Using DAP (Download Accelerator Plus) With This Site

Download Accelerator Plus (DAP) from speedbit has been tested with the FlightSim.Com and TrainSim.Com sites. The latest version of DAP (9.1) was downloaded and run using the default settings that came with the installation. Tests were done with Microsoft XP and the Vista operating systems using both I.E. and FireFox browsers. Segmented acceleration and resuming were both successful but for Non-Paying members a speed setting option needed to be changed. Below you will find the results of these tests.;)

After downloading and installing Download Accelerator Plus, a good size file was needed for testing. I used the "Basic Search" to find a file on the TrainSim.Com site that would be in the 11 MB range. This was done by selecting search by Date, and then hitting search which located every file on the site sorted by date. Clicking on the index at the top of the results page a couple times quickly showed me that files in the 1601-1700 range were perfect. I decided to use "rogersn3.zip" which was 10.88 MB.

After clicking on the download links and accepting the download, DAP took over and started up a four connection download. This shows the file was transferred in 32 seconds.

The file was then downloaded a second time. DAP started up five connections this time but overall download speed was not improved upon in this case. This shows the download in progress and what your screen would look like if the download accelerator was successful in starting multiple connections.

In most cases four or five connections are plenty for downloads from any site. More connections does not mean you will get faster downloads because each connection adds overhead. The more connections you add the slower your transfer could actually become. You could have the bandwidth between you and the site maxed out with four connections which was the case here.

This shows the File Download screen that will pop up when you are about to download the file. You can see here that SpeedOptimizer was not used. Again, these settings were all default settings as they were set in the free download version of DAP. DAP also looks for "Mirror Sites" it can download this file from, but since FlightSim.Com and TrainSim.Com are not mirrored, it uses segmented downloads on the same file from these sites.

Clicking the "Advanced" button in the "File Download" window as shown above shows you the Advanced Options. These are the default settings as set by the developers.

The next test was to ensure that DAP could correctly resume a file transfer that had been interrupted. After starting another transfer of "rogersn3.zip" the file was cancelled 38% of the way through the transfer. Resume was then started and this screen shows it did find the partial file and the connection bars snapped into place at the 38% mark and finished the download from there.

Another download of the same file was started and this time the "File Download" window gave the option to resume the file. It's important to realize here that if you specify a different location to save the file then the location you used when the transfer was interrupted, then your download accelerator will not find the partial file in the directory. This means you won't get the resume option. All download accelerators need to find the partial file so they can see where it left off and add the rest too it in order for resumes to work successfully.

Once the resumed file was completed I took a look at the completed detail status and could see that it had done a resume successfully and completed it using five connections.

Options for Non-Paying Members

It has been brought to our attention from the DAP engineers that Non-Paying users will need to change their settings in DAP to make use of download resumes and acceleration. This change below is what worked for us.

You will first need to get to the options page in DAP. This is done by selecting "Tools" on the menu, then "Options".

Once you have the option page open you will need to select "Connection" (1) and then select the drop down box that is labeled "Acceleration Mode". In this drop down box select "Above Normal Speed". This allows DAP to run in a two segment download acceleration mode and will provide you with the resume option.

Also note that if you purchase the Premium version of DAP, you will want to set this back to a higher setting that is appropriate for your connection.

Cookies

If you are still having problems with getting DAP or any other download accelerator working consider that you might have cookies disabled in your browser. DAP and other download accelerators need to use the browers cookies in order to start up those other connections for segmented downloads.