Links and F.A.Q About Binaries newsgroups
-----------------------------------------
LINKS AND F.A.Q ABOUT BINARIES NEWSGROUPS
-----------------------------------------
v1.00b6 by sebastien@willemijns.com
Last version available on http://www.binnews.willemijns.com
Main page Webhosting is offered by
Thanks a lot to these VivilProject partners, too
Using newsgroups to find binaries (softwares, music, video,
images...) must be easier for you with this document. I explain you in this
FAQ what is newsgroup binaries, how to find good NSP (news server provider),
how to decode and encode binaries on newsgroups...
=> What is newsgroups ? what is binaries newsgroups ?
*****************************************************
Newsgroup definition can be found on this link .
They are two usages of newsgroups: text newsgroups where you can
discuss with other peoples about a lot of subjects (cook, photography,
computer, video games...) and binaries newsgroups where you can find
multimedia files as images, video, mp3... it is this second kind of
newsgroups i will speak on this FAQ...
=> How to find binaries newsgroups ?
************************************
Generally, a lot of ISP purpose news server to his customers,
his name is in the majority of case "news.your_isp.com" but in reality a few
ISP does not purpose a news server, does not purpose binaries newsgroups or
ever does not offer a good quality of service grin !
Newsgroups contains binaries begins with a prehistoric
convention by words "alt.binaries." i.e "alt.binaries.pictures.aviation"
How to choose best NSP ?
************************
If your ISP does not provide binaries newsgroups or is not serious about QoS,
you can use a free open nntp server
or you can choose a commercial servers also known as NSP (News Server Provider):
Well known list about this subject are:
http://members.tripod.com/~newscompare/chart.html
http://www.usenetforyou.com/provider
http://www.exit109.com/~jeremy/news/providers/providers.html
http://www.newsgroupservers.net
http://www.telecharger-newsgroup.com (in French only)
I let you these guys to review servers for us... i only add buzzardnews,
octanews and usenet-news.net witch purpose X gigabytes of data per month with
no expiration and free headers... great for a backup server with low cost...
you can add shared-secrets to this small list but headers are not free on this
service...
As described too in all these document, a lot of parameter must be included to
choose it:
- Do it have unlimited access or limited access (X gigabytes of data per
month or with no expiration date) ? SOME NSP LIMIT UNLIMITED ACCESS
BANDWIDTH AFTER x HUNDREDS OF GB OF DOWNLOAD !
- What is the price ? :-),
- What is his retention ? (FYI in April 2006, best retention is 50/70 days.
Minimal value must be several days... some NSP use lower retention on test
newsgroups so never compare retention on this kind of newsgroup !),
- What is his completion ? DO NOT CHOOSE NSP LESS THAN 98% !!!,
- What is the speed you can "wait" ?
- How many simultaneous connections can you use to download faster ?
- Can you post articles ?
- If yes, is post are free (if you do not choose unlimited access of course) ?
- Is headers are free if you do not choose unlimited access ? (note some
NSP count headers but cost is always free for you, in others words count can
not be equal to paid ;)
FYI DOWNLOAD 100.000 HEADERS "COST YOU" ABOUT 27 Mo, WELL KNOWN BINARIES NEWSGROUPS
WITH 50 DAYS RETENTION CAN CONTAIN MILLIONS OF HEADERS, IT WILL BE A PITY (IF
HEADERS ARE NOT FREE FOR YOU) TO USE YOUR BLOCK ACCOUNT TO ONLY DOWNLOAD HEADERS GRIN !
Note you can consult NZB service included on several NSP or external website
as YABSE or BETA.BINARIES.NL
- Is it an uncensored server ? FYI some NSP writes "uncensored" but use spam
filters...
- Does it own your server or do you a reseller ? use a reseller of a big NSP
is generally less expensive but low retention justify this price :)
- Can you use XPAT on it ? this method permit you to find keywords in subject
line of a newsgroup, it is generally unactived because it "cost" too many CPU
on servers...
- Is the service logs activity ? Generally on this kind of service, only
upload will be logged (for spam or abuse) not download...
If you have choosen block account:
- What is his validity ? without time limit, "x GB" per day or per month...
- For day block account, check if you must download every day this volume or
if you can anticipate (you can download 5 GB today but access will be denied
for you during the 4 next day if you have choosen a 1 GB par day account),
- What method are used to renew your account ? You must manually go to the
website to renew OR it is done automatically every month/quarter/half-year/year
OR a new block account of same size is automatically renewed when you have reached the volume ?
- Can you use unused volume from last month to download more this month ?
=> How to read binaries newsgroups ?
************************************
Binaries newsgroups can be viewed with any newsreader as Outlook
Express (this software is not good because well known Yenc format is not
implemented on it except with third-part tools, see below in this FAQ)
They are better newsreader as Outlook Express, a lot are
specialized on binaries as NewsRover, Newsleecher... etc...
