80% speed boost for P2P downloads

[Nod]

Source: Ars Technica

Comcast engineers have just released the first-ever real-world data on P4P technology—and it appears to be a massive success. While only a trial, the results do show that P4P's iTracker technology can increase P2P download speeds by 80 percent on ISP networks without materially increasing the network load.

P4P, which is being designed under the aegis of the Distributed Computing Industry Association, is meant to "localize" peer-to-peer transfers. P2P users generally grab data from all around the world, putting tremendous cost and bandwidth pressure on ISP peering and transit links with other networks. P4P uses an iTracker server to keep those transfers within an ISP's own network when possible, with the goal of boosting speeds for users and lowering peering-point loads for ISPs.

This could be a very good thing if our local ISP's implemented something like this.

 

[MrG]

Yeah this is really smart actually. Can imagine it helps a lot with network load. Much the same affect as South African local torrents I guess, just hope it works better than that.