Will a WRT54G and QoS rules fix my torrent and slowness problems?

D

Decker87

Limp Gawd
Joined
Mar 24, 2005
Messages
415
My network is slow whenever I have even a small number of connections being made. For example, even 50 connections from uTorrent slows my network enough to make web browsing unbearable. It is not a problem of bandwidth. My data is only downloading close to 50kb/s. This is with a Netgear wireless router.

I was considering buying a Linksys WRT54-G router with DD-WRT installed. I know this has quality-of-service rules and is a little beefier overall...however, will it solve my problems? Can I always reserve a few connections for each machine on port 80 for web browsing?
 
If you get an older version it might, I heard the new version sucks (Memory can't handle QoS well).

I just got done doing some research and it seems to be the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 was a better buy, unless you want to add antennas but then you would should be looking at the Linksys 54GS, I believe it is the new version more similar to the old 54G.

But I hear the Dlink 655 is one the best for QoS right now with updated firmware, but it does not run DD-WRT. It is Pre-N too.

And they will be releasing a new version of the 655 ( 855? ) soon. Now your up to date as of my research yesterday yesterday...

I'm just going to go with 2 WHR-HP-G54's (one to use as a bridge) they should be good enough for my purpose and customizable. A bit harder to flash, though, hopefully I will get mine tomarrow since I'm only miles away from newegg anyways (They had a good deal on the router).


I had my cable company reset my modem tonight at their location (whatever they do there) and my utorrent jumped from 50kbps to 350kbs! it didn't do a damn thing when I reset the modem itself. It was a frustrating phone call since the tech didn't know much, telling me that my ping had jumped from 200ms to 300ms and 300 is faster (WTF) lol. They didn't really believe me when I tried to explain why this was not a good thing! But once they reset the router everything looks good. I have a crappy netgear right now and I can browse the net with that many connections! My internet was really slow with P2P as well until they reset me...
 
That's a very old generation router...if you want performance, why not purchase a current generation router that has substantially more horsepower and RAM. Yeah DD-WRT can help the old wrt54g series....but only so much. Still doesn't hold a candle to todays more current generation routers.
 
What are the newer routers you speak of, that are so much better at dealing with torrents? I don't want to wander out of the low-budget range.
 
DLink's 4300 has been around for a while now..it's fairly strong.
They have a newer 655 model which is pretty much top performer for all home grade broadband routers...it's mentioned above. I believe it's actually Draft-N, not Pre-N.

Linksys has their newer wrt3x0n series out....and DD-WRT has firmware which runs on those...as well as some newer Buffalo models.
 
Decker87 said:
What are the newer routers you speak of, that are so much better at dealing with torrents? I don't want to wander out of the low-budget range.
Click to expand...
The DIR-655 is the best performing consumer hardware you can buy at the moment. At $99 from Frys.com, it isn't necessarily the best value.

The DIR-655 with the latest v1.3 firmware will hold over 1600 connections and transfer from 400, while simultaneously routing at >60Mbps sustained with NAT, SPI, QoS, 802.11n, and WPA2 enabled. In DMZ mode with wireless disabled, it will route at over 180Mbps.

Most importantly, QoS on the DIR-655 is superb. I can download at 6.0 megabytes (not megabits) per second in uTorrent with ~400 simultaneous transfers, yet VoIP and web browsing isn't affected at all. On the QoS page, just set all torrent traffic to a priority of 255 (lowest), as in the example below.



The Buffalo WHR-G54S ($25 from CircuitCity.com) flashed with third-party firmware like DD-WRT is the better value for most users that don't require >15Mbps routing with high-quality QoS, but for pure WAN routing and QoS performance, no consumer router beats the wired performance of the DIR-655. The DIR-655 also has Draft 2.0 802.11n wireless, which may or may not be upgradable to the final version of 802.11n. Even if it's not, you can still use it as 802.11g MIMO router.

Note if your primary reason for buying a new router is improving your wireless stability and range, then the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 ($59, Newegg) is a better buy. With the WHR-HP-G54 running DD-WRT, you can run the wireless transmit power way out of spec. The xmit power with the stock firmware is 28mw, which is nothing special, but with DD-RT, you can run it at 80-100mw, vastly increasing your range. This translates into superior wireless throughput at >50 feet.
 
I have whatever version of WRT54g was "the best" right before the nix change, + DDWRT.. and I have horrible problems running many connections on it.
 
I'll also give another vote for the dlink DIR-655. The thing totally blows away any router I've ever had previously (about a half dozen). The QoS is very nice and the gigabit file transfer speeds between computer in my home network when compared to the older 10/100 routers I've had before is simply incredible. I also bought a dlink draft N card for the laptop and it performs like its wired to the network. The new firmware that came out about a week ago - I have loaded it but have not really noticed much difference yet. I am glad I backed up my config first as the upgrade reset the unit to factory defaults. Reloading the config from the backup file was a snap other than having to temporarily change my IP address back to the 192.168.0.x subnet. I guess I need to just go ahead and change everything to this routers default subnet which would negate that need in the future.
 
