HOWTO: Install uTorrent as a service on Windows Home Server (WHS) CTP
One of the first things I did after completing my Windows Home Server (WHS) Beta 2 installation was look into ways to make it my complete always on computer solution; one of the major requirements was for it to run a BitTorrent client. I had always used my personal computer to download torrents overnight, but as the point of installing a WHS machine was to enable all other computers to be off overnight the WHS machine had to take over this job.
After a week or so of looking into the issue I found a solution to do so and as I have just recently upgraded my WHS from Beta 2 to CTP I have had to re-do this process.
The whole process is documented below so that anyone who also has the same needs as I can achieve them.
Update (13/07/07): I have an updated version of this tutorial as a PDF available here. I will also update this page with the updated version at a later stage.
You can also download a zipped version containing the tutorial and Marcel Nouwens' WHS uTorrent Add-In 1.1 here and Marcel's AnyServiceInstaller tool here which is an optional tool to help with the install process and highly recommended.
Step 1 – Download all required software.
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µTorrent
µTorrent can be used in conjunction with the µTorrent WebUI so that it can be used on any machine via a web-browser to fully manage the torrents making it ideal for the use on a headless WHS.
Download from: utorrent.com
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µTorrent WebUI
Download from: forum.utorrent.com/viewtopic.php?id=14565 -
Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools
These are required to add µTorrent as a Windows Service so as no interaction on the WHS is required.
Download from: microsoft.com/downloads/...
Step 2 – Create new user.
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Connect to your WHS via Remote Desktop Connection as the Administrator user.
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On the WHS Remote Desktop open the Start menu
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Select All Programs > Administrative Tools > Computer Management
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On the Computer Management dialog expand Local Users and Groups and select Users.
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From to toolbar select Action > New Users...
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Fill in the details in the New User dialog making certain to un-tick the first checkbox and tick the second and third checkboxes, then hit the Create button.
Note: Make sure to remember the chosen User name and Password. -
Close the New User dialog.
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Right-click the newly created user and select Properties.
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Select the Member Of tab and click the Add... button.
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In the Select Groups dialog type Administrators into the available textarea and hit the OK button.
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Click the OK button in the User Properties dialog.
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Close the Computer Management window.
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Hi Start and select Log Off.
Step 3 – Installing the applications
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Connect to your WHS via Remote Desktop Connection as the newly created user.
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Locate the Windows Resource Kit installer and install it with the default settings.
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Once that installation is complete, locate the µTorrent installer and install it with the default settings.
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Run µTorrent.
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When the dialog pops up asking you if you'd like to associate .torrent files with µTorrent choose whichever option you'd like, I personally chose No.
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Choose the settings as necessary on the next dialog.
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Location the WebUI files and extract them to a temporary folder.
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Click the Start button and select Run...
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Enter %AppData%\uTorrent into the dialog and hit the OK button.
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Move the webui.zip file from the temporary folder to the newly opened folder.
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Close the folder and feel free to delete the temporary folder.
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In µTorrent select Options > Preferences... from the toolbar.
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Select Downloads and fill out all necessary options making sure to use folders formatted as \\Server\Directory\ oppose to C:\Directory\
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Select Advanced > Web UI, tick the Enable Web Interface checkbox, fill out the Username and Password with credentials of your choice and hit the OK button.
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Close µTorrent.
Step 4 – Creating the service
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In the WHS Remote Desktop, click on the Start button and select Run...
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Type cmd and hit the OK button.
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Presuming that the Windows Resource Kit was installed at c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\ type the following lines:
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"c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\instsrv.exe" uTorrent "c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\srvany.exe"
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exit
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Click on the Start button and select Run...
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Type regedit and hit the OK button.
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In the Registry Editor dialog select HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE > SYSTEM > CurrentControlSet > Services > uTorrent.
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With uTorrent selected, hit Edit > New > Key from the toolbar.
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Type Parameters and hit enter.
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From the toolbar select Edit > New > String Value.
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Type Application and hit enter.
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Right-click Application and select Modify.
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Presuming µTorrent was installed c:\Program Files\uTorrent\ type the following into Value data:
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c:\Program Files\uTorrent\utorrent.exe
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Hit the OK button.
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Close the Registry Editor.
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Hit the Start button and select All Programs > Administrative Tools > Services.
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Locate the uTorrent service, right-click it and select Properties.
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Select the Log On tab, click the This account radio button and fill in the details with the Username and Password created earlier.
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Click the OK button.
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Close the Services dialog.
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Click the Start button and select Shut Down.
