Sudden Bursts of Lag...

[Gamingphreek]

In any online multiplayer game i play (RTCW:ET, BF2) the game will be running fine and then about every minute it will "lag out". I get the "Your connection has a problem" message/icon and my guy jumps around for a couple of seconds.

I closed NAV Corporate Edition, and Microsoft Anti Spyware, as well as GAIM. Is there anyway for me to find out what is causing this problem as it is EXTREMELY hard to play a game with it.

-Kevin

 

[Malak]

Something is hitting your bandwidth, do you keep a browser open? Mail client? Anything that might hit the internet? Check for spyware too.

 

[shawn130c]

Could be punkbuster related try updating with pbsetup avaliabe at http://www.evenbalance.com/index.php?page=pbsetup.php

 

[kindest]

if you have a router check for firmware updates as well.
and try to open the ports the game runs on.

 

[Gamingphreek]

Well i shut down nortonAV and MS Anti Spyware completel.

We are using a Motorola SB4200 Cable Modem. Attached to that we have a D-Link DI-604 wired router. In one of the routers ports we have a Netgear FS605 ethernet switch.

My connection is off of the D-Link router, via Cat-5e cable.

Im going to update the router firmware, but in the release notes, it doesn't say anything about any problems like this. Should i forward any ports, or try out this "gaming mode" junk that D-Link has.

My dad will NOT allow me to move ANY ports into the DMZ so that is out of the question.

This didn't use to happen, it was only until about 3 months ago that this started, and no one has touched the router or modem or anything. Does the modem have any firmware that i might try?

Thanks,
-Kevin

 

[duragezic]

Shutdown EVERYTHING, make sure nothing hidden in msconfig startup, etc.. to rule out something hitting your connection.

To be more in-depth about something running, once you think everything is down, type 'netstat -ano' in the command prompt. There should only be a few entries with 0.0.0.0😛ort (I think), some 127.0.0.1, plus maybe some with your LAN IP, actually I think they all should be LISTENINING. When I boot my comp with nothing starting or running, there are no established entries. Anyway, it shows the Process ID too so you can check your Processes list and make sure nothing is suspicious.

Anyway it might be worth it to do that just to rule out your computer.

OTOH, Updating firmware may fix it too! Them damn routers! We just discovered yesterday we needed to update our Netgear's firmware in order to have two computers join the same Source server. When that first happened long ago, I thought all Source blocked the 2 identical IPs to the same server, but with a different router months after it worked, so firmware updated and we both can join on the Netgear.

 

[Gamingphreek]

Ok, i just finish updating the firmware, and restarting all the computers as well as the cable modem. If that didn't solve the problem that is the first thing i will do.

Thanks a lot!

-Kevin

 

[Gamingphreek]

Well i couldn't help it and did the netstat -ano command right now.

Well it doesn't look good.

There are 10 things that are on Time_Wait. Most of those are going through my Internal IP (i think that is the correct terminology, at anyrate it is the address that my router assigned my computer).

As you said i have a bunch of 0.0.0.0 addresses with some 127.0.0.1 addresses, the rest of the addresses are all (for the local address) coming from my internal IP. I dont recognize ANY of the foreign addresses. What do i do with the process ID to find out what each of these things is?

-Kevin

 

[Gamingphreek]

Well all of that went away, so i started the game. Nope, these huge jumps are still there. Not only that it is nearly impossible to play with them. Ill be running with the rest of the squad and all of a sudden i start to lag and when its done with its crap im lying calling for a medic. Other times, ill just spawn and sit there lagging for a couple of seconds.

Does anyone have any idea what in the world could be hitting my internet connection.

We have one Cable modem. Off of that, 5 computers get their internet. Of those 5 only 2 were active at the time. However, this doesn't seem like a bandwidth issue, i dont have a clue what is happening. It happened on my old computer, it happens on my new computer 🙁

-Kevin

 

[dnuggett]

Run a speed test at speakeasy/speedtest. Do this a couple of times. Are you getting your advertised speeds?