Optimizing Tixati For Speed

Introduction

This guide shows how to speed up downloads in the freeware bittorrent client,  Tixati. All bittorrent programs need to have their incoming and outgoing communications flow freely in order to achieve the highest download speeds and that is what this guide is about.

This guide was put together using information given by the developers of bittorrent programs at their forums, guides and FAQs. There are no secret tricks, just the real basics of proper set up of a bittorrent program. Following these simple steps should result in increased download speed.

These are the basic principles of optimizing a bittorrent client, like Tixati, for speed: 

• Choose a proper port to avoid ISP blocks and conflicts with other programs
• Forward that port through any software firewall and router to allow incoming connections
• Adjust internal settings based upon upload capacity of the internet connection to allow room for outgoing communications and to distribute upload efficiently. 

There are some programs that claim to optimize speed in Tixati.Such programs are a scam and generally contain adware or spyware. I have seen it said, by the developers of all bittorrent programs, that nothing will increase your download speed in a bittorrent client more than the basic steps set forth herein.

If you are not using Tixati, there are several other specific guides for other clients and a general guide here:
Optimizing Bittorrent Clients

This guide is based upon Version 1.52 of Tixait.

Accessing Settings

Press the "Settings"icon up top

Choosing A Proper Port

To avoid messing up a network connection that is already cleared, first check and see if your communications are blocked or are already clear.  Have Tixati running while testing the port.

Click to Test Your Port Success-just go to Adjusting Internal Settings.Error- follow all steps.

The TCP and UDP port numbers selected are  at Settings>Network>Incoming Ports

If you failed the port test above, then you should first set your port to a proper one.  The TCP and UDP port should be set to the same number.   The most important choice here is to avoid using a port within the 6881-6999 range. This was the range originally used by bittorrent programs and is often blocked by Internet Service Providers (ISPs). (If your port was in this range, change and re-test). The safest choice is a port in the 49152-65534 range as this will avoid ISP blocks and possible conflicts with other applications.  Vuze-Wiki: Port is Blacklisted

To change the port, press the change button and another screen will pop up where the port number may be changed.
Again, the setting for the TCP and UDP port numbers is at Settings>Network>Incoming Ports

After pressing "Change", you will see this screen.  TCP and UDP should be set to same port number.

Introduction
A router will block incoming communications unless an exception is made. All software firewalls will block incoming communications and most will also block outgoing communications, unless an exception is made. If you are "firewalled", then other people will not be able to initiate connections with you (see Why Is Being Firewalled Bad).
As there are many firewalls and routers, this guide can not give explanations as to each. However, there are guides available, on the internet for most firewalls and routers and this guide will link you to them.  Note that PortForward.com does not have guides specific to Tixati.  Choose a µTorrent guide and substitute Tixati where µTorrent is indicated.

Software Firewall - The permission should be set to allow TCP and UDP in both directions. Generally, you will have a choice to set permission for the Tixati port or for the Tixati program. Setting permission for the port is the safer choice. You can check these options for guides:

• The help file of your software firewall is the best place to look
•  The µTorrent forum  has some guides posted
•  PortForward.com Firewall Guides(choose firewall and then µTorrent) also has some guides.

Router - There are two choices here. The easier way is to use UPnP. However, this has a possible security issue. Using UPnP allows any program to create a port mapping through the router without consent of the owner. The other choice is to manually forward the port through the router. This does not have that security issue, but involves going through several steps to accomplish. Using the guides linked herein, this should not be that difficult and is the preferred method.

UPnP - The Easy Way -  Enable UPnP in Tixati and router.

In Tixati the setting for UPnP is at Settings>Network>Incoming Ports.  Press the change button near the TCP and UDP port numbers and the screen below will pop up.  UPnP is enabled at default, if not on yours enable by entering check in box.  UPnP must be set for both TCP and UDP.

Manual Forwarding-The Preferred Way

1. UPnP (NAT-PMP) Must be disabled in Tixati (see image above)
2. Use the Static IP Guide
3. Set permission for Tixati port. This should be set to allow both TCP and UDP communications.
   You can check these options for guides:

• The help file of your router is the best place to look
• Portforward.com µTorrent Router Index has guides for most routers 

Click Here to Re-Test Port Success-Proceed to next step. Error- re-do steps or seek help in Forums.   Have Tixati running while re-testing the port.

Adjusting Internal Settings

Introduction
The most important setting here is to cap upload in Tixati to 80% of your overall upload capacity. Setting upload in Tixati is a fine line. The more upload you give, the more download you will get from other peers. However, if upload is set too high, or to unlimited, then download speeds will suffer as outgoing communications (acknowledgment signals, resend requests etc) will be interfered with. Other adjustments are made here to distribute your upload so that you receive back the most download from other peers.

Speed Test: Speedtest.net (Click for Test)
First the upload capacity of your internet connection must be determined by taking an online speed test. Speedtest.net has test locations worldwide and will highlight the one closest to you.
To take the test you must have Flash installed and javascript enabled. 