I love the advice from you guys, but unfortunately I need a budget router, probably under $60, with good ability to run torrents wirelessly. Therefore if this 665 you recommend is $99 and is best for wired communication, it's probably not what I'm looking for.
 
I suppose I should mention that my wireless car on my computer here is only an 802.11b card, not g. Could this be the bottleneck? I doubt it. I need a good wireless router!
 
I have to admit, I had the same problem. and just got my DIR-655 today. So far, in preliminary testing, it seems to have fixed the issue! I'll need to slowly start adding more connections. I am using the 1.3 firmware as well. Seems like a great router over all!

I got it from newegg myself, but Frys seems to have a better price.
 
Xaeos said:
I have to admit, I had the same problem. and just got my DIR-655 today. So far, in preliminary testing, it seems to have fixed the issue! I'll need to slowly start adding more connections. I am using the 1.3 firmware as well. Seems like a great router over all!
Click to expand...
Don't forget to set the priority for torrents on the Advanced -> QoS page:

 
Decker87 said:
I suppose I should mention that my wireless car on my computer here is only an 802.11b card, not g. Could this be the bottleneck? I doubt it. I need a good wireless router!
Click to expand...
If you are using wireless, you really should upgrade to 802.11g for better range and throughput. Does your PC have a 100Mbps ethernet port?

If your PC has an ethernet port, you should buy two Buffalo WHR-G54S routers for $25 each (after rebate), and run one in bridge mode, with your PC connected to its LAN port. Be sure to buy one router in your name and one in someone else's, as the $25 rebate is one per customer. Of course, you'll need to install DD-WRT to get QoS and a usable number of simultaneous connections.

If your PC doesn't have a 100Mbps ethernet port, then you should get a new router + wireless adapter combo. The cheapest combo from Buffalo is the WHR-G54S router for $25 (after rebate) plus the WLI2-PCI-G54S 802.11g adapter for $20 (after rebate) from CircuitCity.com.

If you want an "out of the box" solution without the need for a third-party firmware, then opt for the DGL-4300 router ($74) plus a DWL-520 adapter ($29.99 after rebate), or the DIR-655 router ($99) plus the DWL-G520M adapter ($39.99). Routing speed and QoS on both these solutions is superior, and you get gigabit networking, but you pay more for it.
 
Performance for Bittorrent is not only teh number of connections but limiting the upload speed. Make sure you limit the upload to about 1/2 of your total upload speed to start then increase it if performance is still available.

This with limiting the number of connections should help.

If that don't work then get ipcop!!!

http://www.ipcop.org/
 
KenF said:
The DIR-655 is the best performing consumer hardware you can buy at the moment. At $99 from Frys.com, it isn't necessarily the best value.

The DIR-655 with the latest v1.3 firmware will hold over 1600 connections and transfer from 400, while simultaneously routing at >60Mbps sustained with NAT, SPI, QoS, 802.11n, and WPA2 enabled. In DMZ mode with wireless disabled, it will route at over 180Mbps.

Most importantly, QoS on the DIR-655 is superb. I can download at 6.0 megabytes (not megabits) per second in uTorrent with ~400 simultaneous transfers, yet VoIP and web browsing isn't affected at all. On the QoS page, just set all torrent traffic to a priority of 255 (lowest), as in the example below.



The Buffalo WHR-G54S ($25 from CircuitCity.com) flashed with third-party firmware like DD-WRT is the better value for most users that don't require >15Mbps routing with high-quality QoS, but for pure WAN routing and QoS performance, no consumer router beats the wired performance of the DIR-655. The DIR-655 also has Draft 2.0 802.11n wireless, which may or may not be upgradable to the final version of 802.11n. Even if it's not, you can still use it as 802.11g MIMO router.

Note if your primary reason for buying a new router is improving your wireless stability and range, then the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 ($59, Newegg) is a better buy. With the WHR-HP-G54 running DD-WRT, you can run the wireless transmit power way out of spec. The xmit power with the stock firmware is 28mw, which is nothing special, but with DD-RT, you can run it at 80-100mw, vastly increasing your range. This translates into superior wireless throughput at >50 feet.
Click to expand...

I just got the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 the signal is no better than my old netgear from 3 years ago. :(

It also does not find as many clients when setup in bridge mode.

Increasing the Xmit power to 100, it did absolutly NOTHING to increase the signal.

So far I'm not exactly happy with my money spent :(

In fact the signal to my neighbors wirelss B router (that was in place when I moved in 3 years ago) is abotu the same strength as my new one...
 
I don't need a better signal or better throughput. At this point, with my connections at around 100, and speeds of only 50kb down and 10kb up, my network is on it's knees.

