How to set up a Win32 Cache

Setting up a windows cache is actually rather simple in fact its as easy as when you set up WinMX or a chat room.

You will be given the cache in a zip file. First of all you need to extract it as you would any other programme you would get of the internet and store it somewhere safe on your computer.

The cache itself will run from any directory or place you put it so you aren't restricted to it being stuck on your desktop or somewhere you will forget

Once you have the cache software stored on your computer their are a few things you need to do, first is to forward ports.


Once you have forwarded ports the next thing you need to do is create a directory, by default the cache saves log files to C:\WEB\CacheLogs so you need to create that directory

Once you have done them two main jobs you are ready to fire up the cache, just double click the icon and that's it, you are done. You may encounter a firewall asking you to allow just click and your cache should now be online

As I host one of these caches i was asked what sort of resources one uses on my computer, personally Ive never seen it use more than 3% cpu and 8mb of ram, an it only really ever used cpu when it was doing the indexing process. The Bandwidth it uses is pretty nominal. If you look on the screen it will periodically show you it is doing a recheck of nodes, this is when it uses aprox 25KB/sec download and the same upload. It does this only for a minute or so while it rechecks the IP's stored in the programme to make sure they are still active or removes any dead ones. It only does this periodically so its not too strenuous on BW either.

Now you know how to set one up, time to learn how it works

as posted above you seen what ports are required to be open, but do you know what these ports actually do? ill break them down for you.

7950-7952
These are tcp ports, i wont go into boring you with what tcp is but these are for the secondary client connection process, as each user tries to connect secondary the software makes a request on one of these three ports, if it shows up busy it moves onto another port in this range till it connects. This sounds like a long process but it actually takes milli secondsecond's

7940-7942
These are udp ports, they are used in the primary connection process in the same way as a secondary client tries to connect.

7930
Port 7930 was our best kept secret for a long time, nobody really new how the blocklist was downloaded to the patch, some knew there was a copy on the winmxworld site but even when that site went down the patch and blocklist continued to work, I imagine it probably drove the riaa mad for a few weeks trying to work that one out(or so I like to think) The patch upon connection also query's this port and downloads the latest blocklist. The cache itself pulls the list from a different dns location that can be moved about in an instant. So even if all else fails the list and caches will still work. You can test what list your cache is currently supplying using simple telnet, as that is how the process works. Using the telnet process means all you need to do is in your run/cmd box type  "telnet 127.0.0.1 7930 and blam the list appears as if by magic(cool hay lol).

5690
Port 5690 is for the automatic installation port testing facility WinMX has built into it, this one tests the TCP Ports.

5691
Port 5691 is for the automatic installation port testing facility WinMX has built into it, this one tests the UDP Ports.