We all love downloading music, documents and videos, but the whole P2P system is not about taking from others without giving back. Rather, it’s about sharing with the community and improving a network that is bigger than the sum of its parts. Sharing files on Ares Galaxy is incredibly easy, but if you are a bit lost, don’t worry and read on, because we’re going to make it even easier for you.

Sharing Downloaded Files

By default, the option is turned on to share anything you’ve downloaded through the Ares network (this does not include bittorrents though) with other people. Unless you’ve changed the option, Ares Galaxy will have created a folder on your desktop called “My Shared Folder” which contains all the files you’ve downloaded.

For most people, this folder will already contain all files you want to share, so you won’t have to do anything, except keep a copy in that folder, in order to share the files on the network. The above screenshot shows the Library, which should contain the files you have downloaded.

Scanning Your System

In the Control Panel, there is an auto-scan feature under the Filesharing tab. This is a neat Ares galaxy function that will scan your whole system, looking for files to share. After the scan is done, you’ll be able to choose which files and documents you want to share with the world, so don’t worry, it won’t automatically share everything on your PC.

Configuring Folders

Clicking the tab next to the auto-scan feature will bring you to the manual folder configuration menu. Here you can pick the folders you want to share with other Ares Galaxy users. Be aware that if you select a folder, you’ll be sharing everything in it, including all subfolders, so don’t make any mistakes or you’ll end up sharing you entire hard drive!

A red contour around the checkbox next to a folder just means that at least one subfolder is shared, like the legend states.

Making Exceptions

Finally, what if you want to share a certain folder, but you want to exclude certain files from being shared with the world through Ares Galaxy? One solution would be to simply remove the file from the shared folder, but this would mean that you can’t use the excellent integrated library to organize your files.

A second way of making exceptions to the sharing rules of a certain folder is to manually “unshared” files by right clicking on them in the library and selecting the “Share/Unshare” option. If you unshare a file, it will remain in the library, but it will be recognizable by the lack of the hands icon next to the title. Right click on it again and choose the same option if you want to share it again.

These are the basics of file sharing on the free Ares Galaxy network. You can also use torrents or direct chat connections to share it with the whole network or with specific people, but we will discuss this at a later time.

Ares Galaxy distinguishes itself from the very tough competition on the market of file sharing software in at least three ways: its sheer amount of integrated features, user-friendliness and customization. Let’s talk for a little bit about how our Ares free download differs from similar software that you may find on the Web.

Ares Galaxy Integrates Everything

The first thing that most people notice when they fire up Ares Galaxy for the first time, is the fact that such a large amount of features.

There are few, if any, other file sharing programs available that combine access to a separate P2P network with the ability to download and share torrents, while also offering the user a library to organize and share their files, a video player, a music and Internet radio player, a chat client and an integrated search function. Almost all these functions are offered to you through the tabs on the top of the Ares window.

Everyone hates having to use a separate piece of software for every single thing you want to do on the computer, so having them all together in one program like Ares Galaxy is great, not just because it’s convenient, but also because it reduces the load on your system’s resources.

It’s As Easy As 1-2-3

Some programs need a lot of tinkering and tweaking before they work well. In contrast, you can have Ares Galaxy up and running exactly the way you want it to in just a few minutes! All you need to do is download the free Ares download from the panel on the side, install it and start searching for files.

It’s so easy that anyone can do it. P2P file sharing may have been something that only a very small percentage of Internet users engaged in back in the mid-nineties, but it hasn’t required anything more than some common sense for over a decade. And Ares Galaxy is the most user-friendly yet, with its almost hands-off configuration and pain-free installation.

Customize Ares Galaxy!

Some functions are just there as an extra. Don’t like Internet Radio? Don’t listen to it. Dislike the chat? Don’t use it. But Ares Galaxy offers the end-user much more than just the choice of using the features or not. There are dozens of functions and tweaks available in the Control Panel, for if you want to move beyond the out-of-the-box functionality of Ares. And even the whole look of the program can easily be changed by changing to one of the seven pre-installed skins.

There is much more that we could talk about. For one thing, Ares Galaxy is, and always will be, free and open-source, unlike so many other pieces of software that try to get you to give them your hard-earned money.

Also, the program is continually updated, with the last update, at the time of writing, dating from May 2012. But in the end, what we say here matters little, you should just install the program and try it, we’re sure you’ll fall in love with file sharing in no time at all.

