent available for other users. This first sharer will be called the "initial seed". The other users can download the .torrent file (a small file containing the details) that has been shared and this will start downloading the larger file in small small parts. During the the downloading phase the downloader is called a peer and a peer can share the completed small parts of the file. After the file has been completely downloaded the peer becomes a seed thus sharing the whole file themselves. This way the stress on the initial seed's resources becomes less and the availability of the file becomes higher.
So what are the advantages of torrents?
- Easy to share files
- High availability
- Ability to pause and resume
- High speeds depending on availability of seeds
- Download speed depends on the number of seeds and their upload speeds
- Files without seeds cannot be downloaded
- Possibility of getting conned into downloading useless files
- Vulnerability to viruses
- For users in some countries ISPs may track torrent downloads for copy righted material
So what is the huge trend for torrents with these types of disadvantages??? Let's take an example of downloading a large file of about 2GB. Most direct download servers do not support resume capability for downloads and even for that you will have to use a download manager of the sorts. So either you have to leave the computer on till the whole download completes while being unable to do anything over the net as it would be eating up your bandwidth (of course this won't be a problem to people with high download speeds). But with torrents on the other hand you will be able to pause the download at your will whenever you want and resume it when you feel like it. Again the availability of items on torrents is amazing. Things you thought that you won't find forever as they were lost in time can be found in torrents. But still you must be wondering is it worth the risk?
As a user of torrents for past 3 years (not that much experience I know) I must say it is worth the risk if you know how to handle things. I have been duped into downloading a useless file only once and again ran a risk of getting infected (not me !!! the computer !!!) once. So how am I avoiding all these? That's where the secret of selecting a good torrent tracker comes into play.
Information about available torrents are stored in some sites. We can search for the files we are looking for through these sites and download them. But some sites unlike others provide safety features such as removing wrong, misleading or infected torrents themselves and enabling the users of torrents to comment on the files they have downloaded so that others can determine for themselves the quality of the file. Using these options and a bit of thinking on your part you can definitely become a secured user of torrents. As for the infected files all I can say is even in a direct download you run the risk of getting infected so the best way of preventing that would be to have a good anti virus software installed. As for the tracking of torrents in some countries it is hard to avoid it except that in comments the users would report whether that particular torrent is being watched.
So folks this is as basic as I can get about torrents. This has been a long post (at least for me). I'll be back with more information about good torrent sites, good uploaders and all that is needed to use torrents safely. Adios !!!
Information about available torrents are stored in some sites. We can search for the files we are looking for through these sites and download them. But some sites unlike others provide safety features such as removing wrong, misleading or infected torrents themselves and enabling the users of torrents to comment on the files they have downloaded so that others can determine for themselves the quality of the file. Using these options and a bit of thinking on your part you can definitely become a secured user of torrents. As for the infected files all I can say is even in a direct download you run the risk of getting infected so the best way of preventing that would be to have a good anti virus software installed. As for the tracking of torrents in some countries it is hard to avoid it except that in comments the users would report whether that particular torrent is being watched.
So folks this is as basic as I can get about torrents. This has been a long post (at least for me). I'll be back with more information about good torrent sites, good uploaders and all that is needed to use torrents safely. Adios !!!
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