Hi there,
For about 6 month I've been facing one of the strangest Internet related problem I have ever seen : sometimes (well... most of the times) I just can't download files. Any files. Most of the "large" files I download are podcast and most of the times, the download stops and I just can't finish or resume it. It also happened with a couple of game demos I tried to download recently.
Here are my conclusions :
- I know it's not because of the sites because I have no problem downloading the same files at work or at friends house.
- I know it's not because of a peculiar software setting because it does it in both my computer, in both Linux and windows.
- I know it's not because of my router because I tried plugging directly in my DSL modem.
- My ISP says it's not their fault because they have a clear signal between me and them.
- While downloading, I can browse the web. The download stops but I can continue to browse the web.
- I have no problem downloading huge files with bittorrent.

What the hell am I missing ?
I would gladly appreciate any clues. I've ran out of ideas...

Thanks,
Rognon

Looks like some spyware or setting of some blocker. Could be some connection setting also.

end

I'm pretty sure the issue is not software related since it does it in Linux and in windows, on both my boxes. And what kind of connection setting are you refering to ?

that's a strange problem

did you try downloading using different download apps - wget, ftp, different browsers, etc?

maybe a silly question, but are you sure you have enough disk space?

I'm sure your ISP must be monitoring continuous bandwidth usage and preventing huge downloads on their network. It's not very common for ISPs to do this, but from what you say that must be it.

Does downloads stop when you reach a particular MB limit?

Well, the downloads stop at a particular limit but it's different for every files. For instance, file A will always stop at x MB and file B will always stop at y MB but x and y might be completely different values.

So what you are saying is:

You have problems with session timeouts when using FTP file transfers.
Same problem with two different OS's.
You do not encounter problems when using bittorrent file transfers.

Yes. And it's also for http file transfers.

Yep, I tried wget, different browsers and 2 podcast aggregator.
And I'm sure I've got enough disk space

Bittorrent are using an aggregation of small downloads, so it looks like your are having problems with all big TCP/IP transactions.
Have you checked your outside IP address isn't renewed to a different one when the download hangs ?

Have you checked your network cables? RAM? Could your NIC be faulty?

I'm betting that his ISP is just limiting the high load transactions. There are probably ways around this, such as a download manager designed to connect to multiple different download points for the same file, similar to how bit torrent downloads things (yes, I know it's not exactly the same), or reconnect to the same download point in intervals, or maybe limiting your bandwidth useage down low enough that it's still high but not high enough to trigger the shut-off. You said you called your ISP and they said they had no knolege of why, so either you were talking to a dumb tech support person (try calling again and getting a different person), or they're lieing to you for some reason (God knows why). I say you look into the ISP.

If that's the case, change your ISP.

An ISP who limits/restricts downloads is lame in my humble opinion.

I've done some experiments based on your replies.
First, I switch my network cable.
Then, I downloaded 3 files using wget :
http://videos.revision3.com/diggnati...-05--small.m4v (237 mb)
http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect..../FLOSS-013.mp3 (31 mb)
http://www.demolinux.org/DOWNLOAD/Co...-3.01-z1.0.iso (644 mb)

I download the file severals time and here's what happened :
- My IP address stayed the same
- The first file downloaded perfectly, at blazing fast speeds
- The second file stoped at about 5 mb, resumed and stoped at about 23 mb
- The third file stoped at about 0.7mb, at 0.9 mb, and then at 1 mb (sometimes it went strait to 0.9mb or to 1 mb but never passed 1 mb)

What kind of download manager would allow me to do this ?

Thanks for your replies,
Rognon

Just to be sure, you mean here your router outside address stayed the same, correct ?

Just wondering if there is a firewall like IP-Cop
between you and the net

because IP-Cop has a feature which limits the size of downloads

maybe there is something like this happening

regards
floppy