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Speed up Downloads

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PCQ Bureau
New Update

DAP (Download Accelerator Plus) is a popular download manager and many of you might already be using it. Its default settings, however, might not be optimized for your connection and requirements. Let’s us tweak DAP a little and make it more efficient and useful.

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Integrate with IE



The default installation integrates it with IE so that as soon as you click on a link, DAP takes control of the download. The latest version, DAP 5.0, also comes with a special toolbar that adds itself to the IE toolbar. The toolbar has all the links required to configure and use it. In addition to the toolbar, DAP also has a Download Basket that can be invoked to drag and drop links into it. This remains ‘always on top’ of all windows.

Configure



In the main DAP windows, go to Downloads>Options/Configurations. This gives you access to all the settings. The Connection tab by default is set to Accelerated Mode, which makes four connections to the server. You can set this to Super Accelerated mode if you have enough bandwidth in your Internet connection, so that DAP makes seven connections. Note, however, that this would depend on the kind of connection you have and also the number of available server mirrors, or support for multiple connections on the server itself.

DAP can be set to start downloading all files immediately or can be manually controlled. You can also specify file extensions that are to be downloaded automatically. This setting is controlled through the General tab. It also works in conjunction with the integrated IE toolbar to highlight links to these file extensions on a Web page.

For downloading different extension files to different locations, activate Categorized downloads. This ensures that all the ZIP files are downloaded in one folder while all the MP3s go in a different folder. These file extensions are specified under the

save to tab. 

The Scheduler tab, too, is useful. You can schedule all downloads to occur during off-office hours, for instance, and also set it to switch off your PC after downloading finishes.

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