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In the Shut Down Windows dialog select Restart from the drop down and hit the OK button.
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If all went as planned when the WHS restarts you should be able to connect to the WebUI via the following address:
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http://[Server Name]:[uTorrent Port]/gui/
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Deciphered.RSS
It was me who requested this in your thread on WHS forums.. I almost love you now ;) Great guide.. Will try this tomorrow, and will let you know how it goes
Excellent guide. Submitted in queue @ tweako
Thank you for the guide. I have done everything above and it seems to work OK. I have noticed that torrents downloaded via the RSS importer don't show up on the Web GUI. Have you experienced this?
Hi MrBrut,
I dropped you a line on the WHS Forum, but the gist of it was that the version I used when writing this guide (1.6.1) has not implemented the RSS feature yet. It is available in the 1.7 beta, but as I have not tested it yet I can't confirm that it will work with this method.
I will be testing it when I get a chance and will post an update.
All I can say is THANK YOU! Great guide and it works awesome. Now to find more uses for WHS.
Thanks again,
Rob
Hi,
I followed your guide to the point, but in the WebUI the torrent starts downloading, but after a short while I'm getting Error [F]. Any ideas to why?
Thanks
Here's a few possabilites that I can think of:
If all else fails, give the WHS a reboot and try again.
If you are still having trouble, drop me another line and I will do what I can to help you, and if you leave your email adderss it will be even easier to help you.
Cheers,
Decipher
Hey D,
1. Never removed the Admin privilege from the user.
2. Hehe, this is a nice one: Just after posting my comment here, I noticed that my Downloads directory was set to \WHS\Downloads\ instead of \\WHS\Downloads - BIG mistake. Corrected this, and added the torrents all over again. Everything seemed to be working alright, but this morning my torrents were stuck with the same Error [F].
(Btw, in your guide, I think you should mention that you need to share the folder for it to be accessible via a UNC path)
Will have to check that my users has r/w access to the folder, but I'm pretty sure that I set it to full access. The download directory points to a HDD that has not been added to the "WHS data storage pool", and the completed torrents directory is WHS' own default video share.
3. Not sure about the HDD though - it has been giving me quite a few hick-ups before, so I'm lead to believe that this might be causing the downloads to become corrupt.
Thanks for your guide btw. Saving me a lot of time from guiding myself through those pesky MS KB's :p
Cheers,
Stian
Not sure if this has anything to with it, but when I log on to the WHS with remote desktop and try to start µTorrent, I'm getting the an error message:
"It seems like µTorrent is already running, but not responding.
Please close all µTorrent processes and try again."
Are you able to start up the GUI (non-web) from you WHS when you're running it as a service?
Thanks,
Stian
Hi Stian,
I would expect this error as the uTorrent service should already be running. It should be possible to bring up the standard GUI by logging into the Remote Desktop as the created user. If not, you will be able to terminate the service via the Services console then run it manually.
I doubt that this is related to the issue. Drop me an email at null@deciphered.net and I will do all that I can to help you out.
Cheers,
Decipher.
I followed Your guide everthing went well but im getting same Error [F] message when i add a torrent via web UI, they start then a few min after i get error.
Have any ideas?
Can you tell me how to create a share folder that can be used. Im positive I know how to do that but I might be missing an important step.
Appreciate your help . Much props for creating this Guide!
Hi JediJah,
Send me an email at null@deciphered.net and I will try to knock out some more information for you so that we can get the issue resolved, but as I won't have access to my computers till 18:00 GMT+10 it won't be for a while.
Cheers,
Decipher.
Hey D,
Appreciate your help I figuered out The permissions on my shared folder was set to users not administrator. Im also running 2 drive on my box but everything work fine now(fingers crossed). I appreciate your help again.
Jah
I have set my uTorrent Download Preferences to the same as yours:
\\Server\Downloads\Active Downloads
\\Server\Downloads\Completed Downloads
My question is where do I add these directorys from. Do I use the Consule on the clients and add a shared folder of "Downloads" or a shared folder of "Active Downloads" and "Completed Downloads" or do I add the folder/s from some other location?
Hi Phill,
I definitely need to make this change to the guide at some stage, but to answer your question quickly you need to created a shared folder named "Downloads" with the two directories inside it. The best way to create a new shared folder is via the WHS Console.
Good luck,
Decipher.
I had uTorrent working perfectly under the CTP. I upgraded to the RC last night, but now I can't get the WebUI to work at all - I'm pretty sure that my settings are the same.
