A beginner’s guide to BitTorrent
Click to viewDespite the fact that BitTorrent has been around for a good 6 years now, the lightning fast file sharing protocol hasn't completely taken off in the mainstream. Since we post a decent amount about BitTorrent around here, we figured it was just time we put out a beginner's guide to BitTorrent. This is the guide you can send to your friend next time he gets that glassy look in his eyes when you mention BitTorrent and how quick and easy it makes downloading
Without
going into too much detail, here's a crash course in the file sharing
protocol that is BitTorrent (feel free to skip to the How to find and download a file with BitTorrent section if you're not all that interested in the details).
What is it
BitTorrent is not a program. [1]
It's a method of downloading files using a distributed peer-to-peer
file sharing system. The programs that you use to download files via the
BitTorrent protocol are called BitTorrent clients.
BitTorrent is not like Limewire/Kazaa/Napster/other P2P programs
you've used in the past. This is often the biggest source of confusion
for people new to BitTorrent. It's not difficult to use, it's just
different. As soon as you forget about your old file-sharing program
(and you will once you start using BT), the easier it will be to start using BitTorrent.
How does it work
What
makes the BitTorrent protocol unique is that it distributes the sharing
of files across all users who have downloaded or are in the process
of downloading a file. Because BitTorrent breaks up and distributes
files in hundreds of small chunks, you don't even need to have
downloaded the whole file before you start sharing. As soon as you have
even a piece of the file, you can start sharing that piece with other
users. That's what makes BitTorrent so fast; your BitTorrent client
starts sharing as soon as it downloads one chunk of the file (instead of
waiting until the entire download has been completed).
In order to download a file like the educational public domain video
we mentioned above, you have to find and download a torrent file (which
uses the .torrent file extension) and then open it with your BitTorrent
client. The torrent file does not contain your files. Instead, it
contains information which tells your BitTorrent client where it can
find peers who are also sharing and downloading the file.
How to find and download a file with BitTorrent
Now that you've got a better idea of the terminology and process behind BitTorrent, let's jump right into using BitTorrent.
First you need to download a BitTorrent client (the program that manages your BitTorrent downloads). I'd recommend:
- uTorrent for Windows/Mac
- Transmission for Mac
- Vuze or KTorrent for Linux (Actually, Vuze is cross platform, meaning it will work on Windows and Mac, but on those platforms we still prefer the alternatives listed above.)
Search for a good torrent. There are a handful of really good web sites for downloading torrents (that's right, you search for torrents on the internet). The sites I'd recommend (in no particular order) are:
- Mininova
- The Pirate Bay
- isoHunt
- TorrentSpy
- btjunkie
- Demonoid (Demonoid is sort of a members only site, but if you can get yourself a membership, it's one of my favorites [and a great place to find more esoteric downloads].)
Try
out whichever one you like. One might fit your tastes better than
another, but I've had good experiences with all of these. From this
point, search the site using their search box like you're using
Google—just type in the name of what you're looking for. You'll likely
get several results, but you want to choose the torrent with the highest
number of seeders (indicated in most BitTorrent search results under a
field labeled 'S'). Seeders are people who have already downloaded and
are sharing the entire file. The more seeders, the faster your download
will be. Some sites also provide you with a health meter, which is
generally a measure of seeders vs. active downloaders.
Download the torrent.
Once you've found a good and healthy torrent, find the download link
and download the torrent. Your browser will ask you what you want to do
with the file, so be sure to tell it to open the torrent in the
BitTorrent client you downloaded above.
Your
BitTorrent client will open and (possibly) ask you where you want to
save the file(s). Pick your save location, hit OK, and that's it; your
file will begin downloading. If you're not impressed with the speed at
first, be patient. It can sometimes take a minute or two before the
download ramps up to full speed. If you're still not happy, try
searching for another torrent with more seeders.
That's it?
Yep, that's it. That, in a nutshell, is how to download files using BitTorrent. There can
be more to it, of course, if you want to dive in a bit deeper. For
example, you can run through the Speed Guide in uTorrent to improve your
download speeds (the guide is fairly self explanatory—just go to
Options -> Speed Guide to get started), download select files from
the torrent rather than every file, throttle your bandwidth, and so on,
but this basic guide should get you started.
Also,
to ensure you stay in good standing in the BitTorrent community (and
aren't labeled a leecher), you should always try to upload as much as
you download. Most BitTorrent clients keep track of your upload/download
ratio, and you should generally continue sharing a file until your
ratio reaches 1, after which you can feel free to remove it from your
client (the file will remain on your computer—you just stop sharing it).
If you're ready to move on to even more advanced BitTorrent business, head on over to our intermediate guide to BitTorrent.
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