Since the Internet came globally to become part of our lives, downloading all kinds of files has become one of the actions that we most often perform on our computer. These are usually done directly from a web page or through the use of the famous torrent files. For inexperienced users, today we are going to talk about these types of files, how to download and open them on our Windows PC.
Downloading this type of file became popular years ago to quickly obtain all kinds of content. Although its use has been reduced in recent years, it is still a very valid option for downloading. If you have never used it, we will tell you everything you should do.
What are torrent files
They are basically files that contain all the necessary information about the download of some content and that are shared using the BitTorrent protocol. They include information on pairs and seeds for the file we want to download. This protocol is a technique for sharing files over the Internet , without these containing any fragment of what we are going to download.
These were born to alleviate some of the deficiencies of peer-to-peer networks, such as the search for files among the thousands of systems that are connected to the network, as well as the distribution of the enormous load and unload in many computers and connections. to Internet. Its popularity spread quickly as it was an efficient and decentralized way of sharing content on the Internet, without the need to use a powerful server from which to distribute the files.
On many occasions this term is associated with pira-cy . However, the act itself is not il-legal . What will make downloading files legal or illegal will be those we choose. For example, if we choose to use it to download copyrighted material (movies, series, music, books …), it is an illegal activity. On the other hand, if we use it to download free content, it can be done perfectly. It is convenient to know that the responsibility for downloading illegal files falls directly on the user who downloads the file, so we must ensure the content before obtaining it.
Download torrent files from a client
Carrying out this task is quite simple, since it will only be necessary to have a client software that will be in charge of making the downloads. Then we must add the torrent file that we can download from different web pages or, if you have it, from the program’s search engine. And finally, run it so that it downloads the files it contains and we can access them from our PC.
Download the software
To begin with, we must bear in mind that our PC is not capable of recognizing these files by default, so it will be necessary to download a client. This is nothing more than special software capable of opening .torrent files. For them there are a large number of programs among which we can highlight:
- uTorrent : undoubtedly one of the best known and most used clients to download and open torrents. It has a basic version that we can install for free, although it has annoying and constant advertising that can spoil our experience. We can access it from this link to its official website .
- qBittorrent : this software is characterized by having its own search engine, allowing us to do these searches on third-party websites through the Internet browser. It has multiple options to optimize downloads and consumes little system resources. We can download it for free from their website.
- Bitcomet – one of the fastest and easiest to use download software. It is characterized by storing data in the cache so you will not always need to access the hard drive to avoid damaging it, something common with older clients. It is available for free and can be accessed from this link to the developer’s website .
Configure the client
Once we have downloaded and installed the client that we are going to use to open the files, we must configure it. While it is true that most come with predefined settings, it is always possible to improve them. In the case of qBittorrent, we can click on its “Tools” section to enter its “Options”, or press the keyboard shortcut “Alt + O”.
From here we can allow the program to start at the same time as Windows, and select the place to save them. From the “Connections” section we can enable the UPnP port assignment that allows us to download as fast as our connection is capable of. We can also limit the maximum upload and download speed. It also allows us to configure the maximum number of active and queued downloads from its BitTorrent section.
In other clients, it is possible that we must also verify and configure the firewall, so that we can have an open path for the file transfers to allow us to obtain the fastest possible speeds.
Download the files
Once we have installed and configured the client, we must download the torrent file. For this, it is advisable to always use websites that make legal content available to us. These are not easy to find, but it is certainly the safest way to download a file. In them we can find almost everything, from songs to movies or software. Some of the most recommended sites are:
- Public Domain Torrents : this is one of the most popular legal torrent websites, from which to download safely. The site is divided by categories to facilitate the work. It stands out for having a wide assortment of old movies that are not easy to find. Of course, it requires a donation to download them. You can access it by clicking on this link to its main page .
- Etree Torrent : this is a website specialized exclusively in music, ranking as one of the best options to obtain recordings legally. It has a large number of files, its interface is simple to use and we can obtain the file for free. To access, just click on this link on its official website .
- Vuze torrent : this is another of the different websites that has legal torrents, being able to find all kinds of multimedia files, from movies to television shows or a wide list of podcasts. It does not require registration and all its content is available for free. We can access directly by clicking on this link to the developer’s website .
It should also be noted that some clients also have their own search engine, through which we can access the desired content without having to search web pages. In this case, we must be careful not to find illegal content that may violate copyright.
How to open a file
When we have downloaded it, unless we have configured otherwise, it will be automatically saved on our desktop. It is possible that we obtain directly the file with .torrent format with which to open it directly with the client or that it has another extension, since it may be compressed, which will cause us to have to resort to other programs to open them and obtain the file. torrent.
It is possible that the downloaded file is compressed in a ZIP or RAR file, so we need a decompressor to be able to access its content. In this case we can use programs such as WinRAR, WinZip, among others.
Once we have the .torrent file, we must open it to begin downloading it. To do this, it can be done by double clicking on it. We can also choose to drag and drop it to the interface or from the same program, click on File and Add torrent file and selecting it.
Once added, a new window will appear where it shows us all its content, allowing us to download all the files or only those that we select, being able to uncheck those that we do not want. We can also choose the destination route where it will be stored on our PC and even keep them organized by categories.
Once added, it will appear in the client interface from where we can follow the entire download process. It will be possible to pause it at any time to continue later, see the speed and the approximate waiting time. Once the download is complete, we can access all its content from the folder in the destination path that we choose.
Download from the browser
If we do not want to have a P2P client, we can also use extensions for our Google Chrome browser. These add-ons will take care of turning our browser into a torrent client from which to download.
JSTorrent
This torrent client for Chrome allows us to download all kinds of content from our browser with great ease. We can download all the files we want directly to our Downloads folder, so we will always have them at hand and well located. It has the peculiarity that it is capable of handling large files, even with different files of several gigabytes in capacity and all in a simple way.
uTorrent Easy Client
Here we find an extension for Chrome of the popular uTorrent client. This add-on adds the program’s web interface to our browser, which will allow us to download files comfortably without the need for another external program. From it we can see and manage our list of torrents and files, delete them, remove tags and add them from the context menu. In addition, we will control your upload and download speed at all times.
.torrent to Transmission
By using this add-on we can add, access and control our files automatically with Chrome. This extension is responsible for automatically integrating the Transmission client into our computer in the least intrusive way possible. Allows you to add any link including magnetic links. We can pause, delete and move the files all from its own interface for greater comfort.
