Limits
Wednesday, August 16, 2017 6:03:46 PMLimits are so important feature that whole application derived its name from it.
Basic usage
Purpose of limits is to set maximum transfer speed - download or upload - to selected application or filter.
How to set a limit
- In Activity view find an application to which you would like to apply the limit.
- Click on DL Limit for download limit or on UL Limit for upload limit. The Rule editor window will pop-up.
- Now just set desired limit
Value(in units displayed beside the value box). And checkEnabledbutton at the bottom of the window. - Press
Saveto save and activate the limit.
NOTE 1: If you click in Activity view only on the limit checkbox, you will just enable or disable the limit. To open the window described above, you have to click the limit value.
NOTE 2: In order to make your limit work, please, make sure that Limiter is enabled - a Limiter On button in upper part of main window must be checked.
How big should be my limit?
It depends on what you are trying to achieve and what is the current maximum bandwidth speed of your internet connection in particular direction (download/upload).
If you have no idea how fast is your internet connection then visit websites like Fast.com or Speedcheck.org, which will measure it for you.
When you know the exact maximum bandwidth then you can share it very precisely among your apps. But even if you don't know it exactly (BTW - maximum bandwidth can vary significantly during the day) then you can find very quickly satisfying limit values using trial-and-error method...
- If your internet becomes slow and sloppy (YouTube videos are torn, websites are loading very slow) or multiplayer games are very laggy then it is very likely that some application running on your system has occupied most of your bandwidth.
- In such situation, just open NetLimiter's Activity view and check which application has highest transfer rates. It not only reveals the culprit of slow internet, but also your connection's current maximum speeds - if internet gets slow, then your available bandwidth is used up to the maximum.
- After you identify such a rogue application, then apply a limit to with value of 50% of its current transfer speed (in particular direction). If it is not enough and other apps are still slow, then lower it again. On the other hand, if it helps, then you can try to raise it a bit.
Limits vs. Priorities
Simply put: Limits are more precise and Priorites are easier to use (no numbers). More info can be found here.
Advanced features
Abilities of limits can be used in conjunction with other NetLimiter features...
Scheduler
Scheduler allows to automatically enable/disable limit (or other Rules) at given time or on a given day. If it is that you are looking for, you can find this functionality in Scheduler.
Quotas
Would you like to automatically enable limit when specified amount of data was downloaded/uploaded by selected application? If you would, then Quotas could help you. They do exactly that!