We are taking the (copious amount of) feedback we've received into account and working on the next release around the clock. We hope to have it out by the end of the week.
Desktop integration is probably a long ways off. First and foremost, the platform needs to stabilize a bit, more hosts need to join, etc. Furthermore, desktop integration is not a simple task; on Mac/Linux, we'd probably use FUSE, and on Windows we might look at file system events to trigger uploads/downloads. I haven't worked out the details yet because we've had more pressing concerns.
I will extend the timeout in the next release. In the meantime, I can create a special win64 binary with an extended timeout. Let me know if you're willing to test the fix.
Ho, forget to tell, I also tried with firewall off and I still get the error. So firewall is not the cause.
I would test the fix.
ok, I changed the timeout to 20 seconds. Please test this binary (wait for the full 20 seconds) and let me know if the problem persists: www.siacoin.com/dist/Sia-HostTest-win64.zip
If you are using the UI, you will need to replace the copy of siad in your Sia-UI/Sia folder with the one in this binary. Alternatively, you can test it from the command line with "siac host announce".