I have been using Ares Galaxy as my primary file sharing program for almost a year. My verdict: I would recommend the program to anyone who is even remotely interested in sharing files over the Internet.

Ares Is The #1 Torrent Snatcher

My primary motivation for recommending Ares Galaxy is its bittorrent support. I have used many torrent programs over the last few years, including uTorrent and Azureus, but when I first used Ares Galaxy, I was amazed at how easy it was to get it to run just the way I want it.

My downloads are ultrafast and uploading is painless. And unlike some other clients I’ve tried, there aren’t any difficult menus to go through just to set up a connection. It’s simply a matter of installing the Ares free download and setting it up as the default program (which should happen automatically, but if it doesn’t, just right-click on a torrent file and select “Open with”).

Tons Of Features

Even though I don’t care much for some features myself (I never use the chat for example), the media player and radio station receiver that are built right into Ares Galaxy are amazingly useful. Gone are the days of having to run several programs at the same time just to do some simple things! Almost half of my Internet activity now happens entirely within Ares Galaxy and that’s thanks to the ease with which it plays everything I’ve downloaded, and more!

Easy On The CPU

Not everyone has a state-of-the-art computer with gigabytes of RAM and huge amounts of processing power. My PC is rather old and still runs Windows XP, and it’s extremely annoying to have to run multiple resource-intensive programs to perform basic file sharing functions.

With Ares Galaxy, I can combine a bittorrent client with a traditional P2P network, a library, a media player and a music station, and still have plenty of processing power to spare! In almost a year of use, it hasn’t crashed even once, and it’s on almost all the time.

It’s Free

Finally, the reason why I tried Ares Galaxy in the first place, and why you should as well: it’s free to try and free to keep! I first downloaded the program, thinking that it would be yet another case of unfulfilled promises, but here I am, 11 months later and still using it without ever having paid a dime. I guess it’s true what they say: some of the best things in life are free.

My Verdict

I’ve recommended Ares Galaxy to many of my friends, and have never heard any complaints. Ares does everything it promises to do and even more, and it’s so easy to use that even a baby could do it. But don’t take my word for it. Just download Ares for free from this website and give it a try yourself. I guarantee you that you won’t want to go back to any other file sharing program afterwards!

Two thumbs up for the Ares Galaxy team!

If you’re on a slow connection, or if you have to share your bandwidth with family or roommates, you may be having problems with making efficient use of Ares Galaxy. Fortunately for you, Ares Galaxy has a few options you can use to customize your bandwidth usage, particularly the feature to manage your queue.

Use the following tips to streamline your downloading process and make sure that you’re not hogging the connection so there’s still some left for your sister to check her e-mail or for your mom to watch her cooking videos while Ares is running in the background.

How Does The Transfer Queue Work?

If you navigate to the Transfer tab in the Control Panel, you’ll find a bunch of options, among which the transfer queue. First you must define how many files you want to allow to be uploaded and downloaded at once. This will be the number of files that can be transferred at the same time. Of course it’s possible to download, or upload, fewer files than this number at once, but if you select more file transfers than this, they will go in your queue.

Your queue will consist of the files that are “Locally paused”, and they will begin downloading as soon as you finish the files that you’re transferring right now.

Managing The Queue

If you’re on a bad connection or you have to share it with other people, you’ll want to limit your bandwidth (shown by the red circle on the screenshot below). But if your bandwidth is low, then it’s very important that you manage your queue. If you set the amount of downloads at once to 20, for example, and you only have 40kb/s download bandwidth, you run the risk of having to wait a very long time until your files are downloaded. So limit the amount of downloads (and uploads) to a lower number, and transfer the files one by one, or two by two. Your queue can be as long as you want it to be, so, even if you’re on a limited connection, you can just leave your pc or laptop on overnight and you should have most of what you want.

Increase On Idle

By toggling the “Increase on Idle” checkbox, Ares Galaxy will automatically increase the allotted bandwidth of the program when your machine is not in use. This can be very useful for when you’re sharing a single pc or laptop with more people, and it tends to be on for most of the time. We’re not entirely sure just by how much the bandwidth is increased, but it definitely makes a difference.

These are just two of the most obvious ways of making use of the free Ares Galaxy P2P file sharing program on a less-than-ideal connection. As you can see, you don’t need top-of-the-line equipment to enjoy Ares Galaxy, so get our free Ares download now and join our network!

