Keep getting booted for lagging

Zorilla · 28-08-2003, 00:03

Hi techies,

I seem to be having a problem lately when playing live (especially MGP2) I seem to be getting booted off for lagging - I hear a few people talking about someone lagging, and then I find myself disconnected from the race (mid-circuit). I have also had severe voice lagging when talking to only 2 other friends in the lobby of mech assault! (They could hear each other OK)

I have the NTL500K service, connected via Linksys BEFSR41 router. My PC is sometimes on, but never surfing at the same time.

When I used the xbox "Y" button test, I was getting consistant results of 30K UL and 3000K DL. (Is this normal?)

When I connected the xbox direct to modem (no router), I got:
40K UL and 9000K DL

Do you think it's likely to be a NTL connection issue (I'm located in Reading Berks), or something else.

The problem doesn't seem to be there all the time, but I'd say it's happening about 40% of the time.

I've just upgraded to router f/w to the latest version, and the xbox now says I'm getting:
80K UL and 6000K DL. ??!!

When I try some speed tests (using the PC) it seems to indicate that I've got a good connection (but I think this tends to test mainly the download part)

Any ideas?

Thanks
Zorilla

PS: If I'm playing in one of your games, and I'm lagging - please just tell me, and I'll quit. It really annoys me when just I get booted without anyone telling me why, I always play by the rules, and don't swear alot!

Tezcatlipoca · 28-08-2003, 01:20

Hmm.....Not quite sure!

First off: Do *not* trust the XBox's speed test. It is crap, & inaccurate. Even M$ themselves admit it isn't very good. The numbers it gives can vary wildly, & are often quite ridiculous.

What are your XBox's actual network settings? Does it get everything automatically from the router? Or have you manually given it an IP & set the DNS addresses?

The router shouldn't really affect anything.....But you could try re-installing the latest firmware, just in case, & then give the router a full factory reset (hold in the reset button 'till the lights all go red, I think -or- there's an option in the router settings for this somewhere). Then turn the router off for at least 5 mins, to "clear it out", & then turn it on again. (I had a recurring PC & XBox disconnection problem some months ago, which was solved by simply turning the router off for 5mins).

Could be the PC....but you say you don't have it surfing at the same time. You're sure you never have anything running that's using the net on the PC when you use XBL? Don't have any P2P apps running in the background?

Could be NTL....try these two speed tests:

To test your download speed, get Dan Elwell's Broadband Speed Tester from here:

http://www.vantage.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/v2/v2.htm

To test your upload speed, go here:

http://www.pcpitstop.com/internet/BandwidthUpTest.asp

If the values for the PC are fine (you should have around 600kbit/sec download & 128kbit/sec upload), then it could be something to do with the XBox Live service, or your XBox's connection.

Although...you could have good speed test results, but still have a laggy NTL connection (maybe too many users on your local UBR - I get that sometimes).

Check the NTL Service Status to see if there's anything happening in your area: http://www.ntl-isp.ntl.com/lookup/default.asp

Also...NTL have been having DNS problems recently...plus that virus may still be slowing things down across the internet....I know of some other people who have been having really slow laggy connections recently.........

Caspar & Dooby may be more help.......

zerolight · 28-08-2003, 10:19

Make sure that you dont have any P2P pgms like Kazaa running on your PC. I've had that before, where I forgot to turn it off, and had poor Live connections because there were multiple uploads on my PC where people were downloading files from me over Kazaa.

Zorilla · 28-08-2003, 13:11

Thanks Tez for your time on your reply.

I have downloaded the speed tests today. (I did have a problem with the download test initially not running - some error to do with richtx32.ocx file being too old on my PC - but I've fixed that now).

The results I got agreed with your 'ball-park' figures, so I guess, at this moment, all is well. Next time I get problems, I can run these tests to check NTL's performance.

My XBOX is all set to automatic. However I did set the MAC address to the same as my router last night, so that I can bypass the router in future. (I believe this shouldn't be a problem as the router should use IP addresses for the x-box)

Regarding possible PC (P2P) programs running - I've ruled this out, as I can switch the PC off, and it doesn't improve things!

I was wondering whether it is possible for the PC to 'do' something with the router, that effectively slows down the xbox port, and this will remain even if the PC is switched off!?

I'll try some of your other suggestions too - thanks!

