Should steam use torrenting to increase download speed?

[Fenrar Storm-Hand]

Why on earth down steam offer users the ability to be used to download games faster and more reliably. Torrenting would increase game download speed and free up server bandwidth and improve user experience. Steam could offer some kind of deal like cheaper DLC if you agree to be used as a member of a torrenting swarm and this would save them money buying more bandwidth and be a solution to not being able to download when the server is under maintenance. So tell me this. Why not?

[KillahInstinct]

Aren't you maxing out your connection already?

[Brian9824]

Originally posted by Alpha_Centuri_101:

Why on earth down steam offer users the ability to be used to download games faster and more reliably. Torrenting would increase game download speed and free up server bandwidth and improve user experience. Steam could offer some kind of deal like cheaper DLC if you agree to be used as a member of a torrenting swarm and this would save them money buying more bandwidth and be a solution to not being able to download when the server is under maintenance. So tell me this. Why not?

Well for one how would they offer cheaper DLC for instance, thats not their property to give away at a discount.

For another your not guaranteed to get any better speeds by torrenting, and you can actually get worse speeds if no one is torrenting the files. Plus it would actually require people who participate to have those files on thier computer, for the computer to be running, and so on.

Plus in this day and age it seems like most ISP's have CAP's. So your idea would probably result in people paying thousands of dollars in overage fee's, so all in all it doesn't really seem feasible.

Not to mention the potential issue that people could technically modify the files and introduce viruses to steam and upload them to users by modifying the files....

[Crazy Tiger]

Originally posted by Alpha_Centuri_101:

Steam could offer some kind of deal like cheaper DLC if you agree to be used as a member of a torrenting swarm

They could only offer such a thing for their own games, not for the games made and published by others.

[Gwarsbane]

If you are not getting fast downloads speeds from steam, then the issue is at your ISP or on your end or a pathing issue (not Valves fault for that).

Valve has enough bandwidth to saturate a multigigabit connection. I've seen videos from people who had fiber optic connections and were getting a gigabyte of speed. Think of it this way, Valves download servers are a city water main. Your connection, is at best a garden hose.

If you are not getting your full speed, look on your end or your ISP is slowing things down. Also try changing your download server somewhere else, it could be a pathing issue. A torrent would not solve your speed issue.


And as everyone already said, at best they could only discount DLC for their own games. Which they already heavily discount already every time there is a sale. They and other game makers get nothing out of this.


Also game servers and download servers are 2 totally different things. If the game servers are having issues, that has nothing to do with people downloading from the download servers.

[AmsterdamHeavy]

No. I have no reason or desire to remove a corporation's overhead for their business by sharing my bandwidth with them.

I like Valve and all, but I am a customer, not an infrastructure resource.

[Gwarsbane]

Originally posted by AmsterdamHeavy:

No. I have no reason or desire to remove a corporation's overhead for their business by sharing my bandwidth with them.

I like Valve and all, but I am a customer, not an infrastructure resource.

Also ^^^^this^^^^

[VaLiuM]

Well, if we had to rely on seeders, it might end up being worse than it is now. Think of it this way, most people simply want their game and be done with it, not having to share their bandwidth with others after completing their own downloads, so what they might probably do is just leave the seed and what then? I mean, you can't force them to keep seeding for so long.

In my years on Steam i never had it that a game didn't download at all, it may have been slower than usual (temporary) but it eventually finished, i don't really see the point in using torrents, nor would i want to rely on seeders that may snatch&leave at any given time, slowing everything down.

[Start_Running]

Originally posted by Alpha_Centuri_101:

Why on earth down steam offer users the ability to be used to download games faster and more reliably. Torrenting would increase game download speed and free up server bandwidth and improve user experience.

It already does. Though it doesn't use users as seeds for obvious reasons.

Steam could offer some kind of deal like cheaper DLC if you agree to be used as a member of a torrenting swarm and this would save them money buying more bandwidth and be a solution to not being able to download when the server is under maintenance. So tell me this. Why not?

They're already doing it and no Valve will not be 'paying' to use your slower, less reliable, less secure bandwidth.

[Levi]

There are many other things that affect your downloads, that are not server sided.

Steam downloads are heavily compressed, and saturate even gigabit connections without much effort.

Normally, download rates aren't much of problem, unless the DL server that you're using is whacked.

In which case, you could just change the DL region...

[cSg|mc-Hotsauce]

Try all download servers until you find one with speeds you are happy with.

There are over 130 to try.

Any server near me was slow as dirt. Nearest does not always equal faster.

https://support.steampowered.com/kb_article.php?ref=9498-WPDF-3220

Today, Rio was better for me. Yesterday, Sweden was better. Btw... I'm on the East Coast.

Average speed for me...

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1620992612

During high traffic or ISP throttling...

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1661600888

Programs Which May Interfere with Steam

Spyware, Malware, Adware, or Virus Interfering with Steam

Troubleshooting Network Connectivity

[Satoru]

Torrenting isnt functionally possible given that steam distributes patches in a way that torrents cant really handle

Your game downloads are generally capped by your disk IO or your CPU speed

[Miss Marti. Morgan]

children do NOT click on links.... no no no.. run away

[Crashed]

Originally posted by Satoru:

Torrenting isnt functionally possible given that steam distributes patches in a way that torrents cant really handle

Your game downloads are generally capped by your disk IO or your CPU speed

Because the client would have to hold on to the patch bundles even after unpacking to share with other users, eating up excess disk space?

I do believe Steam Client downloads using multiple HTTPS (previously HTTP) streams in parallel, which should max out most connections no problem.

If you notice slowdowns, it is likely the client is being bottlenecked by CPU or disk usage from unpacking the compressed data files. I see it happen all the time on my client, bandwidth usage drops and disk usage spikes.

[Fenrar Storm-Hand]

okay okay it was just an idea. don't be too hard on me. it was just something i thought would be interesting to see.