Nice interesting tip ;)

Imgormiel

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PCstats Weekly Tech Tips: Filtering False and Fake Torrents
By Colin S.


Tip #1 - Avoiding Bad Torrents
In the last couple of years a few organizations have begun seeding the internet with bad torrents. Generally these are manifested as torrents that stall or fail at 95%, even though there may be many seeders. Other reports tell stories of entirely blank data after decompression. These false and fake torrents probably exist for a couple of reasons; to frustrate users, as vehicles for delivering viruses and trojans, or potentially for gathering IP information that may be used against you in any situation that warrants it.

The good thing is, there are a limited number of bad torrent seeders out there, and a quick Google search (say for “bad torrent IPâ€) will give you the information for reacting. For example, IP addresses of “questionable torrent seeders†can be blocked in most Bit-Torrent clients. If the torrent client is set to block the IPs in question, you essentially mask yourself from these organizations.

Look through the settings or options of your torrent client, and you could save time by not downloading bad torrents, or being directly tracked. While you're at it, read PCSTATS guide to legally copying software and music.

Tip #2 - Speeding up Torrent Transfer Rates
The Bit-Torrent protocol is one of the most popular ways (if not the most popular) of transferring data on the internet. However, most ISPs throttle things back because torrents eats up a ton of bandwidth. If your torrent downloads are coming in at 5KB/s or lower, it's probable the ISP is artificially slowing down traffic. There is an easy way around ISP throttling, all you have to do is stay tuned for next week's PCSTATS Newsletter for the second half of this Tech Tip.
 

Rubric

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There is an easy way around ISP throttling, all you have to do is stay tuned for next week's PCSTATS Newsletter for the second half of this Tech Tip.

Eastenders style cliffhanger.

Doof Doof.
 

Imgormiel

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PCstats Weekly Tech Tips: Encryption Headers and User Accounts
By Colin S.


Tip #1 - Continued.... Speeding up Torrent Transfer Rates
The Bit-Torrent protocol is one of the most popular ways (if not the most popular) of transferring data on the internet. However, most ISPs throttle things back because torrents eats up a ton of bandwidth. If your torrent downloads are coming in at 5KB/s or lower, it's probable the ISP is artificially slowing down traffic. There is an easy way around ISP throttling, and as promised here it is...

What you'll need to do is enable encryption in one form or another - ie. header encryption, message stream encryption, etc.) of the Bit-Torrent data stream. This masks the nature of the traffic, and in most situations prevents the ISP from knowing what it is.

Encryption is not a native feature of the Bit-Torrent protocol, so to enable it you'll need a third party program like Azureus or BitComet. Once installed load up the program and go to its configuration area. Encryption is usually located with the connection options, from there enable the form you find suitable (may have to toy around with different levels of encryption to see what's best), save, and restart the client.

Bit-Torrent downloads will hopefully be much faster as encryption masks the torrent traffic.

Tip #2 - Different User Levels

Like Microsoft WindowsXP, Vista only gives you two user account level options in its "Manage Accounts" section: "Standard user" and "Administrator". If you want to give a user more privileges, but don't want to make them full admin's, there are a few options available.

To do this, press the Windows icon and type "netplwiz" and press the Enter key. That will bring you to the "User Accounts" section, from there you can create or edit user accounts. When you get to the user level section, click the "Other:" radio box and you can select from a whole host of options. User privileges include "Backup Operators", "Power Users", "Cryptographic Operators" and even "Event Log Readers". Select the level you prefer, click the "Finish" button and you're set.

Tip #3 - Get rid of the Pesky Windows Security Center

Windows Security Center means well, but I think we can all agree it's more of an annoying "feature" in Vista for experienced PC users. Disabling its "hey look at me!" visual warnings is easy. First, load up the "Control Panel" and click the "Security" section. From there click "Security Center", that will pop open a new window and on the left hand side click the words "Change the way Security Center alerts me". That will pop open another window, choose the "Don't notify me and don't display the icon" option.

That's it, Windows Security Center will no longer complain about various settings (like UAC being disabled). This tweak is only recommended for veteran computer users who do not need Windows Vista to warn of problems, if you're a novice at Windows Vista, leave this feature enabled.
 

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