Out of ideas - Packet loss/spikes during games

[Janus67]

Hey all,

I'm fresh out of ideas to what is causing packet loss/lag spikes when I am playing PC games. The issue doesn't appear [to me] when I play single player, or if I am hosting a co-op game in BF3, so it must be networking related, as the person who connected to my co-op game told me the things he was experiencing and it was the same that I see.

The issue can be described as running/driving in BF3 (for example, I've tested with also BF:BC2 and TF2 and it is still present) and it feels like getting stuck randomly, or while turning it lags and puts me back to where I was. It happens maybe 5-10% of the time while playing and started a little over a month ago. If I run a ping <insert IP here> -t during the gameplay when I lag spike I see that it gives either a huge jump or no return at all.

What I have done and didn't see any difference:

- Tried using the two different NICs on my MIVE
- Updated Network drivers for my MIVE
- Different OS install - even had one that I hadn't used since before the issue started happening
- Plugged directly into the modem skipping my router and/or switch
- Rebooted modem/router/switch/pc numerous times (and left unplugged for hours at a time just to test)
- Changed network cable from Cat5e to Cat6
- Had my ISP (WOW) install one of their modems yesterday (I've been using a self-purchased motorola SB6120 for 6 months before it started happening) - no change
- The guy that came out yesterday that installed just ran a couple speed tests from speedtest.net and it came back as the full 50/5 and he said 'well if I got you surfing that's all I'm here for' and left
- Contacted one of the guys from the NOC for WOW and he ran some tests and didn't see any bad signal levels/etc apparently

I'm at a complete loss. Other than purchasing/finding a PCI-E NIC to squeeze between my two triple-slot 580s.

 

[Owenator]

What type of internet service do you have?

I got these types of issues when I was on cable but don't now with FIOS. Apparenty cable used a shared connection to the central office (CO) and my neighbors were slowing me down. FIOS uses a star connection so I have my own dedicated line back to the CO. I asked Comcast about this and they said that they try to limit the number of people on the shared link but that today one kid running torrents is all it takes to slow it down.

 

[Janus67]

It's cable. As far as I know none of my direct neighbors (I live in a townhouse) use Wide Open West, they are on Time Warner/Roadrunner. The issue persists at any time of day (morning, afternoon, night, late night). When I run speed tests I generally get the full 50mbit/5mbit speeds, the issue is the irregularity of the packets being dropped.

 

[Owenator]

It's cable. As far as I know none of my direct neighbors (I live in a townhouse) use Wide Open West, they are on Time Warner/Roadrunner. The issue persists at any time of day (morning, afternoon, night, late night). When I run speed tests I generally get the full 50mbit/5mbit speeds, the issue is the irregularity of the packets being dropped.

I wonder if you are on the same physical cable network as your neighbors but a portion of the bandwidth is 'leased' to WOW. That's usually how it's done. I'd be surprised if they ran a physically separate network. More likely they share because utilities are required to do that by law with other service providers. You may want to ask the Time Warner (TW) guys about it.

Can you get FIOS?

 

[Janus67]

Unfortunately, no FIOS.

I only have a few neighbors sharing off of the same line, none are kids/teenagers (2 in their 30s and 2 that are retired). And none are savvy-enough to be torrenting anything. I believe you are right in that the line splits at the townhouse/apartment wall, but these other people have lived here for quite some time and it just started randomly a month ago?


Thanks for your responses

 

[Owenator]

Unfortunately, no FIOS.

I only have a few neighbors sharing off of the same line, none are kids/teenagers (2 in their 30s and 2 that are retired). And none are savvy-enough to be torrenting anything. I believe you are right in that the line splits at the townhouse/apartment wall, but these other people have lived here for quite some time and it just started randomly a month ago?


Thanks for your responses

Well you'd be surprised what people use the internet for nowadays. Streaming movies and other content could be a big one too. Between me playing games, TV over IP (FIOS) and my three kids our connection gets a workout. I'd pitty my neighbors if I was doing all that on a shared line. If they have digital cable I believe it is IP based and "cable phone service" is as well.

Or it could be a physical/electrical problem as in watter getting in the line or a short of some sort. Maybe you can get them to put a sniffer on yours to see when it happens and you can correlate more exactly?

 

[Janus67]

That's true, but I wouldn't expect the neighbors to be streaming/etc 24/7 (doesn't matter the day/time that I do it, it happens multiple times every single round of play). My only other guess was something electrical, or maybe my connection is freaking out for some reason, maybe if I setup QoS to only use 20Mbit/2Mbit (of the 50/5 that I get) the issue could stop.

Just seems weird of after 3 years of living here, 2.5 with WOW as my service I've never seen the issue until a month after upgrading to the new service plan (50/5 from 8/1) and has been happening since then (upgraded in mid-october, no problems then mid/late november is when it started).

 

[Owenator]

That's true, but I wouldn't expect the neighbors to be streaming/etc 24/7 (doesn't matter the day/time that I do it, it happens multiple times every single round of play). My only other guess was something electrical, or maybe my connection is freaking out for some reason, maybe if I setup QoS to only use 20Mbit/2Mbit (of the 50/5 that I get) the issue could stop.