Freeware are GRABIT (good for newbies but use a lot of RAM), BNR2
and XNEWS (not for newbies ;). You can use too NewsMan Pro (a lot of bugs IMHO)
They are four kind of newsgroup reader or grabber:
- monoserver (you can only use one news server) as a lot of old softwares,
- multiserver without recovery method (every newsgroup of every newsserver
has his own database) as 40tude Dialog,
- multiserver with recovery method (every newsgroup of every newsserver has
his own database but you can manually or automatically choose to download
articles from others servers if article is not available) as GRABIT or Xnews,
- multiplexer (every newsgroup has only one database whatever the number of
newsservers: the article can be "clever" downloaded with your conditions in
the order you choose (speediest is choosen in first else if article is not
available free servers is choosen in second else if article is yet not
available biggest is choosen in third and more and more...) as Agent 3.0 or
"small servers for home" as Hamster or Newsplex.
=> How to recognize files in a binaries newsgroup ?
***************************************************
In fact, all binary data is encoded in "printable characters",
it is the same method used to send a file by mail.
Actually, 3 methods are used: UUENCODE,
MIME Base64 and also well known
Yenc:
List of Yenc compatible software
An opinion about Yenc format
Do not worry, best grabber does all the works for you (automatically classify
and decode)
=> What kind of files are posted with files ?
*********************************************
For small files, only the file itself is posted as an unique
article.
For biggest files, 4 kind of files are generally posted with big
binaries files:
- the NFO file who indicate a few details about the file,
- the SFV file who include the CRC/checksum of every file,
- the PAR2 files (or older PAR format) files who can check (as SFV)
and repair missing parts of the entire binary,
- the file itself (cut in X parts of Y parts...depend of his size...)
Some people can sometimes post "in gift" a few second sample of
a movie or a NZB file
who contains the list of all "message ID" needed to download the binary...
PAR files contains by default a total of 5% of redundant packets
"""posted twice""" so a classical file of 100Mo with his par2 files
must contains 5 Mo PAR2 files
Well known free tool to create, check and rebuild all packets is QUICKPAR,
Linux users can see this link.
The file is generally packed, you can use well known paid tool
WINRAR or free tool 7-ZIP to unpack ZIP and RAR files...
Files can be sometimes splitted, you can use free tool HJSPLIT to unsplit it...
=> How to post on binaries newsgroups ?
***************************************
Best windows tool used is powerpost and his version 1.1A&A
You can try this site for linux software
WARNING ! Do not use PAR2 creator tool included in YencPowerpostA&A11B, he's bugged ! choose
to create PAR2 with QUICKPAR or other OS tools !
=> QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS:
#########################
This chapter contains all questions i regularly view on forums:
Q: I have a lot of missing part so i can not obtain entire binaries why ?
A: Generally, some parts can be missed by the poster (broken connexion when
posting and/or "newbie" effect ;) or the NSP you have choosen is not serious...
According to a generally-accepted statistic, confirmed by my own personnal stats,
about 90% of every big files are complete...
Q: Bodies are different if i download same article from another NSP why ?
A: It will never happend... if server displays article, body (not header) must
be the same whatever NSP you use ! Note in October 2005, Easynews NSP has
detected this kind of fu*king trouble...
Q: My NSP has X days retention and more than X days with NZB why ?
A: Big NSP uses two kind of servers ("headers" servers and "bodies" servers)
classical method uses header then bodies server(s) so you are limited to the
header server retention, NZB method use only bodies server(s) so you are
limited to the bodies server retention... who can be better than headers
servers retention... and it is the case in your question ;)
Q: My NSP has downgraded my speed with my unlimited access, why ?
A: Unlimited access has never been synonym of unlimited speed... it is
generally the case when you have download more than X hundreds of gigas
of data but you must be prevent of this quota when you suscribe grin !
It can be used to prevent "share suscription" when NSP purposes concurrent
connexions (1 port for you, 1 port for your friend Joe, 1 port for John,
1 port for Mike...)
Q: How to capture multimedia data ?
A: www.easydivx.org, www.autogk.net, www.irfanview.com, audacity.sf.net
Newsmasters or Usenet devellopers can found here all the reason i know to
create usenet corruption:
- A software bug ?,
- An hardware trouble (bad database, memory or HD) ?,
- A hacker post same article header witch contains the same Message-Id but
with differents bodies from a lot of NSP in the same time (this can be easily detected thanks to path field),
- The Message-Id was already been created for another article "X days ago
somewhere in the world" by the same newsreader or usenet poster
which randomize his own Message-Id (as Power-Post, ForteAgent and Xnews in
default configuration).
FYI, only 1 post about 10^42 can create a dupe Message-Id if you use well
known YENC-POWER-POST-A&A-v11b software... (*)
(*) this value also depend of the number of characters allowed on Message-Id
(A-Z a-z 0-9 $ @ - ...etc...etc...) and his size. Notice I has not include the
very small "retention effect" value who declines when retention of biggest NSP
in the world increase (in others words and in a technical aspect only, they
can not have a "conflict" when Message-Id has already been existed 10 years
ago because biggest NSP actually (in 2006) only have 2 years retention in text ;)
What's New ?
(v1.00b5):
- "Cosmetic" changes.
(v1.00b6):
- Add some information about block accounts...
Give me your comment and suggestion...
WARNING !!! I receive since a few years a lot of spams
so i refuse to answer to any email who have empty subject or containing
a short or classic subject as "hello" or another "please help me"