The Non-Owner FAQ
So you are curious about seedboxes but not sure where to start?
This is information collected to help you understand how they work before jumping into the swarm.
What is a seedbox?
A seedbox is the term for when users of the torrent community use a dedicated server or VPS to increase their upload on trackers. A seedbox normally has a very fast connection (anywhere between 10Mb/s to 1000Mb/s) and is accessed remotely by the user. They can be rented on a month by month or yearly basis. The fast speed allows for users to achieve high ratios on torrents very easily, thus increasing their upload to the tracker.
Seedboxes can range anywhere from ~$40 a month all the way up to however large your check book is. The cream of the crop servers are the latest technology processors with terabytes of hard drive space and a 1Gb/s (1000Mb/s) or even a 2Gb/s connection.
Do I need a seedbox?
Seedboxes aren't just for buffering an account, a large number of users use them in order to keep their home IP address out of the swarm. They also use them if their home connection cant handle the stress caused by the large amount of BT traffic. They are very beneficial to users who have poor home connections where it would cost more a month to upgrade your home internet connection then purchasing a seedbox to do the work for you.
How large a buffer can I get my accounts in one month?
If you are using a dedicated server, you can get anywhere from 500gb to 8tb on a single account. It all depends on how you have your box set up.
With VPS you can expect 500gb to about 3.5TB.
This all depends highly on how active the tracker is and how fast you seed the torrents. Hence why RSS/irc filtering is highly recommended for sites that have it.
Whats the difference between dedicated and VPS?
Dedicated Serves are a computer that only you have access to. You have your own individual connection to the network, have complete control over resources, and pay a premium for it.
VPS is a virtual server, meaning there is 1 computer and 4 users have access to that computers resources. Each user has its own hard drive space and own desktop, however system resources are shared between them all. These usually have 2 100Mb/s lines connected to them in order to deal with the extra traffic generated by the added number of users. These setups are very cheap compared to the dedicated boxes.
Whats the best provider for seedboxes?
Spoiler:
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To help users here decide which company to go with, there will be a ranking system, with reviews, for most of the major dedicated server providers. There will be a separate thread for VPS (Virtual servers, shared connections)
Level 1 = Not Recommended
Level 5 = Highly Recommended
Level 1
keyweb
Level 2
Dedibox
Level 3
layeredtech
Level 4
Vectoral leaseweb
Level 5
OvH Hosting-ie
Explanation of ranks:
Spoiler:
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Few updates:
Hosting ie has moved to level 5, the value of the boxes through them is amazing. A few members have let me use their boxes to test them out and I give them a perfect rating (just as good as OvH when we ran 100mb test files between servers).
Pros: Bang for buck: You get really good hardware for what you spend
Cons: Support isnt that good, not offering 1gb/s
Vectoral will stay at level 4:
Pro's: Fast setup, reliable, good support
Con's: hardware is ancient and outdated, you pay too much for what you get
OVH will stay at level 5:
Pros: Very fast speeds, decent set up time, good bang for buck
Cons: only available in certian countries, french data center
Leaseweb level 4:
Pros: very nice setups, good support
Cons: way too expensive.
Dedibox down to level 2:
Pros: dirt cheap
Cons: Their datacenters are raided every other day, hardware isnt that great, support doesnt exist.
Keyweb level 1:
Pros: I cant think of any
Cons: Everything, support, cost way too much for what you get, limit bandwidth on you, not reliable.
What type of seedbox should I get?
The thing about seedboxes is they are addictive. It is nice to keep your home connection out of the swarm by using a seedbox and connecting to your seedbox using FTP. If you are going to use it for one month, the set up you will want will be very different then if you want to keep a server for a while. Usually when people use a server just for a month, they want to do a great deal of traffic in a very short amount of time. This is called buffering accounts.
If you are using it for a 1 time deal, you'll want to get very good specs and you will pay a premium.
Recommended set up:
Dedicated, not VPS
100mb/s connection
SATA Hard drive (at least 80gb)
non-metered
2gb of ram is recommended however you can survive with 1gb
Total traffic per month~ Easy 4-7TB
If you are going to keep it for a while, you can do lower stats as you will not be needing to seed every torrent to 15.0 ratio, your serve wont be as good as the above, but it will easily do 6mb/s uploading and keep seeding away. It also will be a great deal cheaper then the above.
Recommended set up:
VPS
100mb/s connection shared
IDE or SATA...obviously SATA is better, but IDE is fine for this set up
1gb ram is recommended however you can survive with 512mb
Total traffic per month ~2-4tb
I heard Linux is better for seedboxes, should I go learn it instead of just using windows on mine? Will it really make a difference?
If you don't know linux, then just use windows. There is no point in attempting to learn linux if you can just use remote desktop. Linux and windows both work about equal as far as the average user needs to be concerned about. You will seed just as much with both, as long as your settings are correct.
If I am on a tight budget, what is the most important factor for my seedbox?
Tight budget seedboxes need memory. At least 1gb memory for any seedbox is highly recommend. A lower priced seedbox will have an 40gb IDE hard drive, therefore you will also need to cap your downloading in order to prevent data corruption issues. Usually 4mb/s for any files over 3gb is good. Anything lower can be uncapped.
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