I was wondering if someone could help me solve this network issue. Is there a way to play games mainly quake3/quake4 without being lagged when someone downloads or streams say for example youtube videos on the same connection? Currently I am with Bigpond on a 1500/256 ADSL connection and have a 2wire gateway-router. If it is possible to not be affected by downloads from other pc's hooked up to the network, which connection settings should I have in my router or quake?
Any kind of help is appreciated. :)
QoS is about the only way you are going to get the results you are after... QoS in home networking gear isnt up2scratch to get it as good as ud like either.. you will still notice lag spikes etc.
get a 2nd internet? :)))
i would have thought that connection would be able to handle someone playing online and browsing the net simultaneously regardless of qos?
Got this program of a mate. Works sweet. If you torrent it you will find a cracked version. Load it up on your other pc's and set there speed to whatever.
SoftPerfect Bandwidth Manager
With SoftPerfect Bandwidth Manager, you can apply speed-throttling rules to specified IP addresses, ports and even network interfaces with no changes to existing network infrastructure.
zeal0r, 1500 isnt THAT quick - all it'd take is for the other person to load a web page like gamearena.com.au and it'd lag the quaker out for a few moments whilst the page downloads.
would another option be getting a better connection instead of adding a 2nd one. say adsl2+?
Would cable be the same? is there any difference between adsl and cable?
I remember from having cable that if someone on the network downloaded or browsed a webpage you would get an increase in your ping to 100 or something but the lag wouldn't actually annoy you that much. Whereas with ADSL as crus said, if someone browsed a website with med to high content then you would get lag spikes and a ping of 999. I'm not an expert on this area, but I do remember ADSL was more sensitive and for this reason a mate had a second connection just for gaming and one for his sister.
ive had cable for years and it has never lagged me out when someone is browsing. I can also have a torrent going in the background and still be smooth (providing you set the upload to like 5kb :)
The reason your 1500/256 goes to 999 is because its saturated for long periods of time.
Cable generally runs at 100000 or 170000 or 300000 depending on where you are and if its bigpond / optus. So there is heaps more room in the pipe for web pages to come down at the same time as gaming and most of the time you wont notice it at all. ADSL2 will be the same if your speeds are good.
I can play quake3 to my hearts content whilst my girlfriend uses the other PC to surf the web and i dont notice it. That's with ADSL2 and i get pretty piss weak sync (11Mbit/1.8Mbit atm)
If you cant get Cable or ADSL2, You COULD get an Up2 8Mbit plan.. but then you will increase the latency by about 20ms over a standard 1500/256 connection due to the interleaving that telstra forces upon the line to keep it stable, you shouldnt however get the huge spikes when someone else is surfing the web.
It's the 256 upload that's the problem.
Some sites and games use heaps of upload, others don't.
I find youtube doesn't lag someone playing Q3 on maxpackets 100, but a site like smh.com.au and Games such as BF2 do.
Get a program called DU Meter if you want to see exactly how much upload different sites and games use.
You can get routers like the DLink Gamerlounge http://games.dlink.com/ that are supposed to let you manage who gets how much bandwidth, I have one but it doesn't work that well, still get spikes, perhaps a bit less, but they are strange lag, and last longer.
Actually, I just played with some settings and it seems to be working better with everything set to automatic. The last firmware upgrade must have fixed up some things, yay :p
btw I have this - http://games.dlink.com/products/?pid=371
When me and wench gave the GamerFuel shit a go on his DGL-4300 it didnt do much.. and when no one was playing games at all the download speeds were hopeless compared to when GamerFuel was turned off.
Actually, it cuts the download speed in half turning that shit on. It also fucks my ping.
Have been testing over the last hour with the laggiest websites I can think of + torrents, and Q3 CTF is being played with no lag, and ping looks normal. This is Optus cable with 256 upload.
Will have to test download speed etc later once teh gaming is done, but at the moment there is no raging about omfg LAGGGG!!! so yeah :p
No idea on optus.
I'm on bigpond extreme, and if I turn that gamerfuel thing on, my 3+mb/s downloads go back to about standard cable download speeds (1mb/s).
Thanks for the info everyone. Crus, tell me if I'm wrong, but I believe you can turn off interleaving if you are with Telstra or Internode right? But what are the consequences of doing it? Does your download/upload speed decrease or will you get more packet loss or what is the deal with that thing?
can do it with telstra ADSL2, iinet ADSL2, internode ADSL2.. i think Adam do it as well...
It varies by line afaik.. on my line i go from 15mb/2.4mb on a high speed profile down to 12mb/1.8mb (AnnexM for >1Mbit upload btw - internode SOHO) when interleaving is turned off.. ping goes from 20ms down to 5ms on the first hop... on my line its stable however some people will get drop outs/packetloss - way i see it.. if you have the option to turn it off, give it a go and if it works for you and what you wanna do leave it off.. otherwise just turn it back on again :p
shit like this is one of the reasons why best effort services like ADSL suck the fat one - its really luck of the draw.
Yeh well, that thing about interleaving and adding 20ms to my ping doesn't sound exciting. In the end I will end up with a 50 ping which kinda sucks. Probably I'll consider getting cable, but yet again I think that one is prone to how congested the network is due to usage of your area or neighbors. Siff :/