Why can't I get over 8 connections on my client? How do I make my client acquire more than 8 connections? What settings in firewall and operating system, or flags at execution do I need to use to allow it?
Typically connection counts of 10 or lower usually indicate that you are behind a router or firewall that is not configured properly. Try enabling UPnP from within the Bitcoin client's options dialog. If that doesn't work, try manually forwarding port 8333 to the computer which is running the Bitcoin client/daemon.