I have a major problem with my eMule at the moment. Over the last few days it has on 4 occassions just, all of a sudden, stopped downloading - all my downloads drop to 0 although it continues uploading files - when this happens I am unable to use my internet connection to get to any websites either and have to reset my set top box and restart my computer to reconnect. Then it works again fine, until the next time it drops out.

I have spoken to my provider ( NTL) on two occassions and, as usual, been given two very different answers from them - the first person told me that this is something that just happens when the broadband connection hits its limit - although I'm generally at around 40/50kbps max total d/l speed and NTL have just upped theirs to 750 from 600 - and have never had this problem before and not heard of anyone else experiencing this.

The second person I spoke to did a check on my PC and came to the conclusion that there was something "already talking" to my connection and that I must have some sort of Spyware or something that is accessing my connection and causing this to happen!!! :-o I use Sygate firewall and have Spybot and AVG installed which are both updated and I have run without them finding anything.

I've also noticed that whilst trying to surf, over the last few months, this is incredibly slow (like 20/30 seconds per page slow) whilst I have eMule running but is ok when I don't - something else that I have never experienced with it before.

Does anybody have any idea what could be causing this or have had any similar problems? Is it NTL (maybe secretly capping)??? Is it an undiscovered bug/worm/whatever on my system??? Is it really just something that broadband connections do when they max out - and if so why is mine maxing out at such a low rate???
i am considering two options at the mo - a complete reformat of my hd and changing service provider away from NTL (but I don't want to do this if it is something unconnected to them).

Any assistance/advice at all that anyone could give would be very much appreciated as this is sending me fucking insane.

I would suggest that you have too many connections at once. This is flooding your router/modem/network thing and causing it to freak out. This happened with my router because i'm cheap and got a netgear (never again!!)

if using emule go into the preferences -> connection and set the "connection limits - Max connections" to 220 and then hit apply. reopen your emule and see if it does it again.

If this doesnt fix it then maybe its something else. has this always happened to you? if so it could also be the UDP port traffic.

Agree with lildarien on all points.
Also try, if you haven't already, turning on USS (Upload Speed Sense), or get a client that has it.

Thanx, that would tie on with my post from a few days ago about my downloads showing Too Many Connections - which I've never noticed it saying before. I've set my max connections to 220 from 400 and have USS turned (and DSS) turned on already. I've always had it set to 400 before without any problems but am prepared to try anything.

I don't really understand why there should be Too Many Connections with the type of files I'm downloading. I currently have a total of 71 downloads ( 6 of which are paused) and only 4 have 400+ sources - about half of the others have less than 20 and the other half between 20 and 120. Is this pushing my eMule to the max??? I've had many more d/ls without problem b4 this. Should I change my provider if this no. of connections is freaking it out???

I think it's cause Of a firewall issue, or you are using a router and you forgot to MAC clone with it.

Same happened to me, and use 1000 min connects and 5000 max.

Make sure to open UDP ports 67 incoming and 68 outgoing.