Fill Servers

[toastysoul]

I currently have accounts with UsenetServer (Highwinds) & Blocknews (Readnews).

I have a very hard time completing files >500 days to at least a repairable state with UNS & BN. Movies seem to be much more affected than series. BN has probably 95% of the stuff I'm missing from UNS, and their support is fantastic. -> Totally worth a few extra bucks a month. The problem is, I keep running into unrepairable files over and over again for older movies. I tried hitnews, but they didn't have anything (I think they lost a lot of stuff >120 days old recently). I tried stealthnews (no block accounts, but $3/mo w/rollover GBs), but THEY didn't have it either. I spent all evening yesterday comparing many EU/Independent providers, some where the websites weren't even in English.

Here are my results (alphabetical order):

I only considered providers with advertised retention >500 days. Anything less I have a good chance of completion with my current accounts. Prices with a ~ are for EU providers and given in USD * Current XR ($1.45/1).

CheapNews: http://www.cheapnews.eu -- Dutch, 650 days, Non-Expiring block accounts, 25GB for ~$13.05. Free trial, but refused to work. Requires international sms to a phone. You can only even *attempt* to send the SMS once per account. Tried 2 different accounts with 2 different cell numbers, neither worked. Sent support an email as instructed, no response 24hrs later.

Eweka http://www.eweka.nl/en -- Dutch, 1022 days, No block accounts. Low cost ~$1.60/24hrs access if you really need to get something completed. No trial accounts.

Hitnews http://www.hitnews.eu -- European, Advertised 544 days, but due to server problems, likely much less. See here: http://www.hitnews.eu/index_en.php?group=5 Free 3 day trial, no card needed. Accounts are speed & connection limited, but no flat amount. 2.5MB/s & 2 Conn ~$4.27/mo

MegaBitz http://www.megabitz.net -- Independent, 689 days, 25GB for $9, Non-Expiring. Offers free 8 day trial with sign-up. Website is severely outdated, they are still advertising "shocktober" pricing. Server status currently indicates failed disk, and no response to support email after 24hrs.

StealthNews http://www.stealthnews.com -- Independent, 550 days, $3/mo 3GB, 7 day trial w/ sign-up. -- Did not have parts that were missing on several files from UNS or BN. However, they do have something extra, as I have had a *very small* number of hits on missing pieces in other files.

Usenet Monster http://www.usenetmonster.com -- Independent, 850 days, No block accounts, $3/mo 5GB w/rollover. No mention of trial accounts. Website looks updated and professional.

XS News http://www.xsnews.com -- Dutch, 585 Days, 20GB for ~14.43, 5 day trial account w/ signup. Website is entirely in dutch.


I explored several German providers, but many of the websites wouldn't translate properly, and they looked more expensive anyway.

So there it is, I hope someone else finds this useful, and saves some time. If anyone has anything they'd like to add, please reply and I'll try to add it to the list.

[Malcontent]

Have you tried Astraweb? http://www.astraweb.com Readnews and Astraweb generally have the best completion. Have you tried switching servers with Blocknews?

[toastysoul]

No, and Yes. The reason I explored primarily Non-US providers was that for fills, I did not want DMCA to be a consideration when dealing with failed downloads. I have heard good & bad about Astraweb, but they do not have a free trial account. They are on my list to try out moving forward, however.

[zot]

Astraweb is notably absent from your list. (lots of Astraweb users here!) Astraweb's completion is much better than Highwinds/Usenetserver, and also offers block accounts. Astraweb will give a refund if you cancel within (I think) 24 hours. Supernews (Giganews w/capped 800 day retention) is also a worthy mention. Also Gebruikhet.net is a German XS-News reseller that sells block accounts.

regarding Megabitz: that front-page "(Sh)October special" was put up in October 2007 or 2008 -- and the website has never been updated since then. Megabitz was heavily promoted back then, offered some great specials, and lot of people paid for long-term accounts, only to find the service stopped working --for months-- and tech support stopped answering questions. Read the horror stories on the Slyck forum. I assume you are aware that all "independent" providers are basically just reselling access to one of the (approximately dozen or so) major usenet providers' server farms. Eweka is owned by Highwinds. I think that Megabitz resold Highwinds and Usenet Monster resold Readnews -- so if that's still the case then that should put their retention in the 1000-day range, regardless of what the website might say.

I did some comparisons of server completion over the last few months, and found that Highwinds was much worse than both Readnews and Astraweb. Highwinds completion on newer (<400 day old) files was generally perfect but older (500+day) files was consistently poor, around 98% - 99% completion rate. Header retention was sometimes under a hundred days - with enormous gaps - but I can't say for sure if it was Highwinds fault or a newsreader glitch. (I only discovered this as my account was about to expire)

However, a lot of big files like movies are posted with around 5% par files, so having 1% or 2% incomplete is generally fixable with par2 files. Even if a file was posted with no pars, you can still insure perfect completion by setting up a fill server (or two) in your usenet client since -barring a posting error- it's unlikely that two unrelated NSP servers (such UNS and Blocknews) would both be missing the same segment.