Have you upgraded to the RC yet? If so, are you having issues with uTorrent?
Haha, ignore that.
It would help if I put the webui.zip file in the right directory, wouldn't it? ;-)
Hi mpfl,
I'm glad that it all works for you now, I did my install of RC late last night and have yet to install and test uTorrent on it.
As for forgetting the webui.zip, it happens to the best of us, I actually forgot to do it while I was writing this guide, I wrote to do it, just somehow forgot to do it.
Cheers,
Decipher.
I have a problem installing the wervice via RDC on WHS RC1. I get the following:
C:\Documents and Settings\WHS Services>"c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\T
ools\instsrv.exe" uTorrent
Installs and removes system services from NT
INSTSRV ( | REMOVE)] [-p ]
[-a
Install service example:
INSTSRV MyService C:\MyDir\DiskService.Exe
-OR-
INSTSRV MyService C:\mailsrv\mailsrv.exe -a MYDOMAIN\joebob -p foo
Remove service example:
INSTSRV MyService REMOVE
On the next step there is no service called utorrent, any ideas?
Thanks.
Further to my previous comment regarding Step 4, point 3 I eventually used:
INSTSRV uTorrent "c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\instsrv.exe"
Followed by:
"c:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools\srvany.exe"
This worked, and was the method suggested by WHS command prompt.
Can the guide be updated to reflect this?
Joe
Hi Joe,
The code used in the tutorial is correct however it HAS to be one full unbroken line. There is an update coming to the tutorial that offers and an easy alternative to this step. With any luck the update should be available within the next week or so.
Cheers,
Decipher.
Hello, I am actually running a utorrent client as a service on a windows 2003 server and I would like to know how, in the webUI I could properly add a torrent.
I actually write there because it's kind of fuzzy with the process :
on the top right hand corner, it's possible to directly search for a torrent (well !) this just open an other web page and , what we got there is just the normal web page of the, mininova search engine, for exemple.
When I click on DOWNLOAD THIS TORRENT, the link is an html encrypted file that can be save but this is not a torrent.
Beside this, when I was running a 'normal' utorrent client, the link between those DOWNLOAD THIS TORRENT link and the utorrent was automatik, so this link was adding the torrent if the application utorrent is on or, lunch the app by it self if not, so, well good USED process ... because actually it the same, it lunch the utorrent app on the computer were i am (atually, i would like to add some torrent from my work ...)
So, every body understand my little problem and, so , I beg for a solution, as far as I could NOT get one of those .torrent file, the link DOWNLOAD THIS TORRENT don't want to put the file on my computer even with the "save the target of the link" option of my browser.
Thanks to read me and thanks if you can help me.
Hi there. Well done on ur job.
However.. I do not recommend you using your home server to do your file sharing. In my opinion, doing so compromises the security on your server as you are allowing other users on the web so create incoming connections to your server. If you intend to use your server for other applications, such as a web server, then you may render yourself dangerously vulnerable to an attack.
I also am running a server at home and I considered doing what you did but I wanted to keep my server as solid as a brick security-wise. I have an alternative for you.. VMware Server (Freeware)! My virtual client with Windows XP installed is configured to startup and login automatically. VMware has a snapshot feature which can save the total state of a workstation including files and registry and everything else. In the case something goes wrong you can revert it to the state that you saved it in. For that reason, I don't even bother firewalling my virtual workstation cause I can revert to snapshot within 3 seconds!
VMware server can also run in the background as a service too! You wouldn't even notice it was running! If you need a hand setting this up let me know. :)
I have no "enum" key under uTorrent registry entry. I have been having issues getting the service to run on startup (it installs properly, so it would seem; no errors, can adjust properties in services.msc). Everything else in this guide is exact, except the picture that shows the uTorrent key and then the security, parameters and enum keys. I also can't get the AnyServiceInstaller program to run; it starts to load, gives me the hourglass, and then the hourglass goes away and no windows open, nothing pops up asking for anything. It just doesn't run. I'm on RC1, btw.
Dear Deciphered,
I had this working n the beta, but now with my newly purchased copy I can not.
I have created the user. (with Administartors / Users and Windows Home Server Users)
I then remote into the server as WHS Services , but am unable to execute the toolkit, saying I do not have the rights to do so.
(from either c: or the download share.
Do you have any ideas what has gone wrong?
Many thanks
Jaap
I found the solution as I had this problem before on the beta kindly solved by Philip Churchill:
http://mswhs.com/2007/07/02/how-to-install-utorrent-on-windows-home-serv...