That buffalo router, has anyone here actually used it wirelessly with torrents?
 
I have 4 buffalos and they work ok as bridging ap's. For network related stuff I use a pentium Pro with 128 ram and openbsd/pf. I have 20Mbit down, 2Mbit up and the router is DEFINATELY not limiting me. Load hangs around 0. You should be able to dumpster dive & get a pentium1/2 which will be way overkill for a home lan.

Rob
 
cooter said:
Performance for Bittorrent is not only teh number of connections but limiting the upload speed. Make sure you limit the upload to about 1/2 of your total upload speed to start then increase it if performance is still available.

This with limiting the number of connections should help.

If that don't work then get ipcop!!!

http://www.ipcop.org/
Click to expand...

The issue is not his Torrent performance, it's the Torrent application attempting to create too many connections through the router and essentially DOSing it.

He could have 15/2, 50mb, or 100mb and experience the same issue on said router.
 
There's a tweak in DD-WRT you have to make in order for it to work with torrents really well. In the latest v23SP2 of the firmware, there is a section specifially for P2P. It limits maximum number of half open connections the router will allow and also you can adjust the timeout value for those half open connections that are idle. If your torrents are causing it to crash, you can lower the maximum to something say 2048 instead of the default 4096 and also change the timeout period from I believe 10 minutes to say 5 minutes or even 1 minute. Dropping those connections might actually be beneficial because if your connected to a peer that isn't sending or receiving from you, chances are they are just taking up a connection slot. However this may effect torrents that have few seeds by making it longer to download or upload those torrents.
 
Justintoxicated said:
I just got the Buffalo WHR-HP-G54 the signal is no better than my old netgear from 3 years ago. :(

It also does not find as many clients when setup in bridge mode.

Increasing the Xmit power to 100, it did absolutly NOTHING to increase the signal.

So far I'm not exactly happy with my money spent :(

In fact the signal to my neighbors wirelss B router (that was in place when I moved in 3 years ago) is abotu the same strength as my new one...
Click to expand...
I guess you installed SP2? I never saw any difference with SP2 set to more than 10mw. Only SP1 seems to register changes to the xmit.
 
Ken and Company...


Well, it seems like the problem hasn't gone away after all. Anything else I should look into or settings I should change? QoS is set up just like your picture.
 
If you're not happy with signal try putting the router on a high shelf away from metal objects.
 
Xaeos said:
Well, it seems like the problem hasn't gone away after all. Anything else I should look into or settings I should change? QoS is set up just like your picture.
Click to expand...
Are you using Vista or XP? If XP, you might want to patch your TCPIP.SYS to support more simultaneous connections. Two weeks ago, Microsoft's updated TCPIP.SYS (via Windows Update), and hence any changes made before then were lost. The patcher below is compatible with the new version of TCPIP.SYS in XP.

http://www.lvllord.de/?lang=en&url=downloads#4226patch

In addition, try adjusting the Torrent rule as follows:



This assumes that your PCs IP address always falls between 192.168.0.101 and 192.168.0.109; if that's not true for your setup, you need to adjust it as appropriate. By default, the DIR-655 assigns IP addresses from the top down, i.e. if your DHCP range is 192.168.0.1-- - 192.168.0.115, the first PC to connect to your network will always get an IP of 192.168.0.115. You can assign static IPs to each computer at the bottom of Setup -> Network Settings.

That rule also assumes you are using a random uTorrent port (via UPnP) between 6880 and 65535; if you don't randomize your uTorrent port, then change both fields of the Local Port setting to whatever port you use. Do not make the same change to the Remote Port, as that must always encompass a wider range with torrents.

You don't need the Vonage rule, unless of course you have VoIP and have assigned your VoIP router/adapter a static IP address.

You may also want to change your Firewall settings as below:



If you aren't using 802.11n, you may want to set the router back to mixed 802.11b/g as well. I'm not sure whether 802.11g MIMO mode is enabled with 802.11n disabled, so if you have a 802.11g MIMO adapter, that is something you'll have to test under the Status -> Wireless screen. The processor in the DIR-655 has ten threads, and I believe two are reserved for 802.11n when you have that enabled. If you aren't using wireless at all, you can free up another processor thread and disable that.
 
Thanks... I'll start by patching the half-opens.

What is a good number to use in total? And of that total, how many should I allow uTorrent or Azureus to use? 10? 20? 50?
 
Xaeos said:
Thanks... I'll start by patching the half-opens.

What is a good number to use in total? And of that total, how many should I allow uTorrent or Azureus to use? 10? 20? 50?
Click to expand...
The default of 50 is fine.

I wouldn't change your uTorrent / Azureus settings based on that.
 
All done. I've also set the other two just like your picture. Could you explain why it is worth disabling all of the ALG options and such? How will these firewall rules assist?

Edit: Also, I cannot disable PPPoE, which I am assuming because I am using a standard DSL connection.
 
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