What are current thoughts on Shareaza as a BT client?

[spoco2]

Hi all, I only just stumbled across this forum and must say there seems to be a wealth of info here!

I have a question right off the bat. I've been using Shareaza for quite time now very happily for both video downloads via BitTorrent, and music via the other supported networks. My wife likes it due to it being only one client for handling everything, and it's really easy to use.

My question is that does anyone here have thoughts on how it actually performs these days as a BitTorrent client compared to others? To me it seems as fast as one could want, and I know that in the past it had issues, but there have been a large number of fixes and improvements over time.

As such, does anyone who's tried it and others recently have any thoughts on how it stacks up?

[RealitY]

Last I looked at this it was bottom of the list for bt clients with many issues.
Though it may have improved since then since that was some time ago...

[spoco2]

Last I looked at this it was bottom of the list for bt clients with many issues.
Though it may have improved since then since that was some time ago...

That's really the point of my question I guess. I know it has been bad in the past (although I've never had issue with how fast things come down), but I was more wondering from those in the know, as to whether it's regarded as good these days...

[RealitY]

The issue then was it being viewed as a leech client if I recall corectly. When testing it the ul was slow and the client would dissconect when the torrent was done and share it on the G2 network. Again this was some time ago. Would think by now theyve changed those drawbacks...

[spoco2]

The issue then was it being viewed as a leech client if I recall corectly. When testing it the ul was slow and the client would dissconect when the torrent was done and share it on the G2 network. Again this was some time ago. Would think by now theyve changed those drawbacks...

Very true, that's what it did do. Now it actually does say 'seeding' once you finish a download (although it also still shares on the G2 network too).

I'm asking as I want to write up the best review I can for a site a few of us are trying to put together to ward people off the horrendous file sharing scam sites that are out there. As part of said site, I'm doing reviews of my favourite p2p clients, and Shareaza happens to be my current favourite, so I was trying to ensure I'm not leading people down a bad path by using it.

The site is http://www.mp3read.com (http://www.mp3read.com/) if you're interested, still very much in the 'building' stages. But we hope it can become a site people can be pointed towards as a way of letting them know about all the horrible scams there are out there... I mean there are even sites that pretend to be sites reviewing the 'good' file sharing sites that end up pointing you to some of the worst... it's just mind numbingly horrible.

Anyway, thanks for your thoughts on Shareaza, it would seem it's having trouble shaking off some of the bad feelings of old.

[General2k]

I tried it a while back, and it was nothing but a memory pig. Had trouble connecting to trackers, and very slow speeds when it finally did connect.
I switched over to uTorrent and I must say that either uTorrent or Azureus are the way to go.

[teddytora]

Don't care for Shareaza, although imho the best torrent client seems to depend on how much b/w you have & how you want to manage it. I could never get Azureus configured to perform as I wanted wheras Utorrent works just fine.

[spoco2]

I tried it a while back, and it was nothing but a memory pig. Had trouble connecting to trackers, and very slow speeds when it finally did connect.
I switched over to uTorrent and I must say that either uTorrent or Azureus are the way to go.

Yeah, again, it would seem to be a 'a while back it was crud, haven't tried it since' kinda thing... maybe I need to check the Shareaza forums again, although they tend to be biased towards it for some strange reason :P


Don't care for Shareaza, although imho the best torrent client seems to depend on how much b/w you have & how you want to manage it. I could never get Azureus configured to perform as I wanted wheras Utorrent works just fine.
Yeah, I've never had much issue with speed of downloads, on a good wicket with cable internet here, so bandwidth limits not a problem...

[geen]

I tried it a while back, and it was nothing but a memory pig. Had trouble connecting to trackers, and very slow speeds when it finally did connect.
I switched over to uTorrent and I must say that either uTorrent or Azureus are the way to go.
Shareaza isnt developed for people who mostly download torrents. Its there for people who dont want much trouble with different clients and should be described as kazaa users.
Its a product with a lot of features but some of them are not more then average. Its the old "quality over quantity" story, do you want a lot of features(quantity) or can you live with being limited to torrents but have a better(quality) client.

[TheFoX]

The one major issue that is overlooked by those using ShareAZA is that the torrent you download into the client will then appear in your Shared Folder (if enabled, which it is in most cases).

There are two major issues with having the torrent in your Shared Folder. Firstly, that torrent will probably have your passkey embedded into it, meaning that others can leach off your account. Secondly, having a torrent in the Shared Folder means that it can be selected as part of a search (especially since torrent names usually reflect the Scene name of the original material used for the RAR).

Combine these two, and you have a situation where someone can actively search your Shared Folder, then download the torrent data from peers, posing as you. This is the equivalent of torrent ID Fraud (someone stealing your identity to take data from YOUR peers).

Many communities ban ShareAZA because of this issue, and one community actually changes the name of the torrent file to random characters so that the release name is not the same as the torrent name.

I would also point out that a dedicated BT client will perform much more admirably than a hybrid client, since the dedicated one has been optimised for that specific filesharing method.

Finally, it is uncool to brag you use ShareAZA. People will look down at you, thinking that you are possibly a village idiot. They may think your a charity case, or a few slices short of a loaf. Discard this image immediately. There are a wealth of excellent clients available, some of which will enhance your image (and possibly your sex life as well).