You don't even need to download the file to check completion - just "ping" for the articles. I use NZB Download Checker, but there are many other applications that will check completion without downloading anything.

I used to keep block accounts from Highwinds, Readnews, and Astraweb, but Highwinds completion has been so bad this year that I have not bothered to buy any HW block accts lately.

I've posted some Highwinds completion reports here:


http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/431428-Highwinds-and-their-piss-poor-completion
http://filesharingtalk.com/threads/432538-Highwinds-retention-improves-completion-gets-worse

[TheManMKD]

zot, regarding NZB Download Checker, I've tried it today and it doesn't seem to work with xsnews's free ivp6 access that they provide. I'm guessing this is due to the fact that I don't have ipv6 name resolving cause I'm using the built-in ipv6 that comes with Windows 7. This is backed up by the error that NZB Download Checker outputs (Error 11004). Do you know another program that would work with an ipv6 newsserver?

[nirvana2011]

I use Cheapnews (dutch USP). First a trial of 10GB and upgraded to a 500GB block account.

Overview:

+ Good retention
+ Reliable network (no interruption)
+ Speed = ++! (60MBit!)
+ Fast replies from support
+ Special offers/promo codes on their website

- No phone number
- Prices are Cheap but you can find other USP with better prices, however the quality vs price = good.
- Trial account is 10GB/7days

I decided to use Cheapnews because of their stable and fast usenet service. Before Cheapnews I have tried Astraweb and XSnewz but to many interruptions in downloading articles.

I hope you can do some with my feedback.

[B18C5]

Well, Newsbin required some internal changes to support IPV6 so, I wonder if the NZB Checker does too. I suppose I could write a checker that works with IPV6....

I agree with Zot on Astra. It's my goto server after my primary.

[zot]

zot, regarding NZB Download Checker, I've tried it today and it doesn't seem to work with xsnews's free ivp6 ... Do you know another program that would work with an ipv6 newsserver?


Besides "NZB Download Checker", there is " NZB File Validator" (NZBval) and "NZB Completion Checker" - and possibly many more to try out.

I don't understand why this is not (yet) a standard feature on all binary news clients, but sadly that's just the way it is. As the major providers such as Highwinds seem to favor the importance of retention over completion, I suspect that completion problems may be around for a long time to come. Hopefully, newsreader authors in the future will integrate --and ideally automate-- this "completion checking" feature so that people won't ever end up downloading a wasted blu-ray that can't be fixed.

[TheManMKD]

zot, regarding NZB Download Checker, I've tried it today and it doesn't seem to work with xsnews's free ivp6 ... Do you know another program that would work with an ipv6 newsserver?


Besides "NZB Download Checker", there is " NZB File Validator" (NZBval) and "NZB Completion Checker" - and possibly many more to try out.

I don't understand why this is not (yet) a standard feature on all binary news clients, but sadly that's just the way it is. As the major providers such as Highwinds seem to favor the importance of retention over completion, I suspect that completion problems may be around for a long time to come. Hopefully, newsreader authors in the future will integrate --and ideally automate-- this "completion checking" feature so that people won't ever end up downloading a wasted blu-ray that can't be fixed.

Nope, not working with an ipv6 news server. I definitely agree with you that this should be implemented into newsreaders. It seems it can be integrated into sabnzbd relatively easy, read http://forums.sabnzbd.org/index.php?topic=5074.0

[mesaman]

News servers belonging to 'Readnews' resellers give false results to NZB Download Checker and NZB File Validator, if the checks can even be completed.

[toastysoul]

Thank you for the comments. I did this because I was having trouble with completion on older articles with both UNS & BN (readnews reseller). The problems with older articles isn't just limited to Highwinds resellers. As I previously stated, I did not include Astraweb in this list for a couple reasons: 1) No free trial. Canceling in 24hrs is a bit silly, should be 3 days or 3GB min. 2) While there may be a very passionate following, there are just as many people reporting issues with Astraweb. 3) I'm not done yet! I'll get to them, I promise. I plan on purchasing a small block account for testing, and I will add them to the list asap.

Edit: Just purchased an Astraweb account: Very fast header d/ls.


Eweka is owned by Highwinds.

Are you certain of this? Their IP doesn't resolve to highwinds, and the information I have says that they are independent.


News servers belonging to 'Readnews' resellers give false results to NZB Download Checker and NZB File Validator, if the checks can even be completed.

