Unexpectedly high ping to PlusNet gateway

[#1]

Hi
In last two weeks I've noticed Unexpectedly high ping to plusnet gateway ( 195.166.130.190 - lo0.10.Central10.ptn-bng02.plus.net ) of ~20 ms.
This use to be much lower and closer to 10ms. I'm playing a lot of online games and I've noticed that my ping
jumped up from 14-18ms to 30-35ms which is very annoying. I had few modem restarts but not too many, maybe 5 in a month.
Is this only my link or anyone else experiencing this issue? What are your ping values?
localhost (0.0.0.0)                                                                                                                                                                    Fri Nov 14 00:32:27 2014
Keys:  Help  Display mode  Restart statistics  Order of fields  quit
                                                                                                                                                                              Packets              Pings
Host                                                                                                                                                                    Loss%      Snt  Last  Avg  Best  Wrst StDev
1. 192.168.0.1                                                                                                                                                      0.0%          446    0.4    0.4    0.2    0.5    0.0
2. 195.166.130.190                                                                                                                                              0.0%          445  20.0  20.4  19.3  50.2    3.3

[#2]

The ping to the gateway isn't a figure that I'd worry about, their main job is to route the traffic and not respond to ping requests. You're much better off looking at the end to end ping, seeing what the ping is when it reaches the destination IP or site.
Honestly, a ping of 30-35ms is going to make no difference in online games, my ping is consistently 50-60ms and even that doesn't cause problems. Most games have lag compensation too, which is designed to level the playing field so those with a lower ping don't gain an advantage over those with a higher ping.

[#3]

You could try using paping instead of just a ping test, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paping

Quote

Paping operates by attempting to connect to an Internet Protocol TCP/IP port on the target. In the process it measures the time taken for a connection to be established and records any connection failures. The results of the test are printed in form of a statistical summary of the connections made including the minimum, maximum, and the mean connection times.

[#4]

@ sobol
See this https://www.nanog.org/meetings/nanog45/presentations/Sunday/RAS_traceroute_N45.pdf

Quote

Latency spikes in the middle of a traceroute mean absolutely nothing if they do not continue forward: At worst it could be the result of an asymmetric path. But it is probably an artificial rate-limit or prioritization issue. By definition, if regularly forwarded packets are being affected you should see the issue persist on all future hops.

[#5]

Hi Chris,
The reason why I've noticed higher ping is because I felt while playing game that my aim went down, and on knife only servers I've started losing most of fights.
Ping in BF4 game went up considerably, where I had 19 ms now I have 32 (German servers ), where I had 16ms ( French and UK servers ) i have 26 ms now.
Same if for QuakeWorld.
As to whether it makes real difference, from my experience yes. I have been playing competitively QuakeWorld since 1999 for almost 11 years.
Now switched to BF4 and I play a lot ( 517h on public servers - http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/soldier/5oboL/stats/317942704/pc/ ) and more time on private servers in ESL matches which aren't counted in stats.
I can easily tell when something is off, perhaps that causal gamer wouldn't be aware of.

Quote from: Chris

The ping to the gateway isn't a figure that I'd worry about, their main job is to route the traffic and not respond to ping requests. You're much better off looking at the end to end ping, seeing what the ping is when it reaches the destination IP or site. Honestly, a ping of 30-35ms is going to make no difference in online games, my ping is consistently 50-60ms and even that doesn't cause problems. Most games have lag compensation too, which is designed to level the playing field so those with a lower ping don't gain an advantage over those with a higher ping.

[#6]

Trust me, I understand that gamers can feel when something is off. I'm an FPS player myself, although not as much as I used to be however an increase to 32ms really is unlikely to be the cause of in game lag.
Does the lag occur at a specific time of day? Or is it random throughout the day? As a gamer I'm going to assume you play with a wired connection, so that should rule out wireless being a cause.

[#7]

A lot of the problem whit BF4 is the game itself unfortunately, But the main problem with PN is down which gateway you are on  , in my experience if you are on one the BGN gateways BF4 plays worse maybe its because the load balancers prefer people on them .
as to pings i always have 16- 25 and it runs fine on UK or EU servers, on a RUs server i play well at 80 ping  
http://battlelog.battlefield.com/bf4/soldier/SneekyOldHen/stats/246114397/pc/  ps i dont play a lot  
which router do you have ?  a PN  thompson supplied one or another

[#8]

if my ping goes to 32ms i wouldnt be happy.i play p2p games and not all games have lag compensation.32ms on fibre is poor

[#9]

the ping will not reduce because you are on fibre ,,
for bf4 32 aint bad , on a rus server with my ping at 80 game still plays fine .
if you get lags what settings you use ? what your hardware ? do you see the lost packet squares on top right hand of screen ?

[#10]

when i upgraded to fibre from adsl my ping did reduce adsl 28ms fibre 11ms.

[#11]

Quote from: ghos7em1

if my ping goes to 32ms i wouldnt be happy.i play p2p games and not all games have lag compensation.32ms on fibre is poor

I used to have ADSL with a ping of 60, P2P games worked fine. There's nothing wrong with a 32ms ping.

[#12]

Hi
Sorry to counter you, but it will. This is first hand experience. I've been on ADSL as intermediary solution when moving to new house, ping
dropped after fiber was installation by about 18 ms to same hosts ( my own QuakeWorld servers ). On ADSL and Fiber I've used used the same router TP link WDR 3600.

Can someone on plus fiber could run traceroute to
www.teamspeak-now.com ( DE )
151.236.46.77 ( UK )
31.204.131.49 ( NL )
Thanks.

Quote from: rongtw

the ping will not reduce because you are on fibre ,, for bf4 32 aint bad , on a rus server with my ping at 80 game still plays fine . if you get lags what settings you use ? what your hardware ? do you see the lost packet squares on top right hand of screen ?

[#13]

Chris,
I'm on WDR3600 with OpenWRT firmware. For time being I had baby jumbo frames enabled on it, but I've disabled that just to rule out any factors.
I'm connected to the switch via ethernet cable and am on gigabit link. In my comms cabinet I have Linux server with Intel gigabit card and I observer same
high ping and trace routes.
I understand your opinion that there's nothing wrong with 32ms ping and I agree it makes no difference when surfing, or even when connecting via ssh to remote server
but it does make big difference in game to someone who is used to play with low ping, suddenly bullets are missing, you're being knifed and counter knife doesn't work, and you
loose PDW weapon encounters with other players.
Is there anything you can do to help me please?

Quote from: Chris

Trust me, I understand that gamers can feel when something is off. I'm an FPS player myself, although not as much as I used to be however an increase to 32ms really is unlikely to be the cause of in game lag. Does the lag occur at a specific time of day? Or is it random throughout the day? As a gamer I'm going to assume you play with a wired connection, so that should rule out wireless being a cause.

[#14]

Can you post a full traceroute to the gaming server?

[#15]

Its ok to say having a ping of 60+ but remember 60+ ping is poop when using non uk hosted servers ... that's when it does matter, plus many game servers these days run ping kickers and most of those are set around 80 and above... so having a low ping is very important