Dedicated server or non dedicated

[alanford 27]

Hey!

I am not really knowledgeable about arma enough to make this decision, so I come here to get help, since I am sure you are the experts. :)

tl;dr version: my question to you is if I would gain any performace by using a dedicated server on a slower older computer, or run arma locally, as a nondedicated game. Here are the details:

Up until now I have been hosting the game on my pc, using a non-dedicated game. And I've mostly been playing with just 1 friend, or maybe 2. With no mods. And the performance was just fine. However now I have decided I want to use an AI mod, and a combat enhancement mod. I think both mods are incredibly resource hungry. To be specific I have decided to use bcombat and agm. So now I am worried about performance.

We typically play a COOP mission, which is Ai heavy. Around 90 Ai units. And quite a bit of scripts, in that mission. The mission scales with number of players, so now a few more people will be joining us, from 3 to around 5, so the number of AI units will go up to around roughly 130. Before I had quite stable 50 FPS, but now I have around 20, and I am concerned it will affect gameplay.

And now I am thinking that it may be an improvement if I use my old spare PC to host the games using a dedicated server.

The old PC has these specs:

intel core2duo e6400 2.13GHz

4gb ram

on-board graphics

win8.1

My PC I use to play/host now has these:

i5-3570k

8gb ram

(I am assuming gpu isn't really important when talking server capabilities, I just pointed out the old pc is using on_board graphics, because it takes eats some cpu time, but in case it is important I have gtx670)

win7

So to reiterate: My question is would the game run better if I used the old PC to run a dedicated server, or should I just keep on hosting it in a non-dedicated enviroment? Or could I maybe somehow use the old PC to run as a headless client and control the Ai, while I run a non-dedicated on my computer. or maybe even run a dedicated on my computer, arma 3 on my computer, and than a HC client on the old pc?

[terox 316]

The minimal playable fps that the server needs to run AI is around 8-10. Below this the AI become very poor to the extent that it becomes unplayable.

The ideal minimum serverside fps you need to aim for is 15.

Every player that connects will eat a few fps and will require more upload bandwidth which is limited on home user networks

I would go for running a hosted (client/server combo) and a benchmark mission and then compare that with running a standalone dedi on your older rig and see what FPS they both achieve.

Use Freds arma3 monitor for more detailed info on your server performance.

Try using an AI caching system or your older pc as a Headless client, that may improve things for you.

[JayJaxHD 10]

As i can see here the fps will always drop no matter what your going from high cpu speed to lower cpu speed with less functions on it.

It could be possible that the server will improve a littlebit since your using a server on your main pc and aswell play the game on it.

Just give it a try and use dedicated since dedi's eats less resources.

Super EDIT:

Just install arma3 dedicated server on the c2d and try running it from there.

Maybe installing win XP on the c2d that will make the ram usage less aswell.