Before taking the speed test, press Settings in the upper right of the speedtest.net page.  This will take you to another page.  At the bottom of that page is the "Global Settings" options.  Set "Speed Measurement" to kilobytes and press "Save" .  This will facilitate entry into the calculator below and will lessen confusion as qBittorrent shows speeds in kilobytes.

You should stop all internet activity, including torrents, before taking the test and the test should be taken a few times to obtain a reliable average. Results will now show in KiloBytes. It is the upload rate that is important here.

Another Way To Test Upload Speed

For most people these test results will be reliable (Comcast users see Note). However, you may wish to do a double check on real life upload speed. When you are active on a torrent with a good number of peers and you are using your upload cap, set upload to unlimited and watch for about 5-10 minutes and see where upload settles in at. Then input that number into the calculator in the kiloBytes section. 

Note: Some ISPs will show inaccurate results on the speed test. If your ISP has anything like Comcast's PowerBoost, then your results will show higher than the actual speed of your connection. PowerBoost provides a burst of download and upload speeds above your provisioned download and upload speeds for the first 10MB and 5MB respectively. Since the speed test involves relatively small files, this will skew results upward.
If you have PowerBoost, or something similar, my findings from my own results and those of others is that the actual speeds are 60% of the test result.  So if you get 200kB/s for upload at the test, you should enter 120 in the kB/s box in the calculator.  Using Google ("speed result" x .6) will get the proper number to enter in  the calculator and this actually turns out to be very accurate.  You should end up with the calculator showing a cap that is about half of the test result.

Calculator:  Azureus Upload Settings Calculator

Once you have an average upload speed for your connection go to the online Azureus Upload Settings Calculator. Although designed for Azureus, this calculator will work for all bittorrent clients.
This calculator was created by the8472 a contributor to Vuze (fka Azureus) and part of the team that created Bittorrent Protocol Encryption.

Enter your average upload speed in the appropriate box

The calculator will automatically give the proper figures to adjust bandwidth, connections and queue  options in Tixati.

Bandwidth - On the Bandwidth screen, at the lower right, is the setting for max upload speed.

The Maximum KBs should be set to calculator number above and the other options should be unticked.

Connections Tixati only has a setting for "Maximum peer connections per transfer".   The calculator setting for "Maximum number of connections per torrent" should be entered here.  The "Maximum concurrent outgoing connection attempts" option should be set at 8 for Windows machines.  It can be set to 100 for Linux machines, although setting it higher does not help download speed.

The setting is located at Settings>Network>Connections

Queue Tixati does not have a "max active torrents" setting, so that result in the calculator should be entered in the "Upload Slots" setting in Tixati.  The boxes to recycle upload and download slots should be unticked as this will result in too many torrents running.

The settings for Queue options are at Settings>Transfers>General

Peer Sources & Encryption

Having the proper peer sources enabled, such as Peer Exchange (PEX) and Distributed Hash Table (DHT), will help download speeds as they will help you find additional seeds and peers for a torrent. 
Encryption was primarily designed to thwart Internet Service Providers interference with bittorrent.  Having encryption enabled and allowing incoming legacy (non-encrypted) connections will provide you with the largest pool of seeds/peers to select from.

The setting for Peer Exchange is at Settings>Transfers>General and should be set as in image below

The setting for DHT is at Settings>DHT.  The top setting should be set to "On" .  The other settings leave unchanged.

The settings for Encryption are located at Settings>Network>Connections.  Setting "Outgoing" to "encrypted preferred" and "Incoming" to "Accept either" will result in the maximum number of seeds/peers being connectable, while encrypting as many connections as possible.

IPV Settings

In going through the settings, I noticed that the default setting on my Tixati for this was set to IPV4 only.  I am not sure how much affect this would have, but it seemed wrong to only accept IPV4.  There are settings for IPV4 and IPV6 "preferred" as opposed to "only" and I would suggest using the "preferred".  I have set mine to "IPV4 preferred" and would think for most people that would be the correct setting.

The setting for IPV is at Settings>Network>Connectons

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Gizmo's Best Ever Freeware Forums

If you still have issues after using this guide and would like some assistance, you may post here or our Forums.  The comments section here is not well set up for ongoing discussions, so the forums are a better place.

When posting on a speed issue, please provide

• Your speed test result for both upload and download speed in kiloBytes per second (kBps)
• Your result at canyouseeme, both before taking any steps and after.  Just indicate Success or Error do not post your IP address.

If you have a suggestion or correction for the guide, please post here.

Those who wish to post a thanks may post here or in the forums. I always appreciate hearing from those who this helped and I do read the posts regularly. I used to respond to each thanks, but realized it was clogging up the comments section. I thank all those who have posted their appreciation and all those who will.

So, to those who post a "Thanks", I appreciate it.

Steve