Transmission used to be my preferred app hands down but recent updates have negatively impacted its performance on my end. If all it needs to do is download torrents, why does it now sometimes seem incapable of connecting to a given (popular) swarm ?

Particularly unfortunate is that once it does connect, the download speed has now become arbitrary: it keeps alternating between 'incredibly fast' and 'surprisingly slow' and takes three or four times as long to complete. I've become so exasperated with it that I've been forced to move on (deluge instantly connects and consistently downloads at five times the speed).