Establishing Remote Connection - Common New Torrent User Client Errors

Ideally before reading this guide you should have either read my previous 3 torrent guides, or already know the information they contain. The information you should be comftorble with is

New Torrent Client Selection Guide

Guide to Public vs Private Torrent Trackers

Be familiar with common torrent terms and know how data is exchanged using them

Creating a remote connection and how to find out if you are connectable

When referring to torrents, a remote connection simply means connecting your computer to a computer at another location. Being able to establish a remote connection and the ability of other peers to connect remotely with you is the basic idea behind torrent design. If you are following along with my previous torrent guides up to this point, you are probably excited and ready to get started. However, Before you begin browsing your chosen torrent tracker and enjoying this new source of content you should take a few minutes and look through your torrent client configuration options. The first thing you will want to check is whether you are connectable. In uTorrent this is as simple as looking at the bottom of the toolbar for the green circle.

If you see this picture you are able to establish a remote connection, and others are able to connect remotely to you. You are now able to effectively download and share information with other peers. Unless you have some other client error, or you wish to view my other client configuration guides, you are ready to enjoy the torrent world.

"Why don't I see this happy green circle in my uTorrent tracker"

-You are Un-connectable.....ish

The phrase not connectable is very inaccurate and misleading. Despite getting this error the torrent client is technically functional. You can upload and download information but your internet speed is going to be much lower than if you were truly connectable - able to establish a remote connection with every peer in the swarm. This half working client leads many new torrent users to go extended periods of time without realizing they have an easy to fix error.

“But I can see peers who I have a remote connection with and we are exchanging data, this means I am connectable!”

-you are connectableish

While you are in this “non-connectable” state you CAN create a remote connection with some users. Generally the users (or peers) you are able to connect to at this time are limited to two categories. First are peers who either don’t have a router firewall, have no network firewall, or have toned done their firewall security settings. An example would be someone who was following my guide up to this point, and was lucky enough to become connectable upon loading their torrent client for the first time. The other peers you will be able to create a remote connection with are users who had to go through the same boring steps detailed in this guide and are truly connectable.

If you do not see this sign or get any type of program error similar to “not connectable”, then you are unable to establish or receive a remote connection with other torrent users. This is one of the most common errors and has many possible causes. These range from overly strict firewall security settings, ports being blocked by a network firewall, or in some cases an antivirus firewall or setting. Regardless of which of these conflicts is causing your client woes, you will need to take this next step before you will be able to make a remote connection.

The most common reason for seeing this client error is a conflict in your internet router settings. Although most frequently seen with wireless routers it is possible to run into router firewall conflicts with some DSL and cable routers as well. To fix this client error you need to do something known as port forwarding. The first step is to set a static IP address for each computer covered by your network firewall. You must do this step if you have any type of router, regardless of the type of firewall you have, and even if you have no network firewall at all.

Set a Static IP address.

http://portforward.com./networking/staticip.htm

Find your router or network firewall from this extensive list to open up a port.

http://www.portforward.com/english/routers/port_forwarding/routerindex.htm

Now go into your client configuration settings and set it to use this opened port range.

-In uTorrent this is done by selecting options at the top left then preferences (or just hit ctrl+p). From here select the 4^th option down “connections” and the first box contains your port information. Set this to a number based on what you chose in the port forwarding guide. When this step is finished you should be able to establish remote connections with other peers, as long as you don’t have an additional active firewall. If you are still unable to establish a remote connection and still see the not connectable error don’t get discouraged. You are almost finished and just need take one or two more steps depending on the amount firewall security or presence of an antivirus program that still doesn’t trust your torrent client.

Set all firewall security options to allow your torrent client full access

-Now that you have cleared up the conflict caused by your internet router firewall, there are only a few possible sources which could interfere with your torrent client. If you are using a version of windows that shipped with the windows firewall, it is usually blocking all ports by default, but this is a quick fix.

Tell windows firewall to stop being an ass

-Simply click the start button and run (the search start box works for vista) enter the text firewall.cpl. Click change settings and make sure the top tab (Recommended) is selected. At the very top of this windo click the tab that says exceptions, then the add port button near the bottom. Here you will need to enter the information on the port or ports you opened above.

Popular Antivirus Programs or Antivirus Firewalls That Can Cause Conflicts.

So now your router firewall settings should be compatible with your torrent client thanks to freshly opened ports and all that fun stuff. Hopefully this also took care of any network firewall security issues as well. This final section will cover the two most commonly used antivirus programs and their firewall security conflicts with torrent clients.

-Norton Antivirus

Open Norton internet security and double click the personal firewall. From here select the program control tab and select add to find the .exe of the torrent client you are going to be using. Choose the permit option and Norton antivirus will stop denying our poor torrent tracker the ability to establish a remote connection with its friends

-McAfee Security Center

From the
McAfee Security Center click the Internet & Network button, then select the
configure option. Click on the firewall
protection is enabled bar and then find the program permissions link in the
next window. Since McAfee is paranoid
you cannot give access to a specific port, so from here you have to select your
torrent client and grant full access.

Happy fun time now?

Hopefully at this point you are finally able to establish a remote connection and use torrent sites to their full potential. If for some reason you are still not connectable, and are confident you followed the guide correctly, try restarting your computer to finalize all the changes you made. If this still doesn’t allow peers to establish a remote connection with you, please contact me and I will either answer your question directly or make a guide for that specific issue. There are some cases where an ISP will block certain ports, and there are various other things that could lead to this connectivity problem. They are not common enough to make a separate guide for at this time, but I will try to answer them in the future if a common error emerges.

Update: uTorrent torrent client configuration guide

I hope this guide was helpful and easy to follow. It is intended to be used in combination with the guides I already posted in order to not miss any information. Please let me know if there is anything in this guide that I was unclear on or if you have any questions not covered yet. You can find a complete listing of my torrent guides to date by visiting my Torrent World Blog. This Blog is designed to have a minimalist approach, just serving to update members when a new guide is published. This is intended to enable the focus to remain on comments and offering support from one main site rather than checking each hub daily.