<p>Hey,</p>
<p>Can anyone share with me whether downloading would be a wise thing to do with the school's internet? Are megaupload/sendspace links ok? What about torrents?</p>
<p>Any insight? thanks!</p>
<p>I’ve heard direct downloads are okay. But not torrents. Definitely not torrents.</p>
<p>Torrents (even legal ones) are an issue because of the bandwidth limit (2GB per day). I was nervous when I first saw this since I do 2GB of data transfer a day on a regular basis without doing any heavy downloading. However, I learned something that the IT website does not tell you (or at least didn’t at the time; it may now, but I’m too lazy to check at the moment): the bandwidth limit is only for uploads. There is no limit on downloads. Obviously don’t go crazy, but I’ve definitely downloaded several gigabytes in one day from legal downloads and have never had a problem.</p>
<p>It’s easier to just avoid using torrents completely. You will lose internet if you go over bandwidth and if you’re caught illegally downloading, then you will lose internet for even longer. Direct downloads are fine, though.</p>
<p>I don’t use torrents but last year I download a ton of stuff from megaupload, sendspace etc. and never had a problem.</p>
<p>They keep a close eye on these things. One time in my computer science class, we were called out by the teacher because he had gotten a report from IT. Apparently SOMEONE in our class was using the wireless to torrent. >_>;</p>
<p>You’ll lose your internet for 2 weeks on the first strike, I think.</p>
<p>So I looked up the bandwidth information again. It does finally specify “outgoing” instead of just “bandwidth.” Woot!</p>
<p>[UCSC</a> - Be Smart on the Net](<a href=“http://www2.ucsc.edu/resnet/besmart/bandwidth/]UCSC”>http://www2.ucsc.edu/resnet/besmart/bandwidth/)</p>
<p>Anywho, for going over the 2GB outgoing bandwidth cap, the punishment is loss of internet access for three days. But, as Liesel mentions, punishment for being caught illegally file sharing is much worse:</p>
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</p>
<p>And for repeat violations:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>[UCSC</a> - Be Smart on the Net](<a href=“http://www2.ucsc.edu/resnet/besmart/filesharing/]UCSC”>http://www2.ucsc.edu/resnet/besmart/filesharing/)</p>
<p>I torrented all the time. You just need to make sure to encrypt your bandwidth or else torrents are throttled. Once encrypted, they can’t tell what’s going through so it gets blasted at full speeds. Of course, IT is pretty smart and will catch on.</p>
<p>You still run into the upload limit unless you choose to be a leech =/.</p>
<p>Forced encryption through uTorrent?</p>
<p>@theineffablebob - yes enable that</p>
<p>@Kender - gotta find a balance between uploading and downloading lol.</p>
<p>You can, but you’re still a leech if you’re not uploading until the ratio is 1:1 and this is just not feasible with the size of some files and the upload limit. Unless, of course, you’re only downloading one file every so many days and then letting it upload until your ratio is good again before you download another file. And really, who only torrents only one file ;)?</p>
<p>The risk of losing one’s access to the internet just does not seem worth it to me. And while encrypting may work for awhile, IT will catch on. It just takes enough slip ups (usually too many times over the upload limit; a friend of mine did this and was caught torrenting because of it) to send up a red flag for your account to warrant additional monitoring.</p>
<p>You guys need to get on usenet. Download as fast as possible, no risk of getting caught, no uploads. There’s a small monthly fee, so share it with your dormmates.</p>
<p>Paying for pirated material? Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of pirating ;)?</p>
<p>Hmm, kinda disappointed with UCSC’s internet speeds. They cap it at 5 megabits up and down. At home I get 30 megabits down and 8 up. My cousin gets like 84 megabits down 53 up at Berkeley, though I hear they’re very strict about usage: 5GB a week, which I can blow through in a couple hours.</p>
<p>@theineffeablebob, agreed. Ah well.</p>
<p>@kender The costs come down low when you share, and it’s worth it for the speeds and peace of mind. But I get your point :)</p>
<p>can i watch porn</p>
<p>They don’t seem to block any sites or ports on ResNet so I don’t see why not.</p>
<p>Also, I found this site [put.io</a> | online storage re-imagined](<a href=“http://put.io%5Dput.io”>http://put.io) that seems pretty useful for people who want to torrent but are paranoid about being caught or can’t get good speeds. You gotta pay at least $5 a month, though. Basically, they download the torrent for you and you download the file from their servers through HTTP. It’s pretty simple and fast – I got 8 megabytes per second through the torrent download; the download speed from their servers onto your computer will obviously be capped by ResNet.</p>