Hi there

Welcome to the world of Limewire. Your questions show that you misunderstand the nature of Gnutella. How well or quickly you can access other files is not dictated by compatibility with other applications or services. Think of the thousands of other users out there who have their computers switched on. In theory, you are going to grab some of their files. Whether you can actually find what you want and then get it depends on the quality of the connections through your "local" ultrapeers. Like me, for example. As I type this, I am linking a fluctuating total of some 4295M files (a total of about of about 4440 GB of material). And my machine does this imperfectly because the routing system between utrapeers is in constant flux to distribute the demands of the hundreds of queries and requests for downloads per second in an optimal fashion. If you are lucky, you will latch on to an utrapeer whose traffic is low and you will get efficient dowloads. If you are unlucky, you will get stuck in the traffic of an utrapeer who is struggling with the load.

So, what can you do? You can try to eliminate the consistently inefficient ultrapeers. This means keeping good records of your connections and weed out the ultrappers who seem always to be slow. This is not necessarily effective because every ultrapeer goes through phases. So, right now, my traffic has dropped to 103K files (360 GB available) so the leaf clients now attached to me will have speeded up. But, in some areas, there are not so many utrapeers and they may be more consistently busy. If you force a switch to other ultrapeers, this can produce some improvements but, at best, it's a hit-and-miss exercise.

You can improve results by being more aggressive in your approach to the peer system. Make multiple sequential searches for the same material and you can find different routes to the same product. Some routes will be quicker and more stable than others. Further, once you find a quick host, browse it and add one or two other downloads while the going is good.

You will devise other strategies through experience. Keep an open mind and be prepared to experiment. Remember that Limewire is what we all make it.

Good luck.