Dealing with Lag

[Howpathetic]

After reading and typing a long post I though it would be a good idea to discuss LAG, everyones worst enemy. As well as slow performance while in game. I though I would post my ideas how I dealt with it and let everyone else post what works for them.

I have a few tips more for you aside from updating punkbuster:

Read this post as well
http://www.totalgamingnetwork.com/main/showthread.php?t=15689 (http://www.totalgamingnetwork.com/main/showthread.php?t=15689)

Before I play, I run all of my updates and scans before hand. Examples would be run your Microsoft updates, spyware and virus scans, if they are on auto and try to download, install, run & scan in the back ground while your playing this could cause local lag(too many programs fighting for download time) and system resource usage on your pc.

Its also about how much($) do you want to get rid of lag?

Heres what I also did to help as well, I purchased the following items that made one heck of a diffrence. By the way several little diffrences make one big big diffrence. The router and network card allow me to make rules for BF2142(or any game I choose) that will prioritize BF2142 packets over everything else.

I bought a router designed for games(DGL-4300), by the way I will be upgrading to the newer one(DGL-4500) soon, so I have included the link to the new one I am getting, below the one I currently have, also they make a cheaper non wireless one that performs the same as the wireless ones:
http://games.dlink.com/products/?pid=370&#DGL-4300 (http://games.dlink.com/products/?pid=370&#DGL-4300)
http://games.dlink.com/products/?pid=643&#DGL-4500 (http://games.dlink.com/products/?pid=643&#DGL-4500)

I bought a network card for games:
http://www.killernic.com/ (http://www.killernic.com/)
http://www.killernic.com/products/nic.aspx (http://www.killernic.com/products/nic.aspx)

Since both of these items and my modem were gigabyte compliant, I upgraded my cables to Cat6, by the way, get the length you need, to long of cables makes a small diffrence, not much.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_6_cable (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category_6_cable)
Heres a very inexpensive place to get them:
http://www.vpi.us/cat6.html (http://www.vpi.us/cat6.html)
By the way your wasting your time & money to buy cat6 if ALL of your components are not Gigabyte compliant. Here is my desktop proof (look at the bottom right corner):
http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/248/1gpsdk9.jpg

I upgraded by hard drive to the fastest one as well, this made a real diffrence since I use BF2142 electronic version(no cd/dvd):
http://www.wdc.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=189 (http://www.wdc.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=189)
The fastest hard drive is the following(Hyperdrive 4), but I don't have the money to purchase it but would love to have it! FYI my birthday is in July if ya'll want to pull together to get it for me(closing eyes repeating please please please)
http://www.hyperossystems.co.uk/ (http://www.hyperossystems.co.uk/)

Also I upgraded my memory to gaming memory, this made a big diffrence as well.
http://www.corsair.com/products/xms.aspx (http://www.corsair.com/products/xms.aspx)

One more thing to add, you cannot control your ISP, if there service is crudey, or they are having issues that day, you will suffer, even with all that I have done, I am still at the mercy of my ISP, and I will not mention my ISP Comcast's name either.
Internet speed test sites:
http://www.speedtest.net/ (http://www.speedtest.net/)
http://www.bandwidthplace.com/ (http://www.bandwidthplace.com/)
http://reviews.cnet.com/7009-7254_7-0.html?CType=2273&ac=318&ISPID=404611&ISPNAME=&&kbps=4019.7 (http://reviews.cnet.com/7009-7254_7-0.html?CType=2273&ac=318&ISPID=404611&ISPNAME=&&kbps=4019.7)

Other peoples lag in game can affect you as well.

Also remeber, dealing with lag is like saving money, every one thing you do is eqaul to a value, example would be the router, the network card, hard drive, memory are equal to a qaurter each, the cables are worth a dime, the cable length is equal to a nickel. In the end, it may seem like little diffrence with each piece but when you put them all together you have more. Good luck

[ARCTiC.LiGHT]

Waitor!
We needs stickeh!
Stap!!