Stll would like to know why, but guess I should just get over it;)
Maybe i missing something here but you dont you just use winvnc to connect to server and run install any torrent program you like?
I was able to install everything and get this working fine on my WHS but after a reboot it stopped working. On my utorrent WHS add-in, I get a red light instead of a green light now. Under the WHS user account I checked under services and the utorrent service is running. One thing I noticed was that when it was working properly, the torrents I downloaded did not show up on the utorrent client itself when I was logged in using my newly created WHS user. However, after the reboot, the torrents I was downloading on the server now show up on the utorrent client and I can no longer connect to the utorrent webui. I'm not sure what's wrong... please help!
Alright, so i've been trying to get this set up correctly and it looks like the service portion is there, but I can't seem to get the webgui to work while it is running as a service. While looking at the running processes it shows utorrent running under the account that was created but I can't see it via the webgui address. This works fine if I actually start utorrent though. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Anyone knows of any similar solution (run as service) to use emule (or amule, or any other ED2K client)?
It would be theoretically possible to do with eMule as eMule does have a web based frontend available. I haven't looked into it myself but I would presume you could just follow this guide for most steps and the rest should be pretty straight forward.
I followed the instructions pretty much to the letter but have the following issue:
When I run utorrent manually (ie stop the service and run it from start menu) everything works file with the web page and the WHS gui.
When I run it as a service, however, I cannot access the webui either directly or through the WHS interface. utorrent.exe is running in taskman.
Its running under whs_services with admin privileges as laid out, the only thing I can think I did differently was to be logged in as full-blown administrator during the install rather than the WHS_servies user.
Any thoughts? Maybe I'll start from the beginning. If this works it will be very nice to drop torrents in my watch folder from anywhere to start the D/L.
The instruction worked fine - good work - thank You.
I only noticed problems to get remote access only beeing in the administrators groop. I dont know why the uTorrent service has to be with administrator privileges. I only put the "whs services" into remote access group to get the chance to install it per remote access.
The service starts successfull, and the WHS gui is also available.
The only changes made is given explicit write acess to the needed download folders.
Im not shure if i have a secure benefit beeing only in remote acess group with the service?
Another way i tested was to start uTorrent under user "whs services" not as a windows service but as a planned task with system startup.
How can i get the WHS plugin for uTorrent. The link seemed to be dead - or is there any login needed?
Am sat here and have followed the instructions to the tee and am stuck at installing the three apps. The message am getting is on step 3 installing the appllications "Windows cannot access the specified device , Path or File. You may not have the appropriate permissions to access the item."
I initially saved the files in the Shared folder and then moved them to the desk top to run and yet still getting the same message. Am I doing something wrong here?
Be shure you have the access rights to start the "Windows Resource Kit installer", you can also install it with administrator as an alternative.
(Moving files is not equal to copying them, because of the access rights in shared folder. When you move the files the access rights of them didn`t change, they move also.)
Maybe you have the problems because we haven`t added the new user with the whs console. But if you added the user to the administrator group it should work.
The WebUI.zip has to be in the %AppData%\uTorrent folder of the new user. For every step after that you have to logged on as the new user.
All went according to plan and working well, with the exception of some global settings. Any idea why the values in the Bandwidth Limiting Field under "Connections" would randomly change?
How do u run utorrent overnight cos mine always shuts down
Ok,
This is bizarre. I followed the instructions at to the very letter and I can kind of get this to work.
When I browse to the server as described [http://{server}:{port}/gui/], it brings up a "Internet Explorer cannot display this page" blank page BUT it has the little green uTorrent logo in the corner of the page tab.
This leads me to believe that it is partially working.
However, the only way to get it to actually load the webUI, is to log in remotely and run uTorrent. I can then bring up the webUI perfectly, but this is kind of defeating the purpose of running as a service.
Your help would be greatly appreciated!
Deciphered,
Can you update the links on the WHS? Marcel's links are all dead. Those that pay attention will follow your links to the PDF and the Anyinstaller page. ;-)
BTW, I've been using your set up since it came out and I've set up several friends' WHS's with it too and it works flawlessly.
Most peeps with trouble seem to set up their active downloads to a WHS share and that causes all kinds of trouble...LOL.
Thanks again.
TheJudge
Hi,
Thanks for a great guide - I just can't get it to work - I enter
http://timserver:14025/gui/
into my browser and don't get anything - I notice that the service isn't running - Should it be - If I start it it shuts down after a couple of seconds.
Any help would be gratefully received.
Thanks,
Tim
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