So the problem with Limewire started a while ago when I could connect, search, and download only the first file I looked at. After that, the connection meter dropped and each subsequent time the firewall symbol appeared and the bars would never fill. When I uninstalled it and got a new version, same scenario, worked once, everything stopped working after. However, Ares worked fine and I had very good download speeds (100+ KB/s).

The past couple weeks though Ares was connecting, and uploading just fine, but I was getting download speeds of 3 KB/s, and no change in Limewire.

So then I installed the beta version of Limewire. Now originally I think my prior version had some sort of issue with Java because that was the only thing that could coincide with the timeline (basically Limewire worked exceptional for a long time and then I started having issues). After installing it and booting it up, same thing, red bars and firewall. However, after a longer delay then it used to be, the firewall symbol disappeared and I eventually got to full bars (though it did occasionally go to all green except one from time to time). I was excited thinking it had been fixed. However, the same thing as Ares. Search worked fine (finally, like I said it wasn't working so it was a start) and I was uploading files, but each files I downloaded went to needs more sources.

On Ares, it's the same deal. Search works fine as well as upload. The only difference is occasionally one file in my queue will download 1% of the file and then stop downloading.
However, it seems to only occur when I restart the program. And the dload kicks in about 5 mins. in and then nothing the whole time I leave the program on without re-opening the program.

Just so everyone understands:

The Good:
-Can get search results all the time and not just once anymore
-Can upload files (and this happens almost instantly when I connect, it doesn't take a while)
-Can connect to the network (though it takes a lil longer on Limewire, Ares it's practically instant, again I'm running the Beta version but the version I had prior {I believe it was .13 not .15} wouldn't even let me get this far. Just one day out of the blue even though it worked fantastic before)

The Bad:
-Need more Resources on Limewire all the time
-Download only a very small portion per start on Ares

Couple other things worth mentioning, in Ares for each file it has like 200+ users, but most of them are idle. However, I did look through and there's usually double digit users who all stay stuck at "Connecting...". Sometimes it would also say Forcing TCP under status or something like that but I'm not 100% sure I'll see if it comes up again.


And here's the real kicker. My sister's computer downstairs connects no problem. She doesn't even have the ports forwarded to her IP address on the network and she downloads everything no problem. Her situation hasn't changed this whole time from when I couldn't even connect to now when I can't download.

So it's gotta be somethin on my computer and not the network. I just can't figure out what.

I run Spybot S&D and Ad-Aware and utilize the Immunize feature on S&D almost after every update.

If there's programs you'd like to see if I have (i.e. versions of Java etc.) please let me know.

This thing is driving me NUTS! I just wanna be able to download again.

And one final note, I know the files I'm downloading aren't the fake files. I can spot those fairly easily like when it has 80 users but connection speed is only cable/dsl and it's got a much larger or smaller file size than it should have. So it is 100% not that.