battlefield 2142 lag

[#1]

Hi,
I am finding it impossible to play BF 2142 due to lag. Punkbuster also reports that I am "losing key packets" and I get disconnected.
I used to play without any problem on a fixed 2meg Talktalk connection..actually ran very smoothly...but since I migrated to Plusnet on a MaxDSL 8 meg connection I am having lag issues frequently. This happens on all the servers I have tried, even the less busy servers.
I have interleaving turned off ( at my request ) to try and improve things but it has made no difference.
It doesn't seem to matter what time it is either, lag occurs whether in the afternoon..2pm..or middle of the night... 2am
Any help would be appreciated.

[#2]

Hi there,
You're on the fixed cost option and have just squeezed over the 10gb peak time limit. This will reset tomorrow when you're billed and speeds should pick up again, but until then unfortunately you'll be throttled.
If you like you can change to the flex option which will automatically add usage when you get to your limit, this will prevent the slowdowns in future - the option to change this is in your members centre.
Hope that helps,

[#3]

I checked my connection this evening at 10.30pm..a fairly healthy 5.5mbps..but I got kicked just five minutes earlier from a BF2142 server cos my average ping was too high..(156 as it happens).
I am thinking that at that connection speed my pings should be OK for online games..or am I missing something?

[#4]

Quote from: elcottero

I am thinking that at that connection speed my pings should be OK for online games..or am I missing something?

No - you're missing something
Ping measures the responsiveness - it's roughly the time for a return trip.
Speedtests work by measuring the time taken to download a fairly big file. Provided your PC can periodically tell the download that data is arriving uncorrupted, it will run at pretty much full speed.
In short - there's no necessary correlation between ping time and speedtest performance.

[#5]

Can you run a tracert to the server (or one of the servers) you're playing on? Details on how to do this are here:
http://usertools.plus.net/tutorials/id/34
There could be a number of reasons for the high ping, the tracert should help narrow down which it is.

[#6]

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner.COMPUTER2007>ping www.jolt.co.uk
Pinging www.jolt.co.uk [82.133.85.65] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 82.133.85.65: bytes=32 time=63ms TTL=58
Reply from 82.133.85.65: bytes=32 time=38ms TTL=58
Reply from 82.133.85.65: bytes=32 time=26ms TTL=58
Reply from 82.133.85.65: bytes=32 time=37ms TTL=58
Ping statistics for 82.133.85.65:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 26ms, Maximum = 63ms, Average = 41ms
Ok Dave, here's what I got from the first part of your tutorial thingy...I can't really tell much from this except that the ping rates look OK..are they?
www.jolt.co.uk

[#7]

This is what I got from the second part of the tutorial Dave. I trust this helps you more than it helps me.
Tracing route to www.jolt.co.uk [82.133.85.65]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.0.1
  2    31 ms    25 ms    41 ms  lo0-plusnet.pte-ag1.plus.net [195.166.128.64]
  3    25 ms    25 ms    28 ms  ge0-0-0-403.pte-gw2.plus.net [84.92.4.2]
  4    61 ms  202 ms  199 ms  te2-4.pte-gw1.plus.net [212.159.1.101]
  5    24 ms    25 ms    24 ms  g3-35-501.cr05.hx2.bb.pipex.net [193.203.5.14]
  6    24 ms    23 ms    25 ms  v3953.cr05.tn5.bb.pipex.net [62.72.137.29]
  7    26 ms    25 ms    24 ms  g1-1-6.ar01.tn5.bb.pipex.net [62.72.140.142]
  8    26 ms    25 ms    24 ms  ge-0-0-0-3801.jolt-gw.cust.pipex.net [212.241.24
1.14]
  9    25 ms    24 ms    25 ms  secure.jolt.co.uk [82.133.85.65]

[#8]

Bummer 
I just realised you don't want to check the Jolt server..you want me to check the BF2142 server..OK here goes,

