Using Azureus ‘Magnet Links’

March 12, 08 by sharky 3,248 views

Azureus is a BitTorrent client that exclusively supports special torrent magnet links that run through their own Distributed Hash Table (DHT) network. Instead of downloading the torrent from a web server (i.e. torrent site / tracker), you download it directly from the seeds / leechers. The biggest advantage is that you might be able to download the contents of the torrent even if the tracker is down or temporarily offline (or there are no seeds).

Configuring Azureus for Magnet Links

You’ll need a version of the Azureus client that is higher than 2.3. There are two settings within Azureus that must be enabled in order to use magnet links. By default, these are already set to ON, so no further modification is required. You can check if these two are already selected in the TOOLS > OPTIONS menu (see below). NOTE: We used Azureus v2.5 for these examples, and NOT the new Azureus Vuze client (v3.0.5). The older version can be found here on filehippo.com.

1.Enable the UDP Tracker. In Azureus’ Options, go to TRACKER > Client and be sure that “Enable UDP tracker client protocol” is checked:

2.Enable the Distributed DB plugin. In Azureus’ Options, go to PLUGINS > Distributed DB and be sure that “Enable the distributed database” option is checked:

BitTorrent Websites that support ‘Azureus Magnet Links’

Here are just some of the BitTorrent websites that have Azureus magnet links as an option. In most cases, they can be found on the permalink “details” page for each torrent.

Example: Magnet Links on mininova:

Visit www.mininova.org, and choose a “torrent” you’d wish to download. Click on the title of the torrent, not the green arrow. This will open the ‘details’ page.

Click on “Azureus magnet link”:

This should now launch Azureus (if not, see Troubleshooting below). This window will open, and the magnet link URI will be shown. Click “OK” to import the magnet link. Depending on the size of the release, this may take some time to update and find seeds/peers.

You’ll need to click “OK” again, and the magnet link should appear exactly as a .torrent would within Azureus - the download should automatically begin.

— If the link is dead, you’ll get a message “ERROR : No data contained in…”. This is comparable to downloading a .torrent file with no seeds/leechers. Click “cancel” and try to find another viable source (i.e. the corresponding .torrent file is an option).

Troubleshooting - Magnet Links / Azureus Association

Q: I’ve installed Azureus (or any other magnet-supportive P2P client), but when I click a magnet link, I get an error message in my browser. What gives?

A: For Azureus, we know for certain that it probably won’t ask you if you want it to be the “default magnet handler” during install, or even when you run it for the first time. If Azureus is your only magnet handler, it’s most likely that there are no file associations for magnet links in the Windows registry. Here’s the message you’ll see in Firefox, and in Explorer below it.

— Firefox is looking for an external program that isn’t associated with magnet links, as evident of the Application: <Unknown> message. Wait a few seconds and try to click the “Launch application” button at the bottom. This may or may not launch Azureus (or another) program that handles your magnet links. If not, you’ll be able to fix this here.

You may also just get this Firefox window popup (if you’ve never had any programs associated with magnet links before) as shown below:

— For Internet Explorer, the magnet link URI will cause an error message where you will NOT have the option of ‘launching an application’ to try to open the magnet link. (You’ll be able to “Search online for a program…” but this is useless). Keep reading…

The Magnet Link ‘Azureus’ Fix:

The Windows Registry needs to be associated with magnet links, and this fix will work with any browser. You can do this the long way, or the short way (both are the same thing).

SHORT: Download this file (magnet.reg) and double-click it to import the settings into your registry. NOTE: This will only work if you’ve installed Azureus to it’s default directory (C:\Program Files\Azureus). If not, you’ll have to manually change the path in the magnet.reg file.

LONG: Create a new *.txt file on your hard drive, and open it with Notepad. Copy & paste the text below into it.

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\magnet]
@=”URL:magnet Protocol”
“URL Protocol”=”"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\magnet\shell]

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\magnet\shell\open]

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\magnet\shell\open\command]
@=”\”C:\\Program Files\\azureus\\Azureus.exe\” \”%1\”"

Save it and close it. Now, rename it to magnet.reg and double-click it. This will import (merge) the necessary registry settings to associate magnet files with Azureus.

NOTE: This is a ‘quickfix’ to grant Azureus association with ALL magnet links. Therefore if you already use a G2 program (such as Shareaza) to download magnet links, it may lose the association and magnet files will be forwarded through Azureus. Azureus only works with “Azureus Magnet Files”, not the G2 type discussed here. Again, you can always modify the “magnet.reg” file to give back the magnet link ‘handling’ to Shareaza, BearShare etc., if you run into this problem. In our tests, this “fix” only gave Azureus the bittorrent magnet links, and Shareaza kept the others (but not all systems are equal).

P2P/Azureus Magnet-handler conflicts:

Each P2P program that is capable of handling magnet links will attempt to be the default magnet handler. If you already have a client such as Shareaza installed, and then you install Azureus, you’ll be asked if you’d wish to make Limewire the default handler. Depending on the P2P program (and in which sequence they were installed), this can often lead to a ‘permanent’ or undoable decision within the Windows registry. If you’ve made a mistake by letting one program handle them (but you now wish for another to do it), again create a magnet.reg file (or download the existing one and edit it by right-clicking it) and change the parameter in the last line:

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\magnet\shell\open\command]
@=”\”C:\\Program Files\\Azureus\\Azureus.exe\” \”%1\”"

If you’d like Shareaza to open magnet links, change the last line to:

@=”\”C:\\Program Files\\Shareaza\\Shareaza.exe\” \”%1\”"

Don’t forget to save it, and re-run ‘magnet.reg’ to merge your new settings.

NOTE: This assumes that Shareaza was installed to the default directory at C:\Program Files\Shareaza. Again, the parameter can be changed to fit any P2P program that supports magnets - just change to the proper path, pointing it to the executable P2P program (Shareaza.exe).

Azureus ‘Magnet Links’ - Who Needs ‘Em??

We’re not sure what the big fuss is over Azureus Magnet Links. Most proactive BitTorrent clients incorporate the same DHT (trackerless) support, without having to download these specialized “torrents”.

With the waning popularity of Azureus (as a BitTorrent client), it would only be assumptuous that these magnet links are also being used less and less often. Below are some negative aspects to them:

— Most private trackers don’t have support for them.

— Availability of magnet links are limited. Comparatively, there aren’t a lot of BitTorrent websites that support them.

— Speed. In our tests, they didn’t offer any download speed advantages - speeds were somewhat slower than their .torrent counterparts. Torrents that run on a standard tracker (with a permanent URL) will always be faster than DHT/magnet torrents. Not only that, but large Azureus magnet files took a few minutes just to “load” into Azureus, and that’s not including ’swarming’ (finding peers).

— Only one BitTorrent client supports them, and that’s Azureus. While it is natively cross-platform (a java-based client), it tends to be bloated and memory-hungry. Many users with older systems are far better served with a BitTorrent client that uses a smaller footprint, such as µtorrent. While these trackerless torrents are a great idea for a number of reasons (the main one being is for users who want to host their own “torrents” but don’t have a tracker, or don’t want to use one due to webhosting restrictions on torrents on their domain), it’s unfortunate that this technology hasn’t been embraced by other BitTorrent clients. The new Azureus Vuze client (v3.0.5 +) uses them as a marquee feature, but what the future has in store for their popularity is anyone’s guess.

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