WindowsXP SP2 added a limitation to the number of “half-open” outgoing connections that can be opened in one second. Supposedly, the “feature” was added to limit the speed at which viruses can spread on a network. Unfortunately, it causes other apps to not work as they should. This topic has been covered elsewhere before, but if you have recently rebuilt your system, it may affect you again.
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Since Peer to Peer (P2P) traffic has been growing exponentially and has been a method used for piracy, among other things, some ISPs have decided that all P2P traffic is bad, and must be throttled.
The Gemini Project aims to help you determine if your ISP is throttling your peer to peer transfers. Although the requirements for testing are strict, it only requires that two people be involved in the testing. Each downloads an ISO and boots from the live Ubuntu CD.
An automatic test is run and a report is displayed letting you know the traffic conditions between you and your testing counterpart.