Vuze is one of the most popular programs for downloading files from the Torrent network. It is not a simple P2P client but a very complete software that lets you download and view HD videos, synchronize contents with portable devices and manage podcasts easily and quickly.
If you too have chosen to try it out and are thinking of using it as your default program for downloading files from the Internet, follow me because I’m going to explain how to set up Vuze in the best possible way. You’ll see, just a few clicks and you’ll immediately have positive effects on the speed of your downloads.
The first step you need to take if you want to learn how to set up Vuze is to test the ports through which the program accesses the Internet to download files. To test the TCP/UDP port of your Vuze and see if everything is working properly, go to the CanYouSeeMe website, type the port number you want to test in the What Port? (if you do not know what the port number is, open Vuze and go to Tools > Options > Connection menu) and click on the Check button.
If the test result is positive, you don’t have to do anything. If the result was negative (Error message), you probably need to open the port used by Vuze in the router’s firewall. To do this, you have to access the internal panel of your router (type 192.168.1.1 or 192.168.0.1 in any browser) and enter the TCP/UDP port of Vuze in the Firewall or Virtual Server settings of your router. If you don’t know how to do this, check out my guide on how to open eMule ports, the process is the same.
If after opening the ports the connection problems still persist, try going to the Vuze network settings (Tools menu > Options > Connection) and configure a port that is not between 6881 and 6999, which are the port numbers that operators can sometimes block or limit. Obviously, if you change the port in Vuze’s settings then you have to go and open it in the router’s firewall as well.
Once you have corrected the TCP/UDP port settings, you can set Vuze to the best possible settings and let the program determine the download and upload speeds best suited to your connection. Then make sure that you do not have any ongoing downloads or other bandwidth consuming programs running on your PC and select Speed Test from Vuze Help menu.
In the window that opens, first click on the Next button, then on Continue and wait for the connection speed test to be completed. Then click on the Apply button and you will have the best possible settings for uploads and downloads.
At this point, all you have to do is increase the selection of sources (peers and seeds) for your torrents. To do this, you have to enable transfer encryption (it’s used to evade managers that block P2P traffic) and accept unencrypted connections in and out.
Then select Options from the Tools menu in Vuze and in the window that opens, check the box next to Intermediate to enable more information to be displayed in the settings panel. Expand the Connection item from the left sidebar, go to Encrypt Transfer and check the boxes Ask for encrypted transfer, Allow unencrypted outgoing connection if encrypted connection attempt fails and Allow unencrypted incoming connections.
That’s it! Click on Save and you will have a Vuze that is definitely more reliable and snappy than before. Obviously, don’t forget to choose carefully the Torrent files you download and always make sure they have a good number of sources.