Thread: Review | 5 Power Download Managers

If anything is left on the Internet is information. Download all this information and handling it pretty tidy can be difficult if you do not have the appropriate software tools. Installing a simple download manager can help us not only to manage our downloads, but also accelerated in some cases.

There are download managers specialize in certain kinds of content, others in a particular format. Some programs are minimalist with simple options and easy to use and give us a greater amount of options for those users who like to go further.

Internet Download Manager

Download manager with option for adjusting your speed. It is available in multiple languages.

Internet Download Manager includes support for work on IE, AOL, MSN, Mozilla, Netscape, Firefox, Avant Browser, etc.. In addition to integrating antivirus software to verify the safety of packages downloaded to your computer.

Orbit Downloader

Download manager specializing in multimedia content download sites such as Pandora, YouTube, Myspace, Rapidshare, Megaupload, Badongo, Filefront, Yahoo, Sendspace, Imeem, among others.

Orbit Downloader is a free program and is available in over 30 languages. It supports HTTP, FTP, HTTPS, RTSP, MMS and RTMP. For browser supports IE 5.0, FireFox 1.5, Opera, Maxthon and Netscape.

jDownloader

Download manager that automates Internet downloads directly from file hosting sites. It integrates seamlessly with on sites like Rapidshare.com, Megaupload.com, FileFactory.com, Filer.net and NetLoad.com among others.

jDownloader also includes extensions to Web browsers like Firefox. jDownloader can also pause and resume downloads. Requires installation of Java 1.5 or higher to run.

FlashGet

It is a download manager that, like the Internet Download Manager, can speed up our downloads through its decomposition functionality of files in several fragments.

FlashGet define custom categories to our downloads, besides having a pretty easy to use interface that includes drag-and-drop. It can even work under proxy settings.

BitSpirit

A BitTorrent client powerful, easy to use, able to work with multiple connections simultaneously download queue, UPNP port mapping, NAT traversal (UDP transport).

Features include an integrated interface to clean your disk cache mechanism, UPnP port mapping and data compression format gzip. It comes with an integrated chat.

Flashget and Bitspirit Rocks...........

My favourite is Gigaget. It's no longer developed. Supports downloading from multiple mirrors to increase download speed.

Archer, from the above screenshot it seems it provides 16 connections (mirrors) for downloading which IDM also provides so u can say both are good, i mean better than anyother.

Originally Posted by jagan2

Archer, from the above screenshot it seems it provides 16 connections (mirrors) for downloading which IDM also provides so u can say both are good, i mean better than anyother.

Not 16 connections, I saw it connecting to more mirrors when I downloaded Windows 7 official ISO. I don't know if there is any difference in speed between them. I think it's is better than IDM if speed is all that matters. Other features are limited/basic in Gigaget.

I use Gigaget because it's easier to use than IDM, for me. And it supports Megaupload which I always use. Also it's free (with some non-annoying ads, which can be removed easily).

hey which is better IDM or Flashget??

Originally Posted by imrock

hey which is better IDM or Flashget??

It is more of a personal choice like all other softwares like browsers, antivirus etc.
Personally though I prefer IDM.

Originally Posted by Vignesh

It is more of a personal choice like all other softwares like browsers, antivirus etc.
Personally though I prefer IDM.

Is flashget able to download videos like IDM??And is it integrated in Google Chrome??

Originally Posted by imrock

Is flashget able to download videos like IDM??

And is it integrated in Google Chrome??[/QUOTE]
No. That's why I prefer IDM.

Originally Posted by imrock

And is it integrated in Google Chrome??

Yes. For that matter, most decent download managers integrate with all the popular browsers.

Originally Posted by Vignesh

Yes. For that matter, most decent download managers integrate with all the popular browsers.

ok.
thanks for helping!

Rep+

BTW any reason why FDM and DAP not in the list??

Originally Posted by imrock

ok.
thanks for helping!

My pleasure, buddy.

Back to the poll: Others - Please share in the thread - I have also used DAP and found it to be a decent manager considering that it is free. Provides Speedbit video downloader for downloading videos.

Originally Posted by Archer

Not 16 connections, I saw it connecting to more mirrors when I downloaded Windows 7 official ISO. I don't know if there is any difference in speed between them. I think it's is better than IDM if speed is all that matters. Other features are limited/basic in Gigaget.

