Well, that’s one (relatively) long title, so I hope it makes sense. Just to make sure I don’t get flamed in the comments or via email, here’s the criteria I used to pick the sites in this list:

• I use them almost everyday. Yeah, me/mua/watashi, so this list is certainly going to involve some degree of subjectivity, even if I always try to judge objectively!
• They are fast. I get a minimum of 200 KB/s speeds, and an average of 400 KB/s on these sites, even during rush hours. Some of these sites can push episodes to me at above 1 MB/s, even if they are US servers serving to poor little me in London. These speeds are based on a approximately 15-20 mbit (edu) connection.
• They update frequently with the latest episodes, hence the distro classification.
• They are mostly hassle-free, with free registration being the biggest hassle involved.

And in no particular order, the sites are:

• Anikei.com: As reviewed earlier, this site is fast (on both free servers, and the donor server too BTW), and I can normally grab a recently released episode from this site not very long (tens of minutes to a couple of hours) after its release. I tend to grab manga from Anikei as well.
• Animorc.net: The same thing here. I tend to get even faster speeds here compared to Anikei, but that’s probably because Animorc caps the no. of download slots available (still more than enough slots though). Again, the latest episodes are available very quickly, and for me, if I can’t find something on Anikei yet, it tends to be available on Animorc already, and vice versa.
• Rorikonjyanai/404 Not Found: I definitely get the fastest speeds from this site (up to 1.7 MB/sec so far on DDL3), but while they host more anime compared to either of the sites above, update frequency is lower. So, if there’s a recent series I happened to skip, this tends to be the first place I go to to get myself updated.
• fourzerofour: Not only does fourzerofour.us give me great speeds, the latest episodes are also available very quickly after release (e.g. I got Ikkitousen Dragon Destiny Ep. 10 here before it was available from the rest of the sites above). It’s a bit of pain that download accelerators are not officially supported, but I haven’t found it to be an issue so far.

Of course, there are times when some newly-released episodes from a particular series are not available on these sites even after 24 hours, e.g. I still can’t find Manabi Straight Episode 10 on any of these sites yet, but such cases tend to be pretty rare, and you can always torrent or subscribe to a paid server like [Download] Anime if you really need your anime fix ASAP.

Again, this list is just my list. What about you guys? Which anime direct download sites do you frequent for the latest anime episodes?

This feature comes rather late considering that I’ve been using this site for quite a while now, but better late than never, no? Anyway, Rorikonjyanai/404 Not Found is the next evolution of sites most of us have seen before, i.e. Misha.Distrocity and animeblues.com.

Like its predecessors, speeds are first-rate, with a good load of anime series available to uh… leech distributed among two servers. There are some quirks you’d not normally expect, e.g. you can’t access the direct downloads if you’re using Internet Explorer (switch to Firefox!), but they’re really nothing to be concerned about. I do, however, suggest reading the FAQ before downloading anything as there are rules that must be followed to prevent yourself from getting banned, e.g. no hammering if download slots are all taken, etc. The standard stuff you’d expect really, and a small price to pay for the speeds you can get if you have a fast line.

1. Rorikonjyanai/404 Not Found

• Speed: Fast
• Content: 57+ ongoing (e.g. Claymore, Saiunkoku Monogatari 2nd Series, Gigantic Formula, etc.) and 280+ completed (e.g. Hunter X Hunter, Kemonozume, etc.) anime series and OVAs (e.g. To Heart 2, etc.).
• Update Frequency: Quite Frequent
• Video Format: High Quality (HQ) formats, e.g. .avi (HQ), .mkv (HQ), .mp4 (HQ)
• Note: Hassle-free site, i.e. no registration or forum posting required to access downloads. However, Internet Explorer is not supported and there are limited (~20) download slots per server at any time.