Problems downloading
 

Hello all. Newb here but I'm not new to P2P. I just downloaded Phex last night and it looks great! I love the features much better than the other clients...although the filter feature leaves much to be desired.

Anyway, I'm having a problem with download speeds/connections. I currently have 32 Ultrapeer connections (5 with a (PP) after them), all show as Type OUT (whatever that means). I do a search for something and I get great results (should with that many connections) literally one time I had 71 users sharing the same file at an average connection speed in the 10Mbps range. When I try to download I either get extremely slow download speeds, like less than 1Kbps, or I continually get "Candidate Unavailable" or "Ignored Candidate (file not found)".

The "file not found" makes no sense at all as they should not have shown up in the first place. Other than that I'm even more confused. One would think that with 70-something hosts at least one would be good but so far no. I haven't even gotten any DL's in excess of 10Kbps!!

So, here's the info...I have Windows XP Pro SP2, AMD Athlon XP3200+ with 1GB or RAM. I'm running Phex version 2.8.0.91. I do have a firewall but I allowed Phex to go through no problem (it's Zone Alarm). I have checked all of my settings in Phex and nothing seems to help...I even tried turning off the firewall for a few seconds. I still have Limewire and I found the exact same file on each and downloaded them at the same time to compare...Limewire had it in less than 10 seconds. Phex is still DL'ing it 20 minutes later!

Help?

EDIT: Forgot to mention that I have a 1.5Mbps connection.

My first quick guess would be that your firewall prevents incoming connections. You have a lower download chance in this case. In the lower left corner of Phex you should see that little wall.
Try to configure your firewall to allow Phex as a server on the port that Phex suggests to you. Once you see incoming (Type IN) connections and the wall in the left corner is gone, you can assume that your firewall is configured correctly.

Limewire has some features Phex is still missing that allows automated firewall configuration and firewall to firewall transfers.

File not found can make sense, some people stop sharing the file once it is downloaded or very shortly after. Also candidates are not only spread through search but also through the download protocol, which is a bit slow in updating and spreading up-to-date information.

I hope you see better results soon. Try to raise your maximum parallel download connections overall and per file. Your connection speed can stand much higher values then the default.

Phex isn't automatically detecting its settings like Limewire, but instead it gives you more control on how and where to tune it. It requires a bit experience to find the best settings for you, but usually the results are worth it.

Well, I reconfigured Phex. I changed the port back to default (6346), upped all of my numbers for connections, downloaded the XP patch that allows more than 10 consecutive connections...basically I tried everything you recommended and more. Still nothing. I turned off the firewall and it still showed it as being behind a firewall. (I only turned off the FW within itself) Next I tried actually shutting down the firewall BEFORE starting Phex and it still shows the firewall as being up. Yes, Microsoft's FW is disabled.

What I did find interesting is this...and I'm not very knowledgeable in this area....when I log into Phex with the firewall on it shows my IP as 70.5*.13*.13*. When I logged in without the firewall it first showed 127.0.0.1 and then switched to the previous IP once it had a connection. When I looked in Zone Alarm I found the 127 IP listed as a "loopback adapter". It also listed my ethernet card. So, by the looks of this, the 127 IP must be something I'm hooked up to, right? But what? I do have a hub (not a router) between my DSL modem and my CPU but I didn't think hubs had IP's. Could this be my modem's IP?

Any other thoughts?

GregorK: Changed IP

Just remembered one other thing. Normally when a program opens Zone Alarm will ask if I want to grant it access to the net. With a P2P it also asks if I want to allow it to act as a server. With Phex all I get is the request for it to be a server. Also, it shows the requesting IP as 0.0.0.0:6346. Don't know if that helps or not.

Oh yeah, I also tried using the 127 IP as the host export IP and it worked even shittier. Next I'm going to try removing the hub altogether and see what happens.

Well, I tried it without and it worked great. I got a download avg of 170Kbps. However, I figured I'd try it with the hub again just for the hell of it. Same result....170Kbps. ???? I don't know what I did but somewhere I did something that worked.

I still show all of the connections as OUT and I still have the firewall picture. I'm going to try Zone Alarm Pro to see if the configurable port features help.

what XP patch are you talking about??

I never heard anything about a Xp Patch.... even i dont see George said it...

Basically MS decided to limit the number of consecutive connections to limit the propagation of worms...a half assed way to do it if you ask me. They could have just had better security in the first place. Anyway, they limit those connections to 10! This was in an XP update, not sure which one.

Here's a link to some info on it and the link to the file is on there too somewhere.

http://trustyfiles.com/help-sw-xpsp2.php

Ok, here's an update to my dillema...not really.

I downloaded ZA Pro and configured it to allow incoming and outgoing UDP and TCP on port 6346. I made sure that Phes was using that same port. I made sure that MS firewall was off. I even gave Phex and it's DLL full access permissions on all security levels...I STILL get all connections listed as OUT and the firewall pic in the lower left. Hell, I still get that even if the firewall is shutdown.

Here's some screenshots of what my Phex is configured like...maybe I screwed something up big time?

http://www.xtrememass.com/gallery/da...49Phex-med.JPG

EDIT: Had to change the image host

you using router?

Ok... as I understand it looks like you tried everything you can... and what I would suggest...
Lets go through it to make things more clear.

When you startup and have not connected yet Phex assumes to be 127.0.0.1 (represents your local machine) in case it cant determine anything else. This is nothing to worry about. It will update once you get connected and Phex learns its real IP.
After startup Phex assumes to be firewalled until you received a incoming connection. As long as Phex thinks it is firewalled it asks established outgoing connections to try a incoming connection. If that works Phex knows its not firewalled. If that fails Phex still assumes to be firewalled, since obviously no one can connect to you, out of whatever reason (most likely firewalled or failed port forwarding from routers or such).
Usually that detection goes quite fast...

Phex uses java.exe to access the internet and act as a server, maybe you already allowed java.exe to do this when you were running Limewire.

I think I somewhere saw a link that checks if you are reachable on port 6346, when you have a client running. I will post it once I found it.

To apply the XP patch is a good idea. It allows you to raise 'Max concurrent connects' a bit below the limit you configured with the patch. Though this is not your main trouble it makes things go faster.
You can disable 'Other nearby Phex running', its only useful on LAN networks.
But overall your configuration is all right.

Gregor