I use Gigaget because it's easier to use than IDM, for me. And it supports Megaupload which I always use. Also it's free (with some non-annoying ads, which can be removed easily).

You can easily find out how many connections gigaget provides by going to setting and see whats the max connection available since you have got it installed in ur pc, let me know

Btw IDM is also ad free, plus idm too can download from megaupload.

Originally Posted by imrock

ok.
thanks for helping!

Rep+

BTW any reason why FDM and DAP not in the list??

FDM and DAP not in list coz i dont know about FDM but dap's free version gives max of 7 connections in simple words it splits a file into 7 parts and download, and if you have a dap premium it splits into 10 parts. But download managers like IDM can split upto 16 parts!

Originally Posted by jagan2

FDM and DAP not in list coz i dont know about FDM but dap's free version gives max of 7 connections in simple words it splits a file into 7 parts and download, and if you have a dap premium it splits into 10 parts. But download managers like IDM can split upto 16 parts!

FDM= Free Download Manager

Who cares for connections at a time when u get same speed in all download managers!

i use IDM and i get as much as speed as FDM and DAP.

@imrock: Actually connection does matter, in all download manager u get accelerated download speed how? its only and only because of connections (splitting a file)

The more a download manager offers connection the better.

IDM is a better download manager (it provides more connection) than FDM or DAP.

Originally Posted by jagan2

@imrock: Actually connection does matter, in all download manager u get accelerated download speed how? its only and only because of connections (splitting a file)

The more a download manager offers connection the better.

IDM is a better download manager (it provides more connection) than FDM or DAP.

i know that but why mess up when u know u can't get more speed than what your ISP gives u!
i get the speed what i should in Google Chrome.But i use IDM because of i like it!

Originally Posted by jagan2

You can easily find out how many connections gigaget provides by going to setting and see whats the max connection available since you have got it installed in ur pc, let me know

Btw IDM is also ad free, plus idm too can download from megaupload.

It says "Maximum threads per task: 1-60" and "Threads in original url: 1-10". And IDM is shareware (not free).

[From what I understood]

Support for multiple connections is useful when the server has limited it's upload speed. So if the server's upload speed is 32 kB/s for a connection and your download speed is 256 kB/s, we will get maximum download speed using a download manager and 8 simultaneous connections. And if the bandwidth limit is below 32 kB/s, it will require more connections to get maximum speed.

Normally all download managers uses multiple connections to the same server to get maximum speed. Besides that Gigaget connects to multiple mirrors/servers which hosts the same file and downloads from them (kind of like torrents with only leeching). I have heard other download managers support mirror searching but haven't seen it in action.

Example: You are downloading a file from a free file hosting server with a bandwidth limit, and the same file is hosted in another server with no bandwidth limit, then you will get maximum download speed.

Originally Posted by imrock

i know that but why mess up when u know u can't get more speed than what your ISP gives u!
i get the speed what i should in Google Chrome.But i use IDM because of i like it!

See my friend there are various advantage and disadvantage according to me. Yeah i too use IDM its best. But just i wanna say, in google chrome you cant pause a download that is pause and close the window and again open google chrome, you cant resume. And you get same speed from your isp but the thing is which download manager utilizes it properly. For example in dap with 7 connection it downloads at same speed at what idm also downloads but the difference is in dap you will see huge fluctuation in speed it will go suddenly up and down which will ultimately result into slower download.

But with 16 connection IDM makes a stable downloading, you will always get ur top isp download speed. And hence u will get ur file downloaded much faster than DAP.

Originally Posted by Archer

It says "Maximum threads per task: 1-60" and "Threads in original url: 1-10". And IDM is shareware (not free).

[From what I understood]

Support for multiple connections is useful when the server has limited it's upload speed. So if the server's upload speed is 32 kB/s for a connection and your download speed is 256 kB/s, we will get maximum download speed using a download manager and 8 simultaneous connections. And if the bandwidth limit is below 32 kB/s, it will require more connections to get maximum speed.