Just seems weird of after 3 years of living here, 2.5 with WOW as my service I've never seen the issue until a month after upgrading to the new service plan (50/5 from 8/1) and has been happening since then (upgraded in mid-october, no problems then mid/late november is when it started).

I agree with you that it does sound weird. That makes me wonder if the upgrade was just a CO job (software) or some sort of hardware? Still smells a lot like hardware. Have you seen any work going on around the neighborhood on the pole or in the gound that could have done something?

I wonder if WOW would do more if you asked for a downgrade to 8/1 because this new service is not working as it should?

 

[Janus67]

It was pretty much just a Docsis3.0 firmware getting pushed to my modem as they just started offering the new speeds (30/3, 50/5) on the day that I upgraded (oct 15th I think). I haven't seen any work going on at all.

It's possible that they may do more. The person I talked with on the phone seemed to be more knowledgeable than the tech that came out and told me to call back if the issue persists and they will send the issue to 'tier3' people to figure it out. I just want to make sure I do my due-diligence before passing the buck onto others.

 

[Owenator]

It was pretty much just a Docsis3.0 firmware getting pushed to my modem as they just started offering the new speeds (30/3, 50/5) on the day that I upgraded (oct 15th I think). I haven't seen any work going on at all.

It's possible that they may do more. The person I talked with on the phone seemed to be more knowledgeable than the tech that came out and told me to call back if the issue persists and they will send the issue to 'tier3' people to figure it out. I just want to make sure I do my due-diligence before passing the buck onto others.

I understand. I'm no expert but I say, time to start passing brother!

 

[Janus67]

Just ran one last test to make sure it wasn't my PC - ran the ping from my wife's PC right beside mine and she saw the same intermittent lag spikes/failure to connect/ping the IPs that I gave her at the same time that I was experiencing the lag spike.

 

[turbohans]

Have you tried enabling "tcp no-delay" yet? (Otherwise known as Nagle's algorithm)

 

[Janus67]

I haven't, I used to do that a while ago (years ago) but doesn't it generally give fake latency?

Applications that expect real time responses can react poorly with Nagle's algorithm. Applications such as networked multiplayer video games expect that actions in the game are sent immediately, while the algorithm purposefully delays transmission, increasing bandwidth at the expense of latency. For this reason applications with low-bandwidth time-sensitive transmissions typically use TCP_NODELAY to bypass the Nagle delay.

I don't really need more bandwidth (50/5 speed)

 

[turbohans]

That is the point, nagle is enabled by default. You want to disable it..

((disabling Nagle is in turn, enabling TCP no-delay))

 

[Janus67]

Gotcha, will give it a shot here in a few. Although it doesn't explain much why my wife would see my lag spikes as well on the network from her PC with the ping running.

 

[SpeeDj]

If you are a pretty savvy sort you could set up wireshark to do a packet capture while you are experiencing issues and analyze it further. You can always turn to something like Clearsight Analyzer from Fluke Networks (I believe they have a free trial) that can take the raw output from wireshark and do the analysis for you. Otherwise there's a lot out there about packet capture and how to identify the issue down further.

Just my two cents.

J

 

[Janus67]

Thanks SpeeDj for the advice, I think I will wait until the guy from the WOW-NOC gets back in contact with me about my findings and will run the packet capture application if it comes down to it.

 

[ziggo0]

I had this same issue you are describing down to the T with Comcast in my old place. I would get packet loss so bad I couldn't upload a .jpg correctly to my webserver. Replaced routers, wires, had them replace my modem, re-run my line, re-provision multiple times till something caught my eye. The IP address they assigned me determined my routing to wherever I was trying to go. Sometimes I'd have a 24.12.x.x IP, or a 67.17.x.x IP, and I noticed more or less one of the hops on the 67.17.x.x IP had massive packet loss. it was probably 2 or 3 hops down the line and every connection out I tried went through this hop, probably one of Comcast's hubs/routers out there. Once I 'spoofed' my mac address to trick my modem into giving me a new IP and eventually got a 24.12.x.x IP - my routing was a bit different and didn't get hit by that hub/router with all that packet loss.

I'm not saying this is your case but once I stopped getting that hop all my issues were resolved. I forget the name of the program, but it was a software that did multiple traceroutes and graphed the packet loss over time. Sometimes it would be 90%, usually from noon till midnightish, commonly it was 10 to 30% and would cause horrific things in games/any uploads. Good luck :/

 

[SpeeDj]

If you are a windows user, pathping in command line is useful for looking at latency over a route. Might want to try that next time as well and see how it breaks down. Cycling your modem and router might be beneficial to get a new IP/Route as well and see if it improves if it is the problem described above with a non optimal route putting latency into your path.

Just a thought

J

 

[Janus67]

Thanks, will give it a shot (and I am a windows user). Last night was one of the worst nights of playing that I have had, constant lag spikes at least once every 10 seconds, even changing weapons was a hassle.