nwrickert
sand groper
Premium,MVM
join:2004-09-04
Geneva, IL
 ·AT&T U-Verse
 ·AT&T Midwest
| reply to jd_hupp
Re: Downloads stall with large files
If it restarts from the beginning, that's something your download client is doing.
If it resumes, that's probably tcp error handling. It works on ACKnowledgements. Your system periodically sends an ACK to indicate what it has received. The sending system resends packets that you haven't ACKed. I think the time interval between retries increases.
You could also be having problems with a funky router between you and the server. I have seen a connection stall for several minutes, with an intermediate router missing a routing information update (or some similar failure). If it stalls for more than 15 minutes, the connection is probably going to be closed/reset by your system. This might be operating system dependent. |
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jd_hupp
join:2003-08-02
South Bend, IN
| To clarify about restart/resume: I mean that the download simply stalls, with the download window remaining visible but downloading not proceeding. Then after 5-10 minutes it may show that downloading is making further progress. Although, as you note, if it stalls too long, then I get an "operation timed out" error and the download is terminated.
If I understand, you would guess that the problem is caused either by 1) line/packet errors that hit an absolute retry limit or a lengthy delay due to increasing time between retries, or 2) a funky router somewhere along the current route (a router which I apparently get frequently, since this behavior with large downloads is common for me). |
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nwrickert
sand groper
Premium,MVM
join:2004-09-04
Geneva, IL
·AT&T U-Verse
·AT&T Midwest
| That about sums it up.
If you get that often, with many different servers, then the problem is close to home (the part common to all routes).
If you are connecting via WiFi, then I guess wireless inteference might cause similar problems. |
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jd_hupp
join:2003-08-02
South Bend, IN | This is a wireless + Ethernet router, and I am connecting by Ethernet.
Thanks for helping me to understand the likeliest causes. |
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