We have noticed that a few people are still having problems with connecting to Ares. In the following paragraphs, we’ll disclose a few more easy fixes which should make sure that everyone out there can fully enjoy this amazing, free file sharing program!

Firewall And Port Settings

We have talked about this issue before, but in case you need a reminder: if you are experiencing problems to connect to the Ares network, this may be due to the program being blocked by your firewall. In this case, you should open your firewall software and add an exception for Ares Galaxy.

A second very common problem is due to the port settings. You could spend some time looking for the correct port through which to forward Ares, but the quickest fix would be to delete the port number in the Control Panel (under the Transfer tab) and restart Ares. This will reset the port and allow you to connect without problems.

If this trick doesn’t work, you’ll have to refer to other information online to find out which ports will work best for routing P2P traffic. It may also be possible that your ISP has, for some reason, blocked a number of ports.

Anti-Virus Software

Sometimes, problems may arise due to Ares Galaxy being blocked by security software that may be installed on your system. Similar to the firewall settings above, all you need to do is check whether Ares Galaxy is blocked, and, if it is, add an exception for it.

Proxy Settings

It is also possible that your network is blocking the Ares protocol, or that you need to access the Internet through a proxy at all times. To change the proxy settings and configure Ares Galaxy to access the network via a proxy, go to the Control Panel and click on the Network tab. You can fill in the necessary settings there, and test whether you’ve done it correctly by clicking on the Check Connection button.

Get A New Copy Of Our Free Ares Download

Even though older versions of Ares Galaxy should work without a problem, it’s always a good idea to be using the latest releases. So, if all else fails and you’re still having problems connecting to the network, uninstall your Ares client and transfer our free Ares download to your hard drive again to update to the latest version.

And If The Problem Persists

Unfortunately, if you have tried absolutely everything, the reason why you are unable to connect is most likely because your Internet Service Provider has blocked the Ares protocol. This sometimes happens on university networks or other networks which operate on rather stringent bandwidths.

There are ways around this, which you may be able to find online, but all of these workarounds would result in your download and upload speeds being reduced to a fraction of what they could be. In the end, your only real solution, sadly, may be to switch to a different ISP. However, unless you are on a network as described above, this is very unlikely.

If you’re a heavy Ares Galaxy user, you’ve probably used the chatrooms before. These are a great way to meet new people, talk about common interests and share files directly with the other chatters. Today we’d like to offer everyone who enjoys using Ares Galaxy’s chat function a bit more info on how to configure it.

The Chat settings

Navigate to the Control Panel and click on the Chat tab, this should give you a menu with a number of different options. Most are pretty self-explanatory, but we’ll go over the most important and useful ones in the following paragraphs.

Personal details

Under “Personal details”, you’ll be able to fill in your nickname, gender, age, country of origin and state/city. The personal message is akin to the status update in Facebook, or the second nickname line in MSN, and gives you the opportunity to write a small sentence on whatever you want. This message will be displayed next to your nickname when people look at the list of chatters inside a room.

Your avatar is a picture with which you can represent yourself to other chatters and can be anything as long as it is a common image file. Adult-themed or offensive avatars are frowned upon in non-adult chatrooms though because there may be minors present in these rooms.

Chat settings

In some, heavily populated rooms, the constant influx of “Join/Part notices” can be extremely annoying, so this is where you can turn this off if you want. Also, if you tend to only check the chatrooms once in a while, you may want to turn on the “Display chat event’s date/time” setting. This will put a timestamp on every event that happens in the chatroom and will make it much easier for you to know who said what and when, after you come back from a prolonged absence from the keyboard.

The taskbar button is handy in that it will give you a separate button on your Windows taskbar so you don’t always have to navigate through the Ares Galaxy screens just to get to the chat. Lastly, the Font button will enable you to change your default font and color for your written text.

Direct Chat settings

A Direct Chat is like a private message, but situated in a separate window. It also allows for the browsing of the media library of the person you are chatting with, as well as direct file transfers between two people. It can only be done with someone who is in the same chatroom you are in. You can block the entire option by blocking all private messages or you can block just the library browsing if you don’t want to use it.

Finally, you can set a personal away message that will be displayed automatically when someone sends you a private message, which can be handy if you’re going to be away from the keyboard for an extended period.

As you can see, configuring your chat client in Ares Galaxy is very easy! Downloading files, watching movies and listening to music and radio are very easy in Ares too, so don’t hesitate any longer and get your free Ares download today.

