Ares P2P automatically connects to the network at start up. The connection status is displayed at the left side of the status bar.

Ares P2P updates its node caches on a regular basis to ensure a fast and reliable connection to the network. The first time it can take up to 5 minutes to connect but connection times should improve over time.

If the connection status keeps saying Connecting..., closing and restarting Ares P2P may help.

Once Ares P2P is connected to the network you can start searching for files.

Enter one or more keywords, select a media type, and click the Search button.

The search results are displayed to the right of the search field and can be sorted by media type, title, file size, available sources, and file name.

By sorting the search results by the number of available sources, the most popular files will appear at the top of the page. These files can usually be downloaded immediately and at high speeds.

To download files, select one or more search results and click the Download button. You can also use the context menu which can be accessed by right-clicking one of the selected search results.

On the Downloads page you can monitor the transfer progress of your downloads and uploads.

To speed up slow or pending downloads, select one or more downloads and click the Find Sources button. You can also use the context menu which can be accessed by right-clicking one of the selected downloads.

Another way to find more sources for a download is to search again for the same file. When new sources are found they are automatically added to the corresponding download.

All completed downloads are imported into the Library page where they can be browsed, managed and played/viewed.

Music and movie files are played with the embedded media player on the Screen page while images and text documents are displayed externally.

Software files, such as games, and certain other file types cannot be launched from within Ares P2P. These files can contain viruses or other threats and should be scanned with your virus scanner before any attempt to run them.

(c) 2005 by aresp2p.net