[BUG] npm install fails with ECONNRESET when metainfo is big

Is there an existing issue for this?

• I have searched the existing issues

This issue exists in the latest npm version

• I am using the latest npm

Current Behavior

If package metainfo, for some reasons, is superbig (e.g. 70 mb), npm install often fails with ECONNRESET. Argument --prefer-offline does not help.

yarn works just fine, 5 out of 5 times it ends with success. npm fails 5 out of 5.

Also, yarn 1 finished after 1-2 mins, without yarn.lock file (repo itself uses npm, so there is no yarn.lock and there is package-lock.json), and npm fails after 15-20 mins.

Expected Behavior

Same as yarn 1 – dont fail if there are problems with metainfo. Im not sure why yarn 1 is better here, but could make guess: 1) it retries failed requests many times 2) it does not request metainfo.

Steps To Reproduce

1. just repo with deps, which has superbig metainfo (e.g. webpack, playwright or @typescript-eslint/eslint-plugin) and not very good network
3. Run 'npm install'
4. see

npm i --prefer-offline
npm WARN deprecated @***/cache-loader@4.2.9: Not usefull anymore in webpack 5 with its own filesystem cache
npm WARN deprecated viz.js@2.1.2: no longer supported
npm ERR! code ECONNRESET
npm ERR! errno ECONNRESET
npm ERR! network Invalid response body while trying to fetch https://***/repository/npm-all/@typescript-eslint%2feslint-plugin: aborted
npm ERR! network This is a problem related to network connectivity.
npm ERR! network In most cases you are behind a proxy or have bad network settings.
npm ERR! network
npm ERR! network If you are behind a proxy, please make sure that the
npm ERR! network 'proxy' config is set properly.  See: 'npm help config'

npm ERR! A complete log of this run can be found in:
npm ERR!     /Users/d***/.npm/_logs/2022-07-13T12_41_34_019Z-debug-0.log

Environment

• npm: 8.11.0
• Node.js: 16.v16.15.1
• OS Name: mac OS Monterey 12.4
• System Model Name: -
• npm config:

; "user" config from /Users/d***/.npmrc

//npm-rnd.***/:_authToken = (protected)
//registry.npmjs.org/:_authToken = (protected)
always-auth = true
email = "d***@***"
init-author-email = "d***@***"
init-author-name = "D K"
; registry = "https://***/repository/npm-all/" ; overridden by project

; "project" config from /Users/d***/Projects/***-forms/.npmrc

_auth = (protected)
ca = [""]
engine-strict = true
legacy-peer-deps = true
registry = "https://***/repository/npm-all/"
strict-ssl = false

; node bin location = /Users/d***/.nvm/versions/node/v16.15.1/bin/node
; node version = v16.15.1
; npm local prefix = /Users/d***/Projects/***-forms
; npm version = 8.11.0
; cwd = /Users/d***/Projects/***-forms
; HOME = /Users/d***
; Run `npm config ls -l` to show all defaults.

The report names no source files or tests; first reproduce npm i --prefer-offline with a dependency whose metadata is very large, using the listed npm and Node.js environment. Compare the ECONNRESET behavior with Yarn 1, then trace the npm registry/network request path; done means the install completes reliably for the reported case without the connection reset.