Scooby Roo

trying to find my way through newsgroups.

How do they work are they a torrent derivative ?

Saw Mewzbin which looks easy to use but need an invite. The others are pay sites, bah.

Bit of assistance wouldn't go amiss.

Ta

Geezer

If you want a decent service, you are going to have to pay I'm afraid.

I use Easynews, which is $9.99 a month (about a fiver at current rates?). retenetion is about 30 days I think for the binaries, which is mor than enough unless you are a lazy sod who can't be arsed to look every few days.

If you want the best, get Giganews. Expensive (about £25 a month) but huuuuuge retention (120 days I think), and every group seems to be carried.

For software, you'll need a dedicated newsreader like Grabit or Newsbin Pro, and some software for the .PARs (the files that allow missing blocks to be rebuilt from the parity data). Personally, I use QuickPAR, there may be others.

All the 'good stuff' is in the binaries (e.g. alt.binaries.boneless).

It's dead simple really.

Geezer

P.S. To get the .nzb files which tell you where to download, nzbmatrix.com is a good free one. You can pay a one off donation ( I paid $10) to access their VIP service.

Dr.No

Have a read through this:

Introduction for beginners | Binaries4all Usenet Tutorials

If you're thinking it's anything like torrents, then it's not... and it's not a web-site... it's a completely different aspect of the internet to WWW sites.

Read the above, then to help - I use:

Newshosting.com as a provider (pay about $15 a month for unlimited transfers, normally at full 20Mb speed! A bit faster than most torrents... )

Newsleecher (with SuperSearch) for download software (can't recall, but about $30 a year or something - worth it just for SuperSearch!)

vcdquality.com and newzbin.com as a source of what's there, and screen-shots etc.

DN

stevebt

iTrader: (8)

Newgroups usually work out quickest and are much easier as far as I'm concernd. In the last two days I have downloaded well over 200gig of HD films and I'm sure that would be hard to match on any torrent site

Scooby Roo

Damn wasn't looking to shell out as I don't download a great deal.

I currently live in Aus and they limit download on all but the really expensive deals so I'm limited to 20gb.

Dr.No

You can find free binary newsgroup service providers - but they're nowhere near as good as the commercial ones. Similarly, free Newsgroup downloading software - but you often get limited free search facilities or no search facility (which is OK if you've found out the nzb that you want to download elsewhere).

Really, if you're not downloading much and speed isn't an issue then I'd stick with Torrents.... Newgroups tends to be higher speeds or higher volumes. As stevebt says, I can download many GB a day from Newsgroups at full 20Mb speed - and that's where the real benefit is.

Oh, and you normally get what you expect to - none of this rubbish where you download a film called "Cloverfield-DVDQUALITY-DIVX.avi" and it ends up being "Gone with the Wind" renamed to fool people...

DN

jjones

o'rlly

stevebt

iTrader: (8)

after 200gig I can switch my pc off how long do you have to leave yours on to be a proper torrent user on a descent site

Hanley

I use Giganews, worth it for the 200 day retention.

That costs about 25 dollars a month.

I pay 50 cents a week for a website Newzbin - Usenet Search and that lists whats around and splits in into categories e.g dvds, music, apps etc

I use Newsleecher to download the NZB files.

You'll also need Winrar to extract and Quickpar to verify / repair any missng or corrupt files.

WRX_Dazza

giganews here as well, and bnr news reaper.

along with winrar and a par file application.

also useful stuff is a flac file decompressor and ape file decompressor if you are into quality music

all can be read up on the web

Dr.No

Newsleecher does all of that automatically, PARing and extracting after it's downloaded - very good!

jjones

pc is permanently on anyway, upload bandwidth not measured by ISP, therefore i get to remain a member of an exclusive club with prizes mere mortals can only dream about.

Rob Walker

If you don't download a lot then astraweb is a good option.. you buy bundles of bandwidth on a payg basis... http://news.astraweb.com/

I don't download a lot and a 90gig block lasts me about a year.. much better than shelling out for a monthy service that I wouldn't use..

DemonDave

iTrader: (13)

3 way combo for me

newsleecher - superb --- and now with the rar\par tool so much easier - good support as well - well worth buying - and the supersearch helps in newzbin fails (very rare)

astraweb - for the newsgroup --- long retention - no downtime and cheap enough

newzbin - for the main searches

Hanley

Well I never knew that!!!

Suppose it's force of habit using QuickPar, I'll check Newsleecher when I get home.