This is uTorrent's new Altruistic Mode
BitTorrent Inc has just added a new feature to the popular BitTorrent client uTorrent called Altruistic Mode that may throttle downloads in order to keep a 2:1 ratio at all times.
The main idea behind Altruistic Mode is to make sure you give back more than you take from the community of peers.
This is probably most interesting in situations where you want to keep a good ratio on a tracker, and where you want to support a project by giving it part of your upload bandwidth.
The intended use of Altruistic Mode is to help out a swarm. This can help other peers download faster or ensure a peer has a good sharing ratio. This is especially helpful in conditions where there are already plenty of seeds, which often happens after a torrent has been available for a while.
One thing that needs to be clear is that downloads may never complete when in that mode. If your ratio drops below 2:1, downloads stop until uploads push it back to that level. If you cannot upload to anyone, then you won't download either. This can happen if a torrent has only seeders but no leechers.
You could however disable the mode for a torrent in that case to complete the download.
Note: The feature is available in uTorrent 3.4.9 and BitTorrent 7.9.9.
uTorrent's Altruistic Mode
Altrustic Mode is not enabled by default. That's a good decision as it is likely not that useful to the majority of uTorrent users.
First thing you need to do is enable the mode in the preferences.
- Select Options > Preferences or use the shortcut Ctrl-P to open the Preferences Window in uTorrent.
- Switch to BitTorrent in the sidebar.
- Check the "Enable Altruistic Mode" box on the page that opens.
This enables the mode in uTorrent but does not configure any existing torrents to make use of it. The option to enable the mode becomes available in "add new torrent" dialogs.
You find the option to enable Altruistic Mode there. You may also enable the mode for any torrent that is already in the program's queue.
Simply right-click on any torrent file and select properties from the menu to get started. You find the option to enable the mode at the bottom of the window that opens.
Closing Words
Altruistic Mode keeps the ratio at about 2:1 by uploading two pieces of the torrent for every piece that gets downloaded by the client. The mode ensures that your ratio cannot drop below that for that torrent which is probably most appealing for users on private trackers.
While you could argue that setting up a high upload bandwidth and a low download bandwidth might provide the same result, this is not necessarily the case as torrents will still be downloaded even if no uploads occur.
Now You: What's your take on Altruistic Mode?
μTorrent!!!
Interesting feature, but not enough to change users’ minds. uTorrent has been discredited for quite some time now – and rightly so I’m afraid.
Ha! Not touching this shit any more since they bloated it and also decided to implement a fucking bitcoin miner into their app.
there are plenty of great alternatives equivalent to what uTorrent USED to be.
I am more worried that it might just result in the user not downloading anything, due to the lack of peers that could/would receive the necessary uploads.
I don’t understand how “This is especially helpful in conditions where there are already plenty of seeds” ?!?
Anyway, I’ve already uploaded over 30GB for this one 10GB torrent that’s a must see for everyone and I do the same for other torrents that are worth spreading.
It prevents that your own ratio drops below a critical point.
Noble idea, but in my country upload speeds are something like 15 times slower than download speeds. But if those who use uTorrent enable it, I’m not complaining.
Personally I understand the purpose because torrents stay alive due to those that share and seed. So this is to prevent leeches… though I feel like this will just push more people away from utorrent. I for one haven’t used it in a while as I moved to deluge.
It’s not enable by default so I think nobody wil know about this mode unless they read this ‘article.
I’m using uTorrent portable and I’m happy with it. It has ads but I can disable those through config. I used to use qBittorent but I love uTorrent’s UI more than qBittorent’s one so I returned to it