Normally all download managers uses multiple connections to the same server to get maximum speed. Besides that Gigaget connects to multiple mirrors/servers which hosts the same file and downloads from them (kind of like torrents with only leeching). I have heard other download managers support mirror searching but haven't seen it in action.

Example: You are downloading a file from a free file hosting server with a bandwidth limit, and the same file is hosted in another server with no bandwidth limit, then you will get maximum download speed.

Yeah gigaget is also a very good download manager like IDM, but IDM has some features extra but if your purpose of download manager is just for downloading fies then stick to it.

Anyways how the downloading stuff goes one etc a little info by my friend.

By my friend Stephen
your ISP sets a limit on your internet line, which consists of a couple of things, mostly only three
- maximum download size (bandwidth limit)
- maximum speed (kb/s)
- maximum amount of connections at the same time (connection limit)
these three things combined make your download speed
however, most of the times you have way more connections than you have download speed, so you can download say with 10kb/s per connection and have 100 connections [which results in 10*100 = 100kb/s] but your speed is limited at 50kb/s (for example)
this means that you never use all your available connections, but only 5 (in this case)
this will leave 95 connections unused
now connections are shared over a line, you are allowed to have a 100 but your neighbour also can have 100 and so on
if you and your neighbour are both using connection 1 it can happen that you actually use the same line, so data has to be striped and will look like this:
your data - neighbour data - your data - neighbour data - your data - neighbour data - your data - neighbour data
so you will receive data only once every 2 'ticks'/'seconds'
this will result in the download speed going down from 10kb/s (over that one connection) to 5kb/s over that connection, but both firefox, opera and internet explorer do not notice that
a download manager splits it's data over multiple connections, so it will look like this:
instead of using 5 connections with 10kb/s to get the 50kb/s it will use say 10 connections with 5kb/s
now when your neighbour is downloading, it will have almost no influence on your speed (it does not decrease) and thus it will boost your speed
you will not see this in that your download speed is actually higher than before, but it IS higher than it would have been just using Firefox or Opera
now when a download manager uses more connections it will use less speed per connection and will thus be less influenced by other downloading people
so in general the more connections will make it 'faster', not really a higher download speed but it will be more stable
I hope that was easy to follow

IDM is the best......
DAP is no good.... Just a program to serve ads....

Originally Posted by jagan2

See my friend there are various advantage and disadvantage according to me. Yeah i too use IDM its best. But just i wanna say, in google chrome you cant pause a download that is pause and close the window and again open google chrome, you cant resume. And you get same speed from your isp but the thing is which download manager utilizes it properly. For example in dap with 7 connection it downloads at same speed at what idm also downloads but the difference is in dap you will see huge fluctuation in speed it will go suddenly up and down which will ultimately result into slower download.

But with 16 connection IDM makes a stable downloading, you will always get ur top isp download speed. And hence u will get ur file downloaded much faster than DAP.[/I]

thanks jagan for explaining!

i see u have great knowledge!

But in this world nothing is perfect!there is some disadvantage of it too!

Yes everthing has some disadvantage, but IDM is one of the ideal download manager it does for what it has been made that is download files, plus it gives some additional features like downloading a video, or audio.

Hey guys,

One more thing i tried once orbit downloader for downloading rtmp videos, but it doesnt work for all videos like it doesnt capture secure streaming rtmp videos.

Originally Posted by imrock

thanks jagan for explaining!

i see u have great knowledge!

But in this world nothing is perfect!there is some disadvantage of it too!

The only disadvantage that I could find is that it is a paid software and trial version is for only 30 days.
And being the old-fashioned fellow that I am, I go for only legal versions.
@jagan: Nice explanations.

Thanks, yes IDM is only available for trial no free version

But i know ppl's are too smart now a days that is they know hw to get it ha ha

IDM is my second and Orbit is my third choice of download managers.

@jagan2, Good explanation. I will try changing the maximum connections and see what happens.

Thanks Archer, yes try the more u have connection the more ur download will get stable, and dont expect download speed increase. But indirectly it increases ur download speed a lot as i have said earlier by making the connection stable.

Also note if you have a slow internet connection making the connection too much is not good.

I'm not sure, but I think you have to patch max. half open connections first if you are increasing mirrors beyond 8..... XP by default is limited to 8 connections...... No such problems with Vista or 7.....