How To: Automatically Download TV Shows Using Torrents

Want an automated solution for obtaining TV shows to watch on your HTPC? In this guide, we’ll use the RSS downloader feature in uTorrent to automatically download TV shows from your personal showRSS feed.

What you’ll need

• showRSS account
• uTorrent or other Bittorent application supporting auto RSS downloading such as Miro, Vuze (Azureus), µTorrent or Transmission (with Automatic, Mac-only)

Setting up showRSS to get an RSS feed of your favorite shows

1. Sign up for a showRSS account.
2. Add your TV shows to your list in showRSS.
3. If you prefer to only download a specific quality (standard or 720p) for specific shows select the gear icon next to the TV show, select the appropriate setting, and then click Save settings and return.
4. Click the feeds link.
5. Next to “Your feed address” select Quality: per-show settings and Proper/Repack: per-show settings.
6. Click Generate to get your RSS feed URL.

Setting up uTorrent to automatically download from RSS feed

1. Click the Add RSS Feed button on the toolbar.
2. In the Feed URL field enter your showRSS feed’s URL, and then click OK.
3. You should now have a feed called “showRSS personal feed”.
4. Right-click this feed and select Disable feed. This prevents us from accidentally automatically downloading while we’re getting setup.
5. Right-click the feed again and select Edit feed.
6. Select the Automatically download all items published in field select box, and then click OK.
   Advanced Note: If you want to put each TV show in a certain folder skip this step and use the Advanced section below. In preparation of our upcoming auto file renaming tip, I wouldn’t recommend spending the time setting this up.

   

7. Right-click the feed and select RSS Downloader.
8. Select showRSS personal feed.
9. In the “Save in” field, select a place you want to download your TV Shows to (e.g., S:\Unsorted Media).
10. In the “Label for new torrents field”, type TV Shows
11. Your settings should look like this. If so click Close.
12. Re-enable your feed by right-clicking the feed and selecting Enable feed.

Advanced downloading

1. Select the showRSS personal feed
2. Right-click a torrent for the TV show you want to personalize, and then click Add to Favorites.
3. Select the TV show you just added
4. Consider putting an asterisk * in the filter in place of any additional text like HD or VTV.
5. Set your “Save in” location to where you want to save the TV show (e.g., for The Mentalist set the location to your The Mentalist folder).
6. Set the Quality to ALL since showRSS already filters our desired quality.
7. Your settings should look like this. If so, click Close and you’re done.
8. Repeat the process for your other TV shows.

Now watch the magic happen as all of your TV shows are automatically downloaded to the folder you specified. Soon we’ll expand this to show you how you can automatically organize and give your downloads consistently pretty names using theRenamer.

If you have instructions on another platform before we get it posted, please send us a tip at tips@thehtpcblog.com!