Upstream or Downstream Speed

[HackinCowboy]

I'm just curious as to which speed has a greater effect on your ping for online gaming. Is it upload or download?

[Tiretool]

I would assume that download speed is a little more important to a good ping time, but really you need good speed on both upload and download paths. When your computer sends info, it's only sending it about your computer. When the server sends you info, it's sending info on all other players in the current game. If you're downloading info from the server at mach speed, but you're uploading at turtle trot... your ping would be affected to a degree, but not as severely as if your download speeds are crap.

[Xayd]

For most games, the maximum client rate you can run at is 20kb/sec.

So, theoretically, 160kbps upload would be the most that you could possibly use anyways just as a player. For most games, at least in public servers, the max client rate is set to approximately 1/3 to 1/2 of that.

Xayd

[HackinCowboy]

Aight, I was just wondering. I've got 768 down and only 128 up right now. I was just wondering if I increased my up speed if it would help my pings.

[Xayd]

Nope, it won't matter much. The biggest factor is how you're routed. Run a tracert to the servers you play on, and see what turns up. If you run through 7 or 8 hops before getting out of your ISP's network, tell em to get their $*&^ together or find a new ISP .

Xayd

[HackinCowboy]

What do the number of hops mean? How do I find out how many hops I have? The problem I'm running into is my transfer rate for downloads and such is around a 85 or so, but my pings I can't get below 90. I'm lucky to get 90.

[Xayd]

How far away is the server(s)?

100 is what I shoot for. If I'm at 100 or below, it's as smooth as possible.

Below 90 is a rarity, and will only happen on servers physically close to you probably.

Xayd

[HackinCowboy]

I play on a bunch of different servers. Most seem to be quite a ways away. I live in michigan and I get low pings from servers in Seattle and California a lot. 90 is good, but I expected a lot lower with my speeds.

[Xayd]

Sorry to tell ya, but you're getting the best there is to be got .

I get as low as 85 on east coast servers, usually from 120-135 on west coast servers, and hell, I live in Arkansas and can only get 75-80 at best on the server our clan owns and it's in Houston, only a state away.

Xayd

[HackinCowboy]

It's aight though, I used to own w/ my old 56k connection (ie 300 ping) So even a 150 ping to me is blazing speed. I tweaked my DSL a little bit too and I can get about 80s every once in a while.

[Jade]

Try playing these games in skirmishes (low AI). And see if it is you computer that has a bottleneck somewhere.

[Werewolfdaddy]

be happy with better than 200. I live outside of my city's dsl zone and I'm stuck with a crappy dial up service to boot. I normally don't connect to the internet better than 31200, but that's on a good day. When I play online, it is pitiful. Normally, I ping around 500. I stopped playing online for the most part. I am about to try again with a few new addresses.