PCFormat Forum Archive

Hi everyone

I hope I'm posting this in the right place, but its more network that gaming I guess

So lately I have been playing Arma 3 on some European servers where my ping would go between 160ms to about 200ms, maybe up to 300ms if it spiked. Thing is that suddenly I have had the issue where when I start playing, and I would start at the normal latency mentioned above but then it would get progressively worse until I get kicked for having a high ping (about 500ms+). From this stage I can hardly reconnect because the servers (all international servers) show up as having 600ms to 700ms+ as opposed to the usual 160-300. If I wait a day and try again, I start at the usual 160-300, but the problem would repeat and after about 20 minutes. I would get kicked for ping and end up unable to connect again.

I tested to see if this problem was only Arma, but it turns out the same for my WoW. I login, have 160ms, quit. Launch arma3, play a abit, get kicked with ping issues and test again on WoW afterwards where I would have 800-1000.

So anyone know what might be going on? Might be a pointless question as I suspect that it will be something beyond my control to sort out...

Oh and I should probably mention just in case, I have a Telkom 4 meg line with my laptop connected to the wifi with ICS going to my desktop (that I game with) which is all the way out of the wifi spot.

Thanks for any replies and help

Have you tried with your PC connected with a cable to the ADSL? Your setup there with wifi and ICS sounds like something looking for a place to go wrong. Also who is your ISP and what account do you have with them? Have you tried another ISP? What is the SNR on your ADSL?

Thanks for the reply.

I have not connected my PC directly to my router, reason being that my PC is on the complete opposite end of the property. My ICS setup has been mostly fine, I have been using it for over 2 years now. My ISP is telkom, but I haven't tried another ISP because my dad uses the internet for emails. I therefore don't want to risk anything to happen, also I think its a business account that we have. As for SNR, I have no idea of finding out.

My internet has been fine for 2 years, its just suddenly now where I am having these latency issues. No problem without download or upload speeds though. I have tried with my laptop near the router and still have issues with latency.

Have you tried connecting your laptop to the router with a LAN cable and then testing?

The SNR you can see if you log into the adsl router. Have a look there first.

The only way to find a problem is to eliminate things, so you have to bypass what you can and swap out the other things. Bypassing things are easier. Moving the PC to the adsl router and testing. Then try a new adsl account. You can get a 1gb unshaped from any other to test, its not that expensive. You are in CT, I'll suggest Webafrica.

+1 Nuke. Change one thing at a time.

Also, Afrihost offers everyone 1GB of free ADSL bandwidth for life, even the people who aren't their customers. No payment details required. http://www.afrihost.com/microsites/freegb/

Thanks for the replies! It was actually working fine this morning for about an hour and then when back up to the high latency.

I will try connecting my laptop via cable as well as creating an Afrihost account. I remember a friend having issues with his Black ops 2 which were sorted with using afrihost data. I will reply back once I have.

Alright, so I have tried using an Afrihost account and I must say that it is much better (at least for now).

I started off by testing my latency (in-game, not with cmd.exe) on both WoW and Arma using my telkom data and the latencies were both pretty bad as I mentioned in my first post. I then switched to my Afrihost 1GB account and immediately my latency was as it should be: 170ms on WoW and 205ms on Arma3. I then switched back to my telkom data and again, had bad latencies in both games (500-1000).

I have not tested my Afrihost account yet over a longer period of time. As I mentioned in my first post, in the morning on my telkom data, my latencies would be good and then after about 30 minutes would just increase dramatically. I do not know if this might happen with my Afrihost data.

Anyways, that seems to have been what the problem was. While doing this it kind of hit me, we do have a phone within cable reach of my desktop. I have an old router that is no longer in use (http://www.tp-link.co.za/products/detai ... =TL-WR542G). Would it be possible to hook this up as a closer source of internet for myself, if I get a microfilter? That way I could prevent anyone else from using my Afrihost data, for example. One concern though is that this router has a RJ45 WAN port, as opposed to a RJ11 port. It was previously used for in internet connection involving a kind of aerial.

As for SNR, is this perhaps it? DS Line Attenuation: 12, US Line Attenuation: 4

I apologise for my noobness when it comes to networking. It's the part of IT that I actually really dislike.

Once again, thanks for the suggestions so far.

Kind of just realized that using the new router nearby is not an option because of the RJ45 WAN port concern. Unless I get an extremely long cable to go from the dsl router to the tp link.

Cool. Glad that you're making progress.

xDODGERx wrote:I have not tested my Afrihost account yet over a longer period of time. As I mentioned in my first post, in the morning on my telkom data, my latencies would be good and then after about 30 minutes would just increase dramatically. I do not know if this might happen with my Afrihost data.

Anyways, that seems to have been what the problem was.

Yes, it might seem so. However, that's exactly it, is seems so. Test.

Remember the old testers' slogan: In God we trust. The rest we test.

Yeah that's very true. I will get a chance to test it maybe this afternoon and this evening, so here's to hoping it goes well.

So I have been testing it for the last couple of days and it seems more or less fine again on the Telkom account. The issue must have been with Telkom, if I have issues again I might post again.

It helps having a backup account for internet now, though. Thanks for the help

Cool.