One important lesson I learned while building a download manager:
More connections do not always mean faster or more stable downloads.
Parallel segmentation helps — but only up to a certain point. After that, the gains fade and can even turn into performance loss.
What many users don’t realize is that increasing segments means increasing connections, memory usage, CPU load, and especially disk I/O. Splitting a file into extremely high segment counts (for example 256 segments = 256 connections) can heavily stress system resources and introduce instability instead of speed.
Based on real testing, a practical range looks like this:
• 4–8 → typical downloads
• 8–16 → fast internet connections
• 16–32 → strong CDN + SSD environments
• 32+ → niche scenarios only
Beyond that, the benefit is usually minimal while storage wear, context switching, and connection overhead increase significantly.
Speed is important — but balance between network, hardware, and server behavior is what truly creates a fast and stable download experience.