[crack25]

i would say spending the money on a 1gb set up is still a waste(unless you are transfering files in a lan) as you will still only get as fast as you isp can deliver to you expect for the last bit.

a much cheaper way would just be to conect the pc your using stright to the modem when you go online.

[Dorest0rm]

Having trouble alt+tabbing out of the game

Clear you're desktop

Put stuff u dont use into folders:D

[linyanti]

This is an old post but it is a topic that sometimes has obvious but overlooked aspects.

My house was built in 1987. This predates most modern building codes that require "home runs" for all telephone cable. All of the television cable was home run but was RG-59 which is terrible stuff.

If you have telephone line DSL then consider running brand new Cat 6 wire from the DSL modem to the "telephone drop". This is where all the telephone lines of the house or the apartment come together. Cat 6 is overkill but the cost is still very low. If you know what you are doing then you can directly wire the lines. The voltage is low so you will not be killed but you can cause some problems. There are some fabulous squeeze connectors for 24 gauge wire that require no stripping. But if you do not want to risk messing things up then just run the cat 6 cable and let the telephone installer come and put a modular telephone outlet on the end where the modem is and then wire it directly into the drop box. The installers hate crawling in attics, etc. so if you do the dirty work they will make the connections in sixty seconds and may not even charge you since these companies want your business so bad.

You probably know that cat 6 is 8 strand UTP cable and they only use some of the strands but high quality cable makes a difference and it may just be a few years before all of the wires will be used and you will be ready.

If you have a cable modem then make sure that you have "Quad Shield RG-6" coaxial cable running from the cable "drop" straight to the modem. If you are industrious there are some real fun connector devices that put great terminations on the ends of the cables. But again, if you just run the wire the person will put on the terminations and have you running in less than a minute.

They sell these cables everywhere now. Under almost all building codes you are allowed to run the lines since they are low voltage. You may not be allowed to "terminate" and install them but that is the quick and easy part.

We have four computers working on the internet constantly and the only thing that changed was getting a high quality cable straight from the DSL modem to the phone box on the side of the house. Before the dedicated new cat cable we could always tell if someone was uploading photos, etc. Now the internet screams.

The connectors are lots of fun. Here is a link to some made by Ideal Industries. They are cheap and you can get some wire and practice first.

http://www.idealindustries.com/products/datacomm/connectors/insul_disp_connectors.jsp

When I made the connection I told my wife either we will have faster internet or we will be without the telephone for several days. It was like one of those bomb defusing movies. "Cut the red wire...No the blue one!" I lucked out and connected the correct wires. If you do get interested then you will find that the color codes are not consistent with the wiring but the telephone installer knows them correctly.

[Field]

you actually bought that gaming network card? why didnt you just get an E8500 like me?

[Chris--My--azz]

because this guy obviously knows what he is talking about when it comes to computers / networking
and perhaps he didn't want to have to shell out on an E8500 compatible motherboard or perhaps he already has one .... the possibilities are endless

[hellR1de]

Regarding that Killer NIC you bought, I advise others to read this very interesting article on Anandtech, especially these two parts if you don't want to go through all of it :

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2865&p=3

or this, which is more relevant to Battlefield games (near the bottom of the page):

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2865&p=11

I've read the whole article and I'm not ready to toss 250$ for that product...

[Alex98uk]

Killer NIC is a waste of time. Save $200 and get a simple networking card that bypasses the Windows TCP/IP system. There is simply no need to do packet inspection and processing on a dedicated Linux machine (which is what the Killer NIC is).

The Windows TCP/IP system is ineffective at scanning and processing different data in Internet packets, so BitTorrent and games aren't good, no matter what speed you're downloading at.

If you're not downloading at the same time and you're still lagging it's either a hardware issue or your ISP.

[hellR1de]

The Windows TCP/IP system is ineffective at scanning and processing different data in Internet packets, so BitTorrent and games aren't good, no matter what speed you're downloading at.
Anyone knows if enabling/disabling QoS changes something during gameplay?

[Fixxxer]

This is how I deal with lag and it works quite well!!

Click me for the best Lag solution..........and a good laugh! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kBVmfIUR1DA)