People sometimes e-mail us to ask questions. Even though our FAQ already answers most of them, we’ll take some time here to answer two of the most common ones in a bit more depth.

Why Is My Download Going So Slowly?

Sometimes it seems that people are somewhat confused by how Ares Galaxy works. When downloading something – anything – on the Internet, your speed is limited by two potential bottlenecks (there’s also the network load but there’s not much you can do to influence this).

One is the maximum download speed of your connection, and the other is the maximum upload speed of the server/website/peer you are downloading from. So, even if you have a million-dollar connection, if you’re downloading something from someone with a 28.8 kbps modem, your download will be very slow.

Now, Ares Galaxy is a P2P file sharing program. This means that many people from all over the world share files with one another, and, when you download something, you’re downloading it from other members of the Ares network like yourself. Not everyone has a great connection, and not everyone allows high upload transfers on Ares.

This means that, if your download is slow, even though you’re on a fast connection, in 95% of all cases, this is because you’re downloading a rather obscure file which is either not shared by many people, or is being shared by people who have very low bandwidth. So usually this is not a software problem at all, but simply a matter of bad luck.

How Do I Configure Ares Galaxy For Best Use?

Ares Galaxy has a great way of showing you which files will tend to download faster and which won’t (ie, which are shared by a great many people with good connections and which aren’t). When you’re searching for something and deciding on which file to download in the list of results, take a look at the amount of stars. One star means it is only shared by one person, two stars by more than one, three stars by more than ten and four stars by more than 20.

t’s generally a good idea to sort your results based on stars or amount of users (which has the same effect), as this will almost certainly give you much better download speeds.

But if you’re still having trouble, particularly if your download speeds are zero or close to zero, there may be a problem with your firewall and/or router. Go to the Control Panel and click on the Transfer tab. Check whether your firewall and/or router allows traffic through the port which Ares is using, and whether the program is not blocked. If you delete the port in Ares, and then restart the program, Ares Galaxy will automatically assign a new one, so, in case you accidentally change it, that should fix it. Then allow traffic on your firewall and/or router and everything should work perfectly again!

Like most good P2P programs, Ares Galaxy supports hashlinks (or hash codes). These can be opened directly with Ares, or entered into the specific box in the Control Panel, and the use of these hashlinks can reduce or eliminate the risk of downloading files which turn out to be incomplete or corrupted.

What Is A Hashlink And Why Do I Need It?

If you’ve only begun using P2P in the last few years, you probably don’t know what a hashlink is, even though you may have already used them many times in the past. Basically, a hash code identifies a certain file, by performing a check on it. The technology (specifically, the math) that’s behind it is a bit too complicated to explain here, but an example should make clear to you what exactly a hash does.

Suppose that you want to send a secret message, “KILL TOM”, to a friend of yours, but you’re afraid that your message may turn up garbled or incomplete. What you could do is assign every letter a number (as in A=1, B=2, C=3, etc) and add it all up together, which should be 92 (11+9+12+12+20+15+13) and include this number with the message. If your friend then gets your message, but it somehow gets changed to “KILL MOM”, he will realize something is wrong after checking the “code” you include, thereby saving your mom from certain death!

Obviously, digital hashlinks are much more complicated than this, but it should help you understand how they make sure that the information you want to access is genuine. In the case of P2P file transfer, this can be very important, as there are quite a few incomplete and corrupted files on the networks, and hashlinks, if received from reputable sources, will eliminate this risk.

What Kind Of Hashlinks Does Ares Galaxy Accept?

Ares Galaxy accepts the single most used one on the Internet: the Magnet link. Magnet links are all over the Internet, specifically on torrent websites. All you have to do to download the files the magnet links point to is clicking on such a link and opening it with Ares. Ares Galaxy will then automatically connect to all peers who are sharing this specific file and download it to your hard drive.

Ares Galaxy also accepts m3u and pls files (which point to collections of audio files), as well as the native Ares hashlink, which starts with “arlnk:”. These can point to any kind of downloadable file, but also to a chatroom or radio station!

How To Import And Export Hashlinks Directly In Ares?

You can generate a unique hashlink for every file you’re sharing in the media library by right-clicking on it and selecting “Export Hashlink”. The following screenshot shows you what such a link looks like.

To import a hashlink, go to Control Panel and then Hashlinks. Paste the link in the box and click Download HashLink, and your download will begin.

So, when you want to share a specific file with a friend of yours or on the Internet, and you want to make sure they’ll get it uncorrupted and complete, make a hashlink and share it!

