Help: Why is my Battlefield 2 (BF2) online gaming so slow?

[sygyzy]

I just bought a new video card (6800NU). I have a Athlon XP 2100 o/c'd to 2700+. 1 gig of PC3200 memory. Every game I play is fine. Even BF2 in single player is fine.

My pings are under 100, around 65-70. I forwarded most of the ports (there are too many to fit in my router config).

I lowered many of the graphics settings to LOW and it looks quite ugly now, I'll tell ya. I am running on native resolution of my 15" LCD (1024x768). I am sure both my system and GPU are capable of that.

What's the deal? And this has always been the case, even with BF1942. Multiplayer is lagging and choppy and unplayable.

Any ideas? HELP!

 

[luigi1]

BF 2 likes memory. as in 2 gig of memory. If you expierience lag at busy times (arty strikes, lots of players on the screen) more memory may help you. To be honest your processor and vid card arent up to snuff for a gamer either. I'm not sure how well BF2 scales. I am assuming you have tryed different servers as some servers out there are POS (art of war centeral) and will lag for everybody.

 

[sygyzy]

Art of War Central? Is that the name of a server that is a POS? I'll avoid it then. Thanks for your tips.

 

[aLeoN]

I get an odd lag here or there sometimes but I believe its' mostly the wireless network and/or the Internet connection. I run a 6600GT and a A64 3700+ with 1 gig of ram so I can run things mostly low but some medium. If you want to isolate if it's the CPU in game, play single player on expert since it uses more CPU power for the Ai. Otherwise BF2 definately is a memory hog.

 

[Flashram]

2 GB of memory makes a huge difference with BF2. Upgraded and was very happy. Had to RMA a gig of it and the game was back to being choppy and getting pauses every few seconds. Once I got back to 2 GB it is smooth as butter again.

 

[sygyzy]

That's lame that I have to get 2 GB's of ram just to run a $50 game. This is the only game I have had trouble with.

 

[Stuxnet]

Originally posted by: sygyzy
Why is my Battlefield 2 (BF2) online gaming so slow?

Because [BUY SPECIAL FORCES EXPANSION!!] the code [BUY SPECIAL FORCES EXPANSION!!] sucks [BUY SPECIAL FORCES EXPANSION!!].

Next question.

 

[Spacecomber]

Your system specs should be enough to play the game on the low settings that you mentioned. It sounds like the problem is pretty much specific to online play.

Make sure that you have your connection type set to the Cable option, not the the LAN option, in the game's option menu.

Make sure that you don't have anything else running in the background, especially something that will connect up over the internet, while you are playing.

Punkbuster seems to cause a far amount of trouble. Maybe try to find an empty server running PB and see if this will let you get all the PB updates done while your not trying to stay alive at the same time. Also, I believe the game (because of punkbuster?) seems to insist that you only play the game when logged into windows with an account that has administrator priviledges.

Unless you are running a Creative Audigy 2 ZS, or newer creative card, you probably need to set your sound to software, not hardware (see the readme file for the game). With software, you may need to turn down the sound details to spare your CPU. Some folks report that disabling the VOIP option helps, too.

 

[forumposter32]

faster CPU might help

but are you using a firewall?

 

[dnuggett]

All the other online games do not experience this problem?

 

[skace]

I have a 9800PRO, XP2900, and 1GB of ram. I play the game at some rediculous resolution like 1680x1050 (2005FPW). It is not your hardware unless your CPU is dying. It may have to do with punkbuster not being fully updated. Try googling for manually updating punkbuster in BF2. Trust me, if it doesn't update correctly it causes massive lag ingame.

 

[M0RPH]

Your system specs are fine. You don't need 2GB memory, especially if you're only playing at low-medium settings. Something else is wrong. If the game runs well in single player and then as badly as you say in multiplayer, I have to wonder if there is some networking issue, maybe something to do with your router. Have you tried taking the router out and connecting directly to your internet connection? Just to see if it runs any better.

Just to give you some idea. I have a video card on par with yours (X800 vanilla), 1GB RAM and a A64 3200+ (overclocked to around 3700+). So my CPU is a bit faster than yours but it shouldn't make a huge difference. I can run the game at 1152x864, mostly high settings along with AA/AF and get 40 FPS on average... very little lagginess or choppiness as you described.

So there's something weird going on with your setup. I would start by eliminating the router from the picture.

 

[imported_FishTaco]

Try different servers with different map sizes. Also make sure your connection setting in the options page is set to Cable/DSL intead of T1/LAN. Some people say that setting help them some say it didn't.

EDIT: Also your machine is good enough to get smooth play, you shouldn't need 2gb unless you want to increase more settings to high.

 

[sygyzy]

Well I can officially play BF2 Online now. How did I do it? Well, I don't know exactly. But in the course of 2 months, without any testing in-between, I did the following:

1. Applied latest patch
2. Got latest video card drivers
3. Lowered all graphics settings to LOW or OFF
4. Changed network settings from T1 to Cable/DSL
5. Forwarded many of the ports. Apparently BF2 needs like 100 ports forwarded. I did as many as I could before I ran out of space.

Anyway, now I can play. Since then, I've went back and gradually bumped graphics up one step at a time, from LOW to MED.

Thanks for your help guys.

 

[BlacKJesuS]

Originally posted by: luigi1
BF 2 likes memory. as in 2 gig of memory. If you expierience lag at busy times (arty strikes, lots of players on the screen) more memory may help you. To be honest your processor and vid card arent up to snuff for a gamer either. I'm not sure how well BF2 scales. I am assuming you have tryed different servers as some servers out there are POS (art of war centeral) and will lag for everybody.

same card i got.....Runs BF2 great