Hi, folks. I've read through the forums for a while and, while I see a few subjects that are similar, I haven't seen this exact problem.
I've been using LimeWire for a few years now, with few problems. Any problems I've had were due to logical reasons that didn't require me to come here with them. I've been able to download audio & video files with no problems, even though it may have been a bit slow before I upgraded system & connection speed. That's changed now. A bit of background: I'm running Windows XP (home) on a machine that has 2G of RAM & hundreds of G of storage, DSL (5M), running LW version 4.8.1.
Here's the problem: endless "waiting" messages, whether "waiting for busy hosts" or "Waiting in line, position N" or "awaiting sources" or others. I've had "waiting" messages before, when my bandwidth wasn't as wide, or my RAM was smaller or other similar hardware issues, but they always proceeded as outlined, LW rechecking every minute or so & eventually breaking through. Before DSL I used to download between 1kb/s to 5 kb/s, occasionally reaching 7 or 8. After DSL it jumped to 10 kb/s to 35 kb/s, sometimes reaching close to 50.
Suddenly, in the past month or so, I haven't been able to download anything completely, from 2-minute songs to 90-minute movies. Although I usually see the successful search results in the window, indicating that I'm downloading the files, I either get "waiting" messages or short bursts of downloading, then back to "waiting".
In the past, I've gotten "waiting in line, position N" where N has run from 1 to 10 at most. Now N begins at 700 or so! Are there suddenly that many new users? Also, most of the time when I get to position 1 or even "position 0" I get sent back to "waiting for busy hosts" or "awaiting sources" even though I "repeat search" while I'm searching and see that the file is still active & online.
Is there some setting to fix this? I haven't been able to complete a file for weeks - some even a month or two. I may get an occasional minute of 45 kb/s, but then it drops to 1 kb/s. Either that or occasional blocks of 1 kb/s for 5 - 15 minutes. It's very frustrating to watch "waiting in line, position 700" drop all the way to "position 1", then still not download at all...even (especially) for a file that's 99% done!
I'm about to give up on LimeWire although I'd rather not, but it's been a frustrating waste of time for a long time now. Thanks for any help any of you can give me.