The static IP using addnode will probably work.
However the software is designed to bootstrap using IRC. Probably connecting out to the IRC server is being blocked either by Microsoft or his Linux firewall. Without IRC his system is unable to discover other nodes.
IRC has nothing to do with port 8333, but most likely the Linux firewall is blocking incoming port 8333, so bitcoin will need to establish outgoing connections to other systems with a 8333 open for incoming connections. Without opening incoming 8333 the max connections will be limited to 8 (I think).
Topic: No blocks downloaded - MS Security Essentials users please read - page 2. (Read 49493 times)
This seems like a commonly reported problem now - something to do with the block downloading being really slow. It may be related to the excessive amount of disk I/O that is generated during the initial download. The database file is flushed to disk every time a block is added so this is being really slow for some people. I think we can probably fix this up now that we know about it.. I for one didn't do much testing without having all the blocks, so it never occurred to me to try this under different systems.
Might need to have him start it with -addnode=x.x.x.x, where x.x.x.x is someone's static IP. Hopefully someone should be able to share theirs for that purpose... if that's the issue, of course. :-) I don't know for sure though.
I got my friend to download and try Bitcoin out. I sent him one coin, but he hasn't received it. For some reason, his client isn't downloading any blocks. He turned on "Generate Coins" the minute he started the program for the first time. His speeds were in the 1400-1600 khash/s range, and he had 3 blocks. He generated 50 coins which will mature in another 100 blocks or so. He has around 40 connections.
To my knowledge, his coins will be invalid because none of the other nodes will accept his blocks. And, since he hasn't downloaded any blocks, he won't receive the one Bitcoin I sent him.
He uses Microsoft Security Essentials, but has added Bitcoin to its unblock list. He does have port 8333 open, but has a Linux network firewall. (He doesn't have the rights to access the firewall.)
What could be the problem?
To my knowledge, his coins will be invalid because none of the other nodes will accept his blocks. And, since he hasn't downloaded any blocks, he won't receive the one Bitcoin I sent him.
He uses Microsoft Security Essentials, but has added Bitcoin to its unblock list. He does have port 8333 open, but has a Linux network firewall. (He doesn't have the rights to access the firewall.)
What could be the problem?
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