(The first part is only an intro...actuall guide is after the ||||||||||'s)

Occasionally, I come to these threads in order to help people find the anime they want. I am pretty serious when it comes to watching fansubs and have an ample collection myself. Point is, I can find most any anime pretty easily and have devised some guidelines as to the reliability of each method of downloading anime.

The truth is, you can't rely on only one app to get all your anime for you, unless you're only interested in one series. To truly hunt down anime, you need to utilize multiple apps. I use several apps when looking for anime: Bit Torrent, Direct Connect, mIRC, and Acquisition. With these apps at my side, I never have trouble finding anime ever.

Whenever I come here, I must see at least 20 threads about what is the best P2P or File sharing to get *__Insert Anime__*, many which are constantly answer in other threads. Even more so, I see a lot of people asking for either an http link or a direct send through some IM app or FTP. When I read those topics, I think to myself "We all managed to find some place to d/l that anime, why don't you just do a bit of searching and find it yourself?" Well, when I ask that question, more than often I get the response that they don't know where to start searching. Well, to attempt to remedy that to an extent, I am making a How to Download guide for all of you. I'm not giving specific links to any anime in particular, just easy ways to find your anime. I'm going to start by seperating it into the best apps for new/recent anime and apps for older anime, then move into reliability.

If you wish to contribute to this, e-mail me info about good http and ftp download sites. My hope is to create a master list of sites that we can just post whenever someone asks where to get what. I especially would like information on non File Share apps and non P2P apps (in other words, apps where you need to ask for a send like you do in IM) E-mail to the address I have listed)

(Note: If while reading this you realize you know all of this already, don't bitch at me, cause this thread isn't aimed at you) ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||

New / Recent Anime (NEthing released 2002 - Current Date):

For new and recent anime, the absolute best app to use is Bit Torrent. It's true. When a fansub group releases an ep, everyone wants it, right? But this usually creates bandwidth problems, and causes slow d/l. Bit Torrent corrects this problem by relying on the swamp of d/l. You can download Bit Torrent here:

http://bitconjurer.org/BitTorrent/download.html

You can also find a more indepth explanation of how Bit Torrent works. There is a version for every OS I know of, so every one can use it. Bit Torrent is also dial-up friendly without harming anyone's speeds. Read the site's explanation to learn how it can do that. Now, some useful sites for Bit Torrent.

http://www.animesuki.com/ <--- Good for all new anime releases http://www.downloadanime.org/ <---- Good for some older anime (some anime not allowed for d/l cause of liscensing restrictions) http://www.torrentse.cx/ <--- Currently getting a new server, but good tracker when it's up. Good for movies, music, apps, games, pron, books, and some anime www.bytemonsoon.com <--- Similar to torrentse, but is always up and a little slower. www.btsites.tk <--- Links to almost any type of files you might need (in torrents of course)

Bit Torrent is your best bet for anything that has just been released to the web.

The next best app for new items is IRC. There are a variety of IRC apps you can download, and they can be used on most OS. IRC is where most of the fansubbers will release episodes for straight downloads. IRC is less reliable than Bit Torrent for downloads (you can be put into que on IRC), but is still pretty good. Here are the links for the primary Windows and Mac IRC clients.

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/3418 <--- Mac client http://www.mirc.com/ <--- Windows Client

The windows site has a guide as to how to use IRC to download. To find anime on these apps, go to a fansub site (just search on Google for anime fansubbers to get a list). Most fansubbers list their channels on IRC on their websites.

The Final canidate for new and recent anime downloads is Direct Connect. There are now non-DC++ clients for both Windows and Mac. I highly suggest using a legitimate DC client, as many hub scripts reject any DC++ apps.

http://www.neo-modus.com/ <---- Official site with both Clients

Direct Connect has a variety of hubs to choose from. Some require a certain amount of stuff to be shared, so you might want to get about 10 gig of stuff on your HD before going to any of the bigger hubs. But there are plentiful hubs with little/no share limit. Direct Connect covers pretty much anything you want, and gives you the option to show only people who have slots open for d/l when you do a search for a file, which helps up your chance of getting the file. The only problem is that the speeds can be unreliable depending on who you download from, and some people on there are simply jerks and with kill your d/l for no good reason at all.

On the side of http , the only reliable site for downloads I've found is this one:

http://web.mit.edu/bandersn/anime/

No download accelorators allowed, Verbal usually updates his selection on the site every other week ( the site says daily, but that's an unreal expectation) Most of the anime is newly released though, so don't expect to get any older eps from there.

And as always, if you can't find it anywhere in those apps, just do a google search for it. Something is bound to show up.

As for FTP and other pseudo http share apps, I have little knowledge of these things and hence will not post on them.

Thank you, and enjoy being learned.

-- Anonymous, June 23, 2003

Answers

you sure did make your point! (writing so much, that is)

-- Anonymous, June 28, 2003