As far as we’re concerned, the Ares Galaxy network is pretty much unbeatable and has almost no competition. Except, that is, from the bittorrent network. So it’s a good thing that Ares Galaxy combines support for both its own network and the bittorrent one!

Read on to learn how to use Ares as your default torrent client and how the combination of these two networks gives you the best of both worlds.

Advantages And Disadvantages Of Torrents Compared To Files Shared On Ares

Let’s begin with the biggest advantage that the torrent community has: it is enormous. Over the last half decade or so, bittorrent really has exploded. It involves millions upon millions of users, spread out over many different torrent trackers, and has just about everything you can imagine. And because there are so many people in the torrent community, download speeds will usually (but not always) be higher than those on any other network.

However, with this great popularity comes increased visibility. Whereas ten years ago, copyright infringement was almost synonymous with the word “Napster”, nowadays, most people, and the authorities, tend to think of “The Bay”.

If you’ve followed the tech news the last few years, you know that this website, along with many others, have been targeted by governments around the world for the role they play in the torrent community. Another thing is that there are so many different trackers, and so many different torrent search engines to choose from, as well as a great deal of false information and traps set up by copyright groups, that it can often be more difficult to find what you are looking for than you might expect.

Best Of Two Worlds: Ares Galaxy

A lot of people seem to think you should use a dedicated torrent program such as uTorrent or Azureus, but we don’t quite understand this rationale. We’ve heard of the mantra “less is more”, but, in the words of Frasier Crane: if less is more, just imagine how much more more is!

Ares Galaxy works perfectly as a torrent program. All you have to do is open the .torrent file with Ares Galaxy and your download will start immediately!

Whenever we want to download a backup or a file ourselves, we usually look for it on the Ares network integrated search first, since it’s easier and less time-consuming than having to go look for some torrent search engine on the Internet.

But when we can’t find the file we want (ie, like in the case of the screenshot above, where we couldn’t find the latest version of OpenOffice), we simply use a torrent. Ares Galaxy can be used for both torrent files and magnet links, so if you just set it as your default program for these extensions (by right-clicking on such a file and selecting “Open with..”), you’ll never have to use other software again! And on top of that, you can enjoy all the other features of Ares as well! So get the Ares free download now and start downloading!

Of course we’re huge fans of our program, but we really aren’t just tooting our own horn when we say that Ares Galaxy is a big step up from any other way through which files can be downloaded and shared online. In this article we’ll enumerate some of the advantages that Ares Galaxy has over other file sharing methods.

Peer to Peer

Ares Galaxy doesn’t use a centralized server to send information to you. This has a host of advantages over certain direct downloading methods such as traditional Internet downloads.

For example, the network is extremely difficult to shut down because there is no central server or website which handles and stores all the information. There is no downtime due to holidays or server updates. As long as people use our free Ares program, the network will exist and people will be able to download and share the information they want with the other members of the community.

It doesn’t even have centralized indexing like other P2P programs like Napster used to have, so the network can’t be shut down by the authorities.

Secure protocol

Though Ares Galaxy’s own network doesn’t differ much from the later versions of the Gnutella network when it comes to architecture and file sharing methods, it certainly differs when it comes to its protocol. Ares Galaxy cannot easily be identified, which means that, on many networks which have to deal with restricted access such as college or even library networks, Ares Galaxy will work, unlike many other P2P programs.  

Bittorrent support

Ares Galaxy offers all who download the program for free the opportunity to access not only the great community of peers that is the separate Ares network, but the bittorrent community as well. In the off chance you can’t find what you are looking for on the Ares network, you can always open up a torrent search engine in your browser and download the torrents you want, using Ares. The combination of these two huge networks means that you have virtually the entire Internet world basically at your fingertips!

Easy sharing

If you want to share your own files with the world, then Ares Galaxy really is the easiest way to do this. There are no complicated uploading procedures like with most bittorrent clients. Instead, you just have to put the files you want to share in a certain folder and select it in Ares. Or, if you’re too lazy to do even that, you can just let Ares Galaxy do a scan of your system for shareable files. There is no way it could be easier than this.

Much more

We haven’t even touched on some of the other features that really set this program apart from the competition, such as the chat support, preview and integrated media player, the support for Internet radio or the media library. It should suffice to say that if you get this free Ares Galaxy download, you’ll become part of a community of file sharers and be on your way to discover a world of information.