Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

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LANguy
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Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by LANguy »

Hello all, new to the site. Got a lot of useful information here. Sorry if this is in the wrong section, I was not sure where to ask for help or whether this should be under Servers.

I am trying to get a LAN game going for UT99 and not sure about the best way to do it. Everyone (5 - 6 people) has a laptop with them, everyone disables antivirus and windows firewall, all connect to my network (very strong wireless, high end router, right next to router, but I could maybe buy a hub if needed). All running version 436. I had everyone also set network speed to "LAN" in the options.

- When I hosted on a stronger machine (regular game, not dedicated), everyone but one could see my game and connect.
- When someone else hosted, same issue.
- We eventually found one host where everyone could see the game, but it wasn't the most powerful machine.
- Pings were mostly excellent (<20) but occasionally would spike (like 1500+), though this wasn't very frequent.

I'm wondering if there's anything we should be doing differently to fix the 2 issues:
1- Why sometimes one or two people can't see the game. If the one magical laptop that hosted last time isn't around next time I'm concerned we won't all see the game and someone will have to sit out, which would suck.
2- The ping spikes.

Thanks for any help!
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Barbie
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by Barbie »

First I'd try on a low network level if the machines can "see" the server: ping Server-IP will do that job. If this fails, there is a general network problem. If this works, double check fire wall settings on that client machine and then instead of UT's browser try direct connecting with UT > Multiplayer > Open Location > type in Server's IP address.

The ping spikes can occur if programs on clients try to download updates (Windows, Adobe stuff, flash player, JRE, ...). To avoid that I'd plug off the cable to the internet at the router.
"Multiple exclamation marks," he went on, shaking his head, "are a sure sign of a diseased mind." --Terry Pratchett
LANguy
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by LANguy »

Barbie wrote:First I'd try on a low network level if the machines can "see" the server: ping Server-IP will do that job. If this fails, there is a general network problem. If this works, double check fire wall settings on that client machine and then instead of UT's browser try direct connecting with UT > Multiplayer > Open Location > type in Server's IP address.

The ping spikes can occur if programs on clients try to download updates (Windows, Adobe stuff, flash player, JRE, ...). To avoid that I'd plug off the cable to the internet at the router.
Thanks for the quick reply!

I suppose I'd ping their 192.168 internal IP? Any way that would be successful but the port itself could still be an issue?

Would it make any difference to host as Dedicated? Or hardwire everyone through a switch?

You're probably right about the ping spikes, I don't think they were the type to have all their updates and a clean startup list. Ideally I will want to host to prevent that, but that will require them to be able to connect to me.. It's touchy because I can't troubleshoot it until I have a room full of rabid UT fans who just want to get started :lol2:
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Dr.Flay
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by Dr.Flay »

Regular Windows setups are not good for use as a server.
Laptops are not good for gaming, especially with all the "shovelware"

Disconnect from the internet to make sure the laptops are not fetching updates etc.
Anyone foolish enough to use Google Chrome or any Google software that adds the Google updater, will also have the problem of it always running in the background eating RAM, then eating 50% CPU and another 250MB RAM while it updates.
After I installed Google-drive software I started suffering random CPU spikes and stutters in videos, browsers and games.
I found a smaller and faster 3rd party alternative to upload to Google drive, that also supports more than 800 other sites.
No idea what is bloating the Google crap... sorry app, but the web installer is bigger than the total install size of what I now use.

Remember, closing software in the system tray is no guarantee a program is not running.
Stop any services that are only running to deliver updates, and use the Taskmanager replacement "Process Explorer" to check for any other pointless processes
https://technet.microsoft.com/sysintern ... ssexplorer

It could be that some of the laptops are fetching all sorts of rubbish without notifying the user.
https://www.pcdecrapifier.com
http://www.shouldiremoveit.com

Real servers are configured differently to compensate for the amount of connections they will be dealing with, for the same reason running a dedicated server works better.
Some stuff is not needed on a server so more resources can be used for other tasks, or it is being wasted.
Some stuff is more needed so should take resources from other tasks, or be ineffective/slow.

Outertech Cacheman is handy for swapping the purpose of a Windows box. It has profiles for;
Best of all worlds, Fastest performance, Safest performance, Netbook/Laptop, Multimedia, Gaming and Server.
Pick a purpose, manually verify you are happy with the settings and reboot.
LANguy
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by LANguy »

Thanks for the info. I am not really concerned with performance, at least not if I can get it so that I can host. Mine is a reasonably recent gaming laptop with a proper GPU and decent RAM and I have it on a fresh/clean install (no bloatware) with a clean startup list and only essentials in background. My main issue was that I couldn't host because one of the guests could not see my game.

The other peoples' laptops, on the other hand - yeah - all of these issues very much present :lol: So having someone else host not ideal.

I'll definitely try removing internet access though. If I run dedicated on my machine I guess I could also launch a client and connect to my own dedicated server. Should be more than enough system resources.

I'll look into Cacheman as well!
Higor
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by Higor »

Everyone on wireless is gonna end up reducing your bandwidth a lot.
(Even more if there's mobile devices using it, principle of band being divided in equal parts)

But, for reliability's sake. At least the host should be 'wired'.

EDIT:
Wired host reduces ping to all other clients and negates and chance of mass disconnection due to Wifi reset or smt.

EDIT2:
If no laptop is decent enough to start a Listen server (bloatware making things bad or simply not enough framerate due to lack of good GFX component)
Then do the Dedicated server trick.
- Instead of starting the multiplayer game as usual, enable the 'admin password' setting to something easy like "123", tick the 'Optimize for LAN' box, hit 'Dedicated' button instead.
- Game will close and dedicated server will start, use task manager to assign high CPU priority.
- Open the game again, join the dedicated server.
- Whenever you want to switch the map, do "adminlogin 123" (if 123 is your password) and then do "switchlevel Mapname" (switchlevel CTF-Coret, f. ex) and the server will take all players to the next map.
BTW, CLOSE THE LOG WINDOW OF THE DEDICATED SERVER OR IT'LL LAG
ShaiHulud
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by ShaiHulud »

I've experienced this when I've set up a local server for testing, sometimes the server is visible in the LAN tab, sometimes it isn't. Regardless, on a client machine you can always resort to right-clicking in the server browser, selecting Open Location and manually entering the server address.
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Re: Help with LAN games - inconsistent visibility or ping

Post by JackGriffin »

I have this exact issue with my server. It's an old laptop running an Unreal coop server, an FTP server, and a Sync server. I tried everything and got the same results you see (are you also Charter by chance?) until I stumbled on the total fix. In my router I am forced to place the server laptop into a DMZ on the router. Doing that immediately fixes everything.

Proper warnings concerning having an open node like that on your LAN apply. I run a good firewall as well as PeerBlock (thank you again Nelsona for that).
So long, and thanks for all the fish
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