This exact issue was the substance of a support request I had with BN. While the support is awesome, the issue is unresolved. NZB checkers stall when trying to verify the validity of an NZB on BNs servers. I'm not certain of the cause, but I get a "501 Newsgroup" error. Bottom line is, older movies struggle consistently on this provider, while older series seem to have great completion.

I have received emails from both Megabitz (6/7/11) & Cheapnews (6/8/11); I filed both tickets on 6/5/11.


Beste ***Redacted***,

Er is gereageerd op uw ticket met ticketnummer: xxxx.

08-06-2011 - Cheapnews
Dear customer,

Last Monday/Tuesday we have experienced some troubles in our ticket system. We have had a delay of 24 hours in our system. We recieved all tickets and we are busy replying to all open tickets.

We apologize for the inconvenience,

Cheapnews



Cheapnews did not have any parts of 3 movies I was missing from UNS or BN, neither has Hitnews, or Stealthnews, I'm just giving up on these files for now.


Megabitz Webuser wrote:
> What is the status of your service? Your website looks quite out of date, and
server status shows a failed disk. I'm interested in getting an account, but
the lack of updates makes me wary.
> Thanks.

Greetings -

We are currently offering services. We have a vacancy in our website
dept., which explains the status of the website. The server status is
currently being worked on. Please feel free to open an account; we
offer an eight day free trial, so you've got nothing to lose!


--
Thank you!

Megabitz Support


I've run 3 websites (with small communities) myself. It doesn't take that long to update your website, especially if it's supposed to be your full-time job. If, in a forty hour week, you can't find the time after 6 months to fix your pricing, I'm not too optimistic about your ability to provide good service. I'll pass for now, if anyone has any experiences with them I'd still like to hear about it.

[zot]

I did this because I was having trouble with completion on older articles with both UNS & BN (readnews reseller). The problems with older articles isn't just limited to Highwinds resellers.
Agreed. I think you will find, however, that Highwinds is definitely the worst.



As I previously stated, I did not include Astraweb in this list for a couple reasons: 1) No free trial. Canceling in 24hrs is a bit silly, should be 3 days or 3GB min. 2) While there may be a very passionate following, there are just as many people reporting issues with Astraweb.

Even a 3-day refund policy would be barely enough time on a weekend because Astraweb does not provide tech support over weekends -- even for new customers who are having trouble just getting started. (my biggest complaint with Astraweb) But I don't think Astraweb (or any other USP) refunds block accounts at all. But used as a backup/fill provider, an Astraweb block account is virtually risk free.




Eweka is owned by Highwinds.
Are you certain of this? Their IP doesn't resolve to highwinds, and the information I have says that they are independent.

Who is telling you that Eweka is independent? One of the many dime-a-dozen "review" sites full of paid referral links?

If you "Google" Highwinds and Eweka, (and use Google Tranlate if needed) you can easily find the answer:



Eweka overgenomen door het Amerikaanse Highwinds Capital / Eweka acquired by American (company) Highwinds Capital




http://www.ispam.nl/archives/759/eweka-overgenomen-door-het-amerikaanse-highwinds-capital/


Also, Eweka apparently has the same retention and completion as other Highwinds llabels. Also shares Highwinds numerous DMCA takedowns, which it seems, other Dutch providers rarely get hit with.




News servers belonging to 'Readnews' resellers give false results to NZB Download Checker and NZB File Validator, if the checks can even be completed.

This exact issue was the substance of a support request I had with BN. While the support is awesome, the issue is unresolved. NZB checkers stall when trying to verify the validity of an NZB on BNs servers. I'm not certain of the cause, but I get a "501 Newsgroup" error. Bottom line is, older movies struggle consistently on this provider, while older series seem to have great completion.

Reports of Readnews' inaccurate NZB Completion Checker results is news to me. I will say that Readnews article checks take an unusually long time to finish compared to other servers, although it never stalled on me completely. Unlike Highwinds, I never verified Readnews results.

At least Highwinds seems to be consistent (and very fast) in what gets reported to NZB Download Checker compared to what actually downloads. I know this because several times I went back and checked completion after downloading a very-incomplete file -- something I should have checked first.



Cheapnews did not have any parts of 3 movies I was missing from UNS or BN, neither has Hitnews, or Stealthnews, I'm just giving up on these files for now.

It's also possible that the original uploader was to blame. Were the files reported as being complete on search engines such as Binsearch?

Regarding Megabitz: It was reportedly an excellent provider when it first started. Then one day the service stopped working, the emails went unanswered, and the company rep who had been a regular contributor on Slyck's forum suddenly disappeared and never posted again. Megabitz then went quiet for months - if not years. The webpage never changed. People who had bought multi-month accounts at Megabitz presumably lost everything. That happened several years ago. I'd be curious to learn when the company started answering emails again.