The 1-scond download will have been a bittorrent header or tracker or
whatever it's called, it's sort of like a URL that you put into a
bittorrent client which then handles the actual download in a
perr-to-peer filesharing system. Probably not an ideal way to download
Ubuntu, a straightforward download is normally much quicker.

So, have you tried Ubuntu yet? Burned your CD and run it up? Good luck,
I'm sure it'll be worth the wait.