Question about server bandwidth

[l mandrake 9]

Now that 20mb/s+ fibre optic broadband is rolling out here in the UK , I was thinking, could I host a decent dedicated Arma2 server here at home, rather than renting one from a 3rd party hosting company?

So: If I added a fast dedi box (latest quad core, DDr3 etc )to my LAN at home, and hooked it up to a fibre optic 20mb/s internet connection, would this server be capable of hosting, say, a big warfare mission with 20+players online?

I don't have a clue about how much bandwidth servers need, so any advice is welcome!

Cheers

Mandrake

[B17gunner98th 10]

I'm sure you can, just make sure you have a good enough computer to host for others. Sometimes I also see that players have more of a desync sometimes when they play Player to Player. But I think you can. Since it's a box that would help even more. In short-yes I am 95% sure.

[Taxman 10]

Buddy.. thats 20 meg download.... u Need decent upload. and b/width to suit. but u can host one.. wont handle many players though....... (Btw 20meg been out in Uk for like 2 yrs :) on virgin that is)

[Tankbuster 1733]

20Mb/s down and 768Kb/s up for that connection, but Virgin are rolling out a 50Mb/s which has 1.5Mb/s upload.

Ive been hosting mi dedi box on the 20/.76 connection for ages. It can cope with 6-7 players with no problems.

[l mandrake 9]

ah yes, I meant 50mb/s.. ;)

Thanks for the replies guys, the answer seems to be yes, you could run a small server from home, but not one capable of big warfare missions with 20+ players - again, cheers for clearing that up.

Mandrake

[PogMoThoin 10]

Doubt a standard network card would handle many connections, 8-10 max. Also You got the problem of the modem/router supplied by Your isp (usually the cheapest one available) not being able for too many connections either. You'd never get the performance of what a proper host offer with a proper dedicated server and proper network gear

[CaptainBravo 0]

I believe the minmum bandwidth for upload is 50kb per player. So for 10 you will need at least 500kb which is the usual limit for hosted MP. After that you will run into serious lag issues.

So it depends on how many players you plan on having? 20 might be tough unless you have at least 1 meg upload speed (very rare for home product) and one pimped PC!

[Game__On 10]

More than 1 mbit upload isn't that rare i think. I have a pretty standard connection which is 25 mb down, and 4 up . But i thought you needed about 10mbit up for a decent server ?

775 kbit up is way too slow i think ?

[BCA Cat Toaster 10]

I´ve 2Mbit Upstream (32 down) and i´m hosting a secondary dedicated Server with that at home for 20 players. It worked quite well yesterday with 18 players already on it. I´ve to add that this server runs in an virtualized environment also (VMware ESXi 4.0 / Server 2003 x64 Standard) with two vCPUs E6600 and 2GB RAM available to this VM. However, that 2MBit of course is still a bottleneck, because a joining player has to download the mission first and that can easily cause lag for those actually playing, not to mention what happens during a map-change in a regular server-evironment. It´ll take ages for example until a 1MB-Mission is delivered to 20 clients at the same time with just 2Mbit or less. I would recommend to have at least 10Mbit-Upstream for hosting up to 64 players. Simply for playing 4-5Mbit are already sufficient, but uploading missions shouldn´t affect gameplay, that´s why some headroom is always good to have.

The network-card isn´t an issue at all. On our primary server with 100Mbit Up/Down we are facing the Problem that CPU-Power is a even worse problem as it seems you really need a QuadCore-CPU for hosting more than 32 players, our E4500 Dual Core is working on his limits with 32 players, not even able to host 40.

Edited September 19, 2009 by BCA Cat Toaster

[Tankbuster 1733]

775 kbit up is way too slow i think ?

Not at all. I can happily punt 6 players around my server with 768Kb/s upload.

[l mandrake 9]

I´ve 2Mbit Upstream (32 down) and i´m hosting a secondary dedicated Server with that at home for 20 players. It worked quite well yesterday with 18 players already on it. I´ve to add that this server runs in an virtualized environment also (VMware ESXi 4.0 / Server 2003 x64 Standard) with two vCPUs E6600 and 2GB RAM available to this VM. However, that 2MBit of course is still a bottleneck, because a joining player has to download the mission first and that can easily cause lag for those actually playing, not to mention what happens during a map-change in a regular server-evironment. It´ll take ages for example until a 1MB-Mission is delivered to 20 clients at the same time with just 2Mbit or less. I would recommend to have at least 10Mbit-Upstream for hosting up to 64 players. Simply for playing 4-5Mbit are already sufficient, but uploading missions shouldn´t affect gameplay, that´s why some headroom is always good to have.

The network-card isn´t an issue at all. On our primary server with 100Mbit Up/Down we are facing the Problem that CPU-Power is a even worse problem as it seems you really need a QuadCore-CPU for hosting more than 32 players, our E4500 Dual Core is working on his limits with 32 players, not even able to host 40.

interesting reply, thanks. I wonder if it is possible to disable automatic mission download for connecting clients. This would mean you have to find the mission yourself and dl it, but with sites like Armaholic etc that shouldnt be too hard. It sounds like most of the lag problems which often ruin this game online are caused by this.

[Tankbuster 1733]

For regular players this mission download shouldn't be a problem. It's only downloaded the first time a given client joins the server. For subsequent joins (for that player), if the mission file is unchanged, he won't download it again.

[l mandrake 9]

sure, but it really is a problem, even with professionally hosted servers, you get massive desync (red chain) for long periods when too many players connect at the same time - totally ruins the game (and often crashes the server).

[nobrainer 0]

In the old days of OFP and ArmA, someone said that CTI in some way used max out of your connection and you needed to configure it to 256kbit pr client and 512 kbit pr client at connect.

Of course you will get desync when people connect, but to play it might go ok on a slow line.

But I used 512kbit pr client to calculate the maxplayers on our 26 MBit line and then I max can have 50 players.

But if this is "the truth" anymore, I don't know.