Quote

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner.COMPUTER2007>ping 85.236.102.5
Pinging 85.236.102.5 with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 85.236.102.5: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=122
Reply from 85.236.102.5: bytes=32 time=25ms TTL=122
Reply from 85.236.102.5: bytes=32 time=24ms TTL=122
Reply from 85.236.102.5: bytes=32 time=25ms TTL=122
Ping statistics for 85.236.102.5:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 24ms, Maximum = 30ms, Average = 26ms
C:\Documents and Settings\Owner.COMPUTER2007>tracert 85.236.102.5
Tracing route to opt63.multiplay.co.uk [85.236.102.5]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.0.1
  2    25 ms    24 ms    25 ms  lo0-plusnet.pte-ag1.plus.net [195.166.128.64]
  3    24 ms    26 ms    23 ms  ge0-0-0-403.pte-gw2.plus.net [84.92.4.2]
  4    24 ms    25 ms    24 ms  vl23.thn-gw1.plus.net [212.159.4.19]
  5    44 ms  207 ms  161 ms  po2-1052-rt0.thn.datahop.it [195.72.128.21]
  6    25 ms    25 ms    25 ms  195.72.129.14
  7    24 ms    25 ms    24 ms  opt63.multiplay.co.uk [85.236.102.5]
Trace complete.

Quote

[#9]

I dunno what all this "tracert" stuff means...all I do know is that I tried to play BF2142 tonight ( after midnight ) and it was as laggy as hell and impossible to play..

[#10]

First glance over the traceroute that you posted shows slightly elevated pings when your data hits the datahop.it network (see bold).

Quote

4    24 ms    25 ms    24 ms  vl23.thn-gw1.plus.net [212.159.4.19] 5    44 ms  207 ms  161 ms  po2-1052-rt0.thn.datahop.it [195.72.128.21]

It seems that Plusnet peer directly with datahop.it in Telehouse North (bold italics, above), so the connection should be nice and fast.
It may be something that Networks can look into.  Certainly, your pings up to that point look nice and fast.
B.

[#11]

What I might do is try and get on to a server where it doesn't lag and try the traceroute there, to check that there are no elevated pings. Do you think this would be worthwhile?
I mean would it help trace the problem..or am I just being picky about this..maybe the problem lies with the servers I have been using..although I feel that I get lag far to regularly for it to be a server problem.
Also, I always try to play on a server with low latency and a max of 32 players...even though some game servers support 64 players.

[#12]

Quote from: Barry

It may be something that Networks can look into.  Certainly, your pings up to that point look nice and fast.

I don't think that's the problem Barry. If you look at the actual ping times to the destination then you can see that they are fine (In fact they're pretty darn good):

Quote

Ping statistics for 85.236.102.5:     Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss), Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:     Minimum = 24ms, Maximum = 30ms, Average = 26ms

The increased response time for datahop.it in the traceroute doesn't ring alarm bells. Quite often this can happen when a routers' CPU is too busy to respond to low priority ICMP packets.

[#13]

Who would have thought that one man's gaming problem could become such a diverse discussion..maybe this is the reason I returned to Plusnet.
Anyhoo...back to the point..Could it be that my PC specs are to blame?
CPU AMD 64 3700+
Ram 2gb PC 3200 ( I think)
GFX Asus 6800 GTX Extreme ( 256mb DDR3)
Asus AN5FX Mobo ( nvidia nforce 4 chipset)
Hitachi Sata II 250gb drives x 2
I don't know if anything else really matters but I'll post it if someone asks. According to the minimum specs for the game ..these are fine, but hey..who wants to try to beat a 1979 VW Golf GTI with a Morris Marina

[#14]

Hi,
have a look here :-
http://forums.filefront.com/bf-2142-problems-errors-help/310366-pb-important-losing-key-packets-b-ff...
My PC is of a very similar spec to yours except I have an x1950pro graphics card. It works fine for me in game at 1280* 1024.

Hope that helps you.

[#15]

A lot of games are using Punkbuster these days, and i am in a UK clan for COD4 and 2142.  Our forums are full of members having similar issues.
The secret is to visit http://www.evenbalance.com/index.php?page=support.php and download the PBSETUP file.  Stick this is a wee subfolder in your games area for safe keeping and run it, this will expand out a proper EXE and some config files.
On the window opened, fill in ALL your PB related games and their install paths.  These games will have a PB subfolder.  When you tell it to check for updates, it will pull all the required update files from the secure master servers, and apply them to all your games.
Now when you go into your games, you should be bang up to date.