Hello everyone,
I would like to update you on the latest changes to GOG Downloader (the optional app that can be used to download your GOG.com purchases).
We have just released an updated version (0.9.30) which includes three important things:
1. a faster app core (thx to updated Adobe AIR Runtime, and jQuery 1.3.3)
2. updated file resuming, witch will now allow:
- more reliable auto-resuming, witch should fix _some_ of the problems
- auto discovery of incomplete/complete files
3. an option to send bug report to gog.com
If you have the downloader already installed, you will be notified about the update next time you launch the app; if you don't have the app yet, check out the list of downloads in My Account page for any of your purchases)
2. UPDATED APP CORE
While updating our source code, we also updated all libraries involved which should make the whole app a bit faster and less resource hungry.
3. UPDATED FILE RESUMING
This was, and still is, the most important thing about the downloader. We have received numerous reports from our users, that there are issues with this, especially on slower, less reliable, connections.
The real problem with fixing this is actually recreating this situation, to have a peek at what's really causing this. We tried a lot of different setups, we've used faulty network hardware, we used cellphones as modems to access Internet, we tried disconnecting cables on different levels of the connection, we used software to slow the connection down, we tried downloading files to very slow hard drives, but so far we couldn't recreate problems that some of you were experiencing.
So, as the first step, we changed the way that files are handled, discovered, and resumed. It should help with at least some of the problems.
The second thing, was to enable the downloader app to discover files from previous sessions. This means that if you have an incomplete file backed up before the downloader encountered an error, you can copy that incomplete file into download folder, then add the game to the downloader again, and the app will continue from the incomplete file instead of starting at zero. This is hardly a resolution for the problem, but it will at least allow for some temporary workaround, until we get all the issues sorted out.
So if you have problems using the downloader, you can try to:
1. Start the download normally
2. From time to time, make a copy of the temporary files in the GOG Downloader downloads folder to a safe backup location
3. If the downloader encounters an error click "Send report" (more info below), and shut it down
4. Copy your backed up files back into GOG Downloader downloads folder
5. Relaunch the app, and resume the transfer (or add the game again using the website), the transfer should resume at the point of last backup
Please remember, that this is only a temporary workaround as we work on fixing all the real issues.
3. BUG REPORTS
As mentioned before, we are adding an option to submit bug reports straight from the downloader. Every time you encounter an error while using GOG Downloader, you will have an option to "Send report" to us - please click on it, as it is essential for understanding and solving the problems :).
The report includes:
* GOG Downloader application logs (detailed information about file transfers and errors)
* your gog.com user name
Report does NOT include:
* any personal or hardware info (no hardware logs, no apps list, etc)
We will keep these logs as short as possible and we'll be using them only to find & fix bugs in GOG Downloader. After that we will delete them. We won't spam you, won't spy on your system and won't create any stats regarding downloader and it's usage.

No problem, you can send it via email. Thanks for your help, your logs will help us to fix the bugs, that we couldn't recreate in our test environments.

You would have to use the cookie that you received from gog.com in your browser. But we haven't test it, so i can't guarantee it will work.

unrealcyn, basically there shouldn't be any difference in download speed when using downloader vs using the browser. Could you please let us know if you experience such slow downloads when downloading directly from our server (via browser, without using GOG.com Downloader)?

unrealcyn, the Opera is not a problem here, that's for sure. Actually, as you've confirmed that downloads via the browser are slow as well, I'm afraid the problem might be the connection between your ISP and our Content Delivery Network. It should improve with time, as the CDN is adding new nodes around the world all the time, but at this moment - and I'm really sorry to say that - I'm afraid we cannot do anything to improve the download speed for you :(
PS: Apart from the slow download speeds, were you able to download your purchased games via GOG.com Downloader?

Have you tried re-downloading the GOG downloader air application and re-installing that? I'd say that would be worth a try and then try to download the game(s) again.
Do you have the same problem i.e. instant cut-off download when trying to download via the browser? If so, have you tried another browser?
If you're still having problems, please send a message to support.

As soon as we'll have any info for you about the next downloader update, we'll be sure to post on the forums. But for now, we're hard at work finding/fixing bugs, and adding features, so you'll have to be a bit more patient.

Do you have some kind of firewall running which might stop the Downloader from contacting our servers? Maybe you need to add the application to the access list?

There is no automatic update. You download the most up-to-date version we have.
This is something we're looking into, how to notify people of updates but we don't do that many updates anyway.
As the games are older :) and all official patches have already been released and applied to the games.

Please raise a support call and provide the same information you have provided here, also how the download was progressing, did you notice anything else whilst downloading? Did you pause the download or not and any other detail you can think of regarding this issue. Thanks!

Does this also happen when trying to download a game from HTTP only and not via the downloader? I'm thinking of the speed dropping.
We have some tools / options that we could try to troubleshoot but you would have to write to support, as we would do those via email.

Sorry that you're experiencing problems downloading.
Follow these instructions to extract the downloader logfile http://www.gog.com/en/forum/general/gog_downloader_feature_request/perm=5/#p_b_5
Please send that data in to our support team - but this won't help you right now as we don't yet provide full support on weekends.
I'd suggest checking if you have any anti-virus or other programs running which could be checking the data on the fly? It might be worth adding an exception to allow the data to go through, some have found that useful.
Others have stopped the download just before the place where it usually stops and then resumed it. We're still trying to resolve these downloader issues and the only way to do so, is to get those log files.
Have you tried simply downloading via http?

Sorry for the trouble you're having!
It should restart however if it encounters a problem it isn't prepared for, then it will restart the whole download -- in our own tests we haven't been able to recreate some of the problems you and other users are having.
We're planning an update in the future (no info when yet) which will help us identify more problems and improve the downloader.
Please contact support about the downloading issue/speed, we may be able to help identify the problem.
Also there's the downloader log file which you can send to us (here's how you extract it).

Do you have some kind of anti-virus/spyware etc type of checking happening in the background and did you put the gog downloader in as exceptions?
If you continue to have this problem - please read the above posts about logging etc and send the log through to support.

Please raise this with support.
We won't be able to provide much help via the forum.