Zorilla

PS: If there is anyone out there who plays MGP2 regularly (& often hosts) please feel free to send me a friend's invite. As long as you don't just boot me for lagging - just tell me and I'll leave - I know it's annoying when someone lags, but it's more annoying for the person lagging!

Tezcatlipoca · 29-08-2003, 18:49

Quote:

Originally posted by Zorilla
Thanks Tez for your time on your reply.

I have downloaded the speed tests today. (I did have a problem with the download test initially not running - some error to do with richtx32.ocx file being too old on my PC - but I've fixed that now).

The results I got agreed with your 'ball-park' figures, so I guess, at this moment, all is well. Next time I get problems, I can run these tests to check NTL's performance.

No problem, Zorilla.

Good, glad you're speed test results were OK.

Quote:

My XBOX is all set to automatic. However I did set the MAC address to the same as my router last night, so that I can bypass the router in future. (I believe this shouldn't be a problem as the router should use IP addresses for the x-box)

Yeah, it doesn't matter if you clone the MAC address from the router's WAN port onto the XBox - it won't interfere with anything (as it's essentially the same as cloning the XBox's/PC's MAC onto the router, but the other way round). Although: Is the router's WAN port's MAC address the same as your PC's? i.e. had you previously cloned the PC's MAC onto the router? If that's the case, and therefore the XBox actually has the same MAC as the PC as well as the router, then you should remove the cloned MAC from the XBox.

If you want to bypass the router in future, all you really need to do is power cycle the modem after disconnecting the router from it & before plugging the XBox into the modem. But, yeah, cloning the router's MAC onto the XBox, as you have already done, will simplify it.

Quote:

Regarding possible PC (P2P) programs running - I've ruled this out, as I can switch the PC off, and it doesn't improve things!

Hmm. OK, at least that's ruled out, anyway.

Quote:

I was wondering whether it is possible for the PC to 'do' something with the router, that effectively slows down the xbox port, and this will remain even if the PC is switched off!?

No, not afaik.

Quote:

I'll try some of your other suggestions too - thanks!

Zorilla
[/B][/QUOTE]

Yep, I'd have a go at re-installing the firmware on the router, plus doing a full reset & power down on it.

Tez

Zorilla · 23-09-2003, 20:00

It's me again!

Everything was fine for a few weeks, then the problem started appearing again. I went straight to the PC to check my connection speeds, and found that I couldn't connect to some sites.

namely the upload test site:

http://www.pcpitstop.com/internet/Ba...hUpResults.asp

At the moment, I can't even get onto the Linksys home site reliably!!

I've been looking around, and found this on one of the other forum headings:

http://www.nthellworld.co.uk/forum/s...5&pagenumber=1

(especially post #12)

It seems to indicate that you can have problems accessing some sites, and not others. Hit refresh a few times, and all seems OK - this seems very similar to the problems I'm getting at the moment, and it makes me wonder whether it could also be linked to my xbox live problems.

Does anyone know about these proxy thingy's and any ntl caching issues??

Zorilla

Doctor E · 24-09-2003, 08:57

Hitting refresh doesn't tell you anything. Explorer and the like get fasater as you revisit or refresh pages because the files that make up the page are cached (stored) on your hard drive. The real test for speed if you want to refresh a page is to hold down the shift key while pressing the refresh button. This forces Explorer (or similar) to ignore the cache and get a fresh copy from the host server.

Nige.

Zorilla · 24-09-2003, 11:15

The problem that I was seeing, was that the web pages I was trying to access by the PC were completely unavailable. I got the explorer error page (This was happening on quite a large number of sites).

If I waited several minutes, or hit Refresh many times, I could eventually get the page to load.

Thanks for the shift key tip though - didn't know that!

Zorilla

Tezcatlipoca · 24-09-2003, 22:56

Zorilla,

There are currently problems with some of the NTL web proxies & DNS servers.

Both can cause browsing problems, while the DNS server problems can also cause issues with XBox Live.

For browsing, you could try setting an explicit proxy in Internet Explorer.

If you get "can't find DNS" errors in XBox Live, you could try giving the XBox's network settings a different DNS server to use instead of having it set on auto.

There is info on changing proxies & changing DNS servers in the following two threads in the Broadband Troubleshooting forum:

http://www.nthellworld.co.uk/forum/s...&threadid=2454

http://www.nthellworld.co.uk/forum/s...&threadid=2672

Tez