Perhaps no one else has this problem, but my Limewire 4.1.11 (Pro) slows down terribly several times a day, and will then lose or corrupt the download.dat file. This has happened to me since the first time that I used Limewire, many versions ago. It is so routine an occurrence that I now regularly back up the download.dat file to several locations. Sadly, one cannot copy a good copy of the file back into the \Incomplete folder while the program is running. It can be restored after the program is shut down, but not while Limewire is running.

I am tired of downloading the same file several times because of this annoying problem with Limewire, or being forced to terminate and restart the program to gain control again. If the program cannot be made stable, at least it should have an automatic download.dat backup feature (with a sequential numbering system so that one could restore the last GOOD copy). Even if the download.dat file were backed up after each successful download, and even if one could keep the last one thousand sequential backups, the amount of disk space would be small compared to the storage capacity of a modern hard disk drive.

It would also be nice if one could restore a previously saved download.dat backup while Limewire is still running. That way one could continue active downloads without interruption.

Finally, I would like a feature where one could interactively reconcile the \Incomplete file folder, the Download Pane of the Search Window, and the Incomplete Files Directory of the Library Window. I have files orphaned in one or another of these places due to Limewire’s frequent crashes. Sometimes, when trying to repair the situation, I have gotten duplicates of some files, one of which will download, and its twin will not, but I cannot tell the difference. A utility to reconcile these different directories would help overcome the problems caused by Limewire’s frequent crashes.

Thank you.

You could manually backup the downloads.dat & .bak files at the end of each session. I know for Mac OSX someone created a backup system of their own using a special utility. I use it myself; http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showthread.php?t=56080
It would be good if someone developed one for windows. This problem is more common on windows.

I've also noticed about the orphaning of incomplete files but that's something that's been naturally occuring for a long time. My very 1st post on the forums was in regards to incomplete files in red. Earlier today I made references to this issue here http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showthread.php?t=56080