[artifact]

its crap use utorrent, or azureus... if u want somethign diffrent than that i rec bittornado

shareza is serious memory hog as i recall.. honestly you are much better off using seperate clients for each protocol u want to use.

[spoco2]

The one major issue that is overlooked by those using ShareAZA is that the torrent you download into the client will then appear in your Shared Folder (if enabled, which it is in most cases).

There are two major issues with having the torrent in your Shared Folder. Firstly, that torrent will probably have your passkey embedded into it, meaning that others can leach off your account. Secondly, having a torrent in the Shared Folder means that it can be selected as part of a search (especially since torrent names usually reflect the Scene name of the original material used for the RAR).

Combine these two, and you have a situation where someone can actively search your Shared Folder, then download the torrent data from peers, posing as you. This is the equivalent of torrent ID Fraud (someone stealing your identity to take data from YOUR peers).

Many communities ban ShareAZA because of this issue, and one community actually changes the name of the torrent file to random characters so that the release name is not the same as the torrent name.

I have a feeling this is false. The torrent is stored in a separate directory, and as such is not shared... you could share it, but then you could do that with any client. As mine is setup, and is the default, the .torrent file is not shared. The resultant downloaded files are indeed shared, and seeded as soon as they all come down, but the .torrent file is not.

Plus I've never actually downloaded a torrent that required a passkey anyway, so this has never been an issue... I would imagine once you're getting into the realm of downloading torrents that do require passkeys, that you're a pretty serious user. The amount of material available without ever needing a passkey has always met our needs for downloading.



I would also point out that a dedicated BT client will perform much more admirably than a hybrid client, since the dedicated one has been optimised for that specific filesharing method.
You're stating that without actually knowing it to be true at all. Sure, you can use the logic that 'a client that does one thing will do the one thing better than one that does more', but that's not ever guaranteed to be true. The multi client may well do all of its downloading just as well as any individual client.



Finally, it is uncool to brag you use ShareAZA. People will look down at you, thinking that you are possibly a village idiot. They may think your a charity case, or a few slices short of a loaf. Discard this image immediately. There are a wealth of excellent clients available, some of which will enhance your image (and possibly your sex life as well).Hmm, that was a sensible addition...

a) I like only having to bother with one client
b) It's always downloaded everything we've wanted it to in a very small amount of time
c) It's an easy to use interface which greatly helps my wife use it.... which leads to...
d) My sex life is damn great as I am married, thanks for being concerned.

As such, while this was an interesting post, and it would seem that maybe some are concerned with Shareaza for downloading torrents that require passkeys (which, again, after doing a LOT of BT usage for years and NEVER having to use a passkey), it still seems to be holding up pretty darn well from a "normal" user point of view.

Thanks for the reply though :)

[TheFoX]

Plus I've never actually downloaded a torrent that required a passkey anyway, so this has never been an issue...


If you are a member of a closed community, or many open door membership communities (see the many different threads here for a summary of many communities), then using a passkey with your announce is more or less standard, and has been for the last two and a half years.

Many of the big, non membership, sites will not need a passkey (piratebay as an example), since they are not membership orientated sites.

As for ShareAZA, the practice of not saving the torrent file to the shared directory may be a recent one. My history with this client, which goes back roughly three years ago, tells me that it does, or did. In fact, I actually joined numerous membership only torrent communities (in the early days) simply by searching for a film using ShareAZA, then using the torrent announce URL to locate the host site. Whether it was ET, TB, FL or a number of others, I located all these using torrents that I had found in the shared directory of other ShareAZA users. Of course, this may have well changed since the days I used ShareAZA, but having legacy programs around that allow sharing of passkey enabled torrent files means that site operators often ban such clients as a security risk.


You're stating that without actually knowing it to be true at all. Sure, you can use the logic that 'a client that does one thing will do the one thing better than one that does more', but that's not ever guaranteed to be true. The multi client may well do all of its downloading just as well as any individual client.


I am making assumptions here, and rightly so... If I spent 100 man hours working on one solution, that solution should be more optimised that 3 solutions that equally split 100 man hours between them.

We all make assumptions and they are not always true, but in the cases of majorities, we cannot argue that, with the exception of a few, the majority of BT only clients will outperform, either technically or from a feature viewpoint, a client such as ShareAZA that tries to envelope a number of protocols.

The same argument could be applied to the Windows V Linux debate. There are those that argue that Windows Pro is better since it costs a lot of money, while others argue that Linux is better as it has a much larger development base. Each side will have it's viewpoints, and who are we to change them.


As such, while this was an interesting post, and it would seem that maybe some are concerned with Shareaza for downloading torrents that require passkeys (which, again, after doing a LOT of BT usage for years and NEVER having to use a passkey), it still seems to be holding up pretty darn well from a "normal" user point of view.

You are among peers who probably rank along side you regardling time online with torrents in particular, and filesharing in general. What I know for a fact is that no two people are alike. What interests one person will bore the pants off another person. My own filesharing history spans the last 9 years (even on a 56K modem - that was slow stuff), so I have definitely worn the T-shirt (bearshare, kazaa, gnutella to name a few). Filesharing is much like driving a car. Each driver will have their favourite form of transport, whether it is saloon, hatchback, SUV, off-roader etc. Some prefer Diesel, and others prefer Petrol. Some prefer comfort, while others prefer power. No two drivers are alike.

Yours has been an interesting read...

::TFX::