Avarice for IRC/XDCC Bot IRC Searching

February 25, 2008 by sharky

Every once in a while a P2P utility comes along that really captures our attention, and so deservedly earns an honorable spot all by itself at FileShareFreak. Such is the case with Avarice. Avarice is a multi-server IRC client designed to simplify XDCC file transfers - so simplified that users need not even know what IRC is in order to use it. Moreover, Avarice should be rightfully classified as a P2P program unto itself.

Unlike other IRC “scripts”, Avarice is a stand-alone IRC client that mimics the behavior of a P2P program. And since IRC is a goldmine for copyrighted content that exists at the apex of the piracy pyramid, it is an essential tool used in facilitating XDCC IRC searching.

The best feature about Avarice is in the search results. When treated as a regular P2P program, users need not worry about the quality of the files in the results - everything that should be, will be! Unlike public BitTorrent sites with all the publicly-submitted junk .torrents and Limewire-style P2P programs with the bogus files and anti-P2P corruption - XDCC Bots don’t suffer the same maladies. They are a highly-organized group of file servers from the upper echelon of piracy, itself. Avarice cuts out the middlemen and brings you right to the heart of “the scene” for newbies and experts alike.

Setup/Installation

To get the most out of Avarice, we recommend that you follow these procedures.

1. Download Avarice from http://avarice.cc/downloads.html. Run the SETUP and install.

2. Download and install the ‘Trap Channel Eliminator‘ (TCE) program (from the link above).

3. Update your “servers.ini” file. Since Avarice is an ongoing project, the developers keep an updated index of current (spidered) XDCC servers. We cannot stress enough the importance to update this file - the servers.ini that comes with Avarice is from March, 2007. First, just try to download the servers.ini file and save it to your hard drive. If it just opens up to a ‘text’ display in your browser, you’ll need to visit their servers link, and choose EDIT > Select All from the menu in your browser (Firefox). Right click it, select “copy” and create a text file (i.e. with Notepad) and ‘paste’ the data. Save the new file as “servers.ini” and transfer to your C:\Program Files\Avarice folder, be sure to overwrite the old file.

4. Run the Trap Channel Eliminator program (either from the desktop icon or your Start Button). You’ll want to first point to two files: 1. The updated servers.ini file and 2. the traps.ini file. Click the corresponding buttons and ‘browse’ to these files - see below:

Running Avarice

Launch Avarice - click on the Networks button at the top - the first thing you’ll notice is a list of IRC servers in the main window. Click the “Connect to all Servers” button:

Avarice comes with a couple of different features. You can either start searching the XDCC bots in the connected IRC channels, or you can ‘browse’ what the XDCC bots have to offer.

Browsing the ‘Bots

To browse the XDCC bots, click on the OFFERS button from the top menu. The main window will show (in real-time) exactly all of the files that are being served up in the connected IRC channels. Avarice takes some time to index all of the bots, but you’ll soon see the amount of content is staggering! This list never ends - as new XDCC bots enter a channel, they too will be indexed and added to the list of available files.

You’ll be able to toggle the data columns to arrange the results by name, size, available free slots. Free slots, (if you didn’t know) mean you’ll not be placed in a queue sequence and the download should commence immediately (in most cases). This is handy when arranging the data by description and deciding what like-content will warrant the best chances for instant downloading.

To download a file, simply double-click it. It will now appear in your TRANSFERS menu. We can also tell you that download speeds will vary depending on the speed of the XDCC bot that is doling out the files. Bot speeds are generally quite good - and in our tests we managed to easily max out our download bandwidth. We were able to download a full DVDRIP movie (700MB) in about 12 minutes. Take a look at those speeds:

Searching the ‘Bots

Searching is fairly straight-forward - click the SEARCH menu button and conduct your searches.

NOTE: Search results work best if you first let Avarice index the XDCC bots for a good 10 minutes. Not only will this give you a greater overall selection, but you’ll be able to compare similar content and select files that have available free slots. This is where using the filtering (by clicking the ‘description‘ column heading) comes in handy. (Also note, after running Avarice for 2 hours, there were 60,000 available XDCCs from over 2,200 Bots - proof that letting it run for awhile increases searching).

Below is a screenshot where we searched for “Alvin and the Chipmunks”, and the data was arranged by available “Free Slots” to facilitate faster downloads. Notice that most of the results are proper “scene” releases, as vindicated by the filenames. That’s IRC for you! To download, just double-click a desired name. The file will now appear in your TRANSFERS menu.

Avarice - Advanced Settings

As mentioned before, users of Avarice don’t need to know anything about IRC, and can treat this as a regular P2P search program. However, it does contain full-fledged features for the IRC gurus - if you already have your own favorite networks/servers (and channels) that don’t exist in the Avarice servers.ini file, you’ll be able to add your own. Select NETWORKS > Server Editor and edit the existing servers (to add specific channels) or click “Add Servers” where new IRC Networks can be created (scroll down to the bottom and select NEW NETWORK).

LAST NOTE: The default download path for Avarice is:

C:\Program Files\Avarice\Completed

However, this can easily be changed in the PREFERENCES menu. Additional changes can also be made to your personal IRC settings (nickname, email address, etc. if desired). The default download speed is set to MAXIMUM by default, but it is configurable. Use the “skins” option to change the visual aspects of Avarice. Happy hunting!

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