uTorrent is dead...long live...

...long live what?

I've come to the realization that uTorrent is broken, and as much as I love it, I can no longer depend on it due to it's CONSTANT "Disk Overload 100%" error message preventing me from using it.

Sometimes I need to download parts of extremely large files rather than snatching the entire thing and, even after I changed/disabled every possible setting and upgraded to the latest alpha release and downgraded all the way to 1.6.1, this error has virtually rendered this program completely useless to me now. The weird thing is I only started having this problem since I recently rebuilt my computer using all new hardware.

Anyway, I'm in the market for a replacement app that is dependable and get the same great speeds uTorrent did (and most importantly won't give me that stupid "Disk Overloaded" error).

Any suggestions?

 

The problem will likely not be solved by switching clients. It is result of a combination of "snatching" extremely large files, cache size, and the speed of your connection.

These things will not change with a new client.

However, read here if you haven't already:
http://www.psychcomp.com/utorrent-disk-overload-100-error-fix/

additionally, have you increased the number of Max Half Open TCP connections? 80 seems to be a good number...

Also, test to see if your provider is throttling bit torrent traffic at:
http://broadband.mpi-sws.org/transparency/bttest.php

 

I've come to realize that your right about switching clients, as people are telling me on other sites that the issue is my connection and that I'll have this problem with any client (as you said above).

My connection is 30mb Down and 5mb Up.

There is no setting in uTorrent that will fix the "Disk Overloaded" error (I know because I have tried anything/everything I found online including the suggestion in the above link about changing the MB to 1700).

Is this a problem with my HDD not being fast enough? I've never had this issue till I bought no parts for my PC about a month ago and did a fresh install. If not, do I seriously have to limited my download speed to fix this (meaning I wont get the benefit of my extra connection speed). If so, what guidelines do I need to use to ensure I'm right at the maximum speed I can utilize without going over and causing the error. I let currently uTorrent's automatic setup guide determine my connection speeds for torrents.

 

Your speed (as advertised by your provider) seems fine, have you tested it? speedtest.net, speak easy.net are a few you can try. Try this at several time during the day/night. I know at 3 AM I see moderately better speeds, maybe the time of day you do this work can help a bit...

What about your provider throttling your bit torrent traffic? Did you run that test?

The default settings for uTorrent may need to be tweaked, there dozens of sites that your search engine will take you to. It will be a bit of trial and error with these, but ultimately could be worth the effort.

How big are these files you "snatch"? Any chance the uploader could rar them into more manageable parts?

 

As for my speeds from my ISP, I can say I'm completey happy with what I'm getting. I test my connection on a regular basis and I always get 25ms Ping, 29-31MB Down and 4-5MB Up (as advertised).

I tried running the uTorrent test but it failed. However, I'm assuming that's because I do not have uTorrent currently installed and I'm running IE sandboxed. I can tell you that when it is installed, the ports are open/connectible and my upload speed is always right where it should be based on my settings.

The files are always going to be an issue like this as I usually find myself downloading smaller pieces of a larger file. They pieces themselves can be up to 2 Gigs each and sometimes I'll be pulling multiple parts from a larger torrent this way. Add in the fact that I may be queuing up 10-20 torrents in my client, all with the same "piece meal" setup, this is something I'll have to figure out on my end.

I've seen in forums people stating they have a faster connection than I do and still do not generate the "Disk Overloaded 100%" error (but I'm not sure if they download parts like I do).

Here are my HDD specs if that helps narrow down what is generating the issue:

 

Did you see this:

http://www.martinlawrence.ca/2011/02/disk-overloaded-100-in-utorrent/

 

I had seen something similar to that link but I decided to cover all my basis and so today, I did another test and here are the results:

I setup uTorrent in the following way:
~Pre-Allocate Files checked
~Override Automatic Disk Cache checked and set at 1700MB
~Enable Caching of Disk Writes is unchecked/disabled
~diskio.use.partfile is set to False/disabled

Using these settings I load up several torrents ranging anywhere from 50-800 Gigs. In each one I picked out just the files of each one I needed and started downloading.

RESULT 1
On my primary WD 500 Gig 16 MB Cache drive that runs Windows, I immediately get the Disk Overload error within a few minutes.

RESULT 2

I then try changing the download location to my second internal drive which is a 1.5 Seagate 32 MB Cache.

It took a little longer and I had to load in a few more torrents, but I get the same result. I had to throw a little more at it but the Disk Overload error still kicks in and wipes out my connection speed down to 2 kb/s.

RESULT 3

If the issue was my internet connection being to fast for the drive, I figured I would try just limiting my download speed to half of what I have now (currently have 30 down so I cut it in half to 15 MB down, which is what my old connection was before the upgrade).

SAME, still get the Disk Overloaded

Needless to say, I'm out of options on my end. I hope there is something I'm missing that will resolve this, but at this point, I just can't see it.

 

Step back from uTorrent for a while, what other programs are auto running at Windows startup?

 

Only a handful of start ups. I have went through and disabled anything non-essential. All that's left is stuff like Bitdefender, Sandboxie, keyboard software, etc...