In article <3882FA5D.9BDAE...@hammer.imm.ox.ac.uk>, Kev
<ke...@hammer.imm.ox.ac.uk> writes
>I tried my first VROC race at the weekend. What a disaster :(
>I picked a novice race at Kyalami first. Not a track I like but I'm ok
>on it. I waited for a while to see what was happening and because there
>were lots of PO chat messages which I thought was 'piss off' at first :)
>.Anyway, there was only 2 mins left of qualifying so I headed out for a
>tentative out lap. I started my qualifying lap, came over the crest of
>the hill to be confronted by a car stopped in the middle of the track!
>At 150mph+ on a blind crest I did my best to avoid the Cooper but
>clipped the left rear, span into the fence on the right and quit back to
>the pits. Game over, no time to qualify now. Well, I don't particularly
>like Kyalami anyway so I quit back to VROC.
>Ah! Monza. Cool. I'm not bad there, and it's another novice race too. Goodo.
>I joined with plenty of practice time left. I did my out lap (having
>typed PO of course), did my flyer, went for a third lap and the pit
>board said my last lap was a 2.02. NEVER! No way, that was easily a mid
>1.30's. Never mind, I'll carry on for another lap. On the way round,
>several cars appeared and disappeared (for maybe 1-2 secs each). Odd I
>thought but never mind.
>Race time. I go the grid and there's just me and 1 other car. No sign of
>the other 8 people. Off we go then. I did one lap and got dropped by the
>other car (he was a 1.28 man. I'm not even a sub 1.30...) so I was on my
>own, then the pit board comes up showing the next car 40 secs down on
>me. Where did he come from? I retired. Fed up.
>I expected a good race with 10+ cars of similar skill but the whole
>thing seemed a shambles. Maybe I just had a bad experience. I think I'll
>stick to races against my friend and 12 AI cars instead........
Here's an old post from James Pickard that I've held onto (hope he
doesn't mind me reposting it). I used it to setup my 56k modem here in
the UK and it has held me in good stead. Hopefully it will do the same
for you. I've posted it in its entirety, though you shouldn't have to
mess with the core.ini.
Are you sick of those LPB (Low Ping Bastards :-) who keep braggin
about
getting less than 100 ping???
Well.. don't dispair... :-)
I have been racing ONline since GPL came out.. and have found it pretty
good
up until now.. BUT.. I have just found a way to make it better.. for
me
I'm no ISP Trouble Shooter.. and don't know THAT much about networking
and
Dial connections.. but his is what i have learned and discovered from
GPL
online racing...
(for all those who have found this.. plz excuse.. I have just
discovered
it.. and other need to know it too)
PING / Latency DOESN'T necessarily make for warp free racing.. My
understanding and experience is that you require a STABLE connection..
not
a "FAST" connection..
Most connection seem to be "suped-up" for bandwidth.. and not stable
throughput.. which is what GPL ( and probably other online games)
require.... This seems to make them more prone to Errors and
fluctuations
in Flow...
Sooooo.. by decreasing the connection speed.. you lessen the chance
of
such things.. and therefore make the connection more stable... A
connection that is more stable. .can take full advantage of the
"prediction"
that is built into GPL
Take note of the QUALITY in the ALT + L function.. PING is NOT THAT
important... lower is better.. but QUALITY is the most important...
With my 56k V90 US Robotics modem.. I was getting about 177 Lat /Ping
(same
thing) @ 967 Quality to the best server here in Australia (THANK YOU
TROY!!!! :-). Connection seemed quite good...
Then I took the advice of friends and tried different connection
speeds..
It took a lot of mucking around with differnt strings.. but I
eventually
got the following
26,400 bps conecction and got 23j0-240 Lat @ 1.000 - 995 Quality
The latency has gone up by about 50ping.. but the cars are now VERY
smooth.. (not far off LAN speed) The main differnce is the
Quality....
The following is a post that Ron Ayton put here a few weeks ago (Hope
you
don't mind Ron .. BTw.. thanx for your help..... it cover basically
all
this..
==========================================================
Firstly, the DUN you use for the Internet is NOT suitable for on-line
gaming. It most likely would be using Data Compression, Error
Correction, Maximum FIFO Buffers and probably going as hard as your
poor little modem can peddle, or harder if i believe half of the tales
i hear about....
All of the above is VERY bad news for on-line gaming.
You should make up another DUN for on-line gaming, with Data
Compression and Error Correction turned OFF. Also, turn down the
maximum connect speed of your modem to 24000, 26400 or 28800 at a
maximum.
The quality of the lines in your area, will dictate the best speed for
you.
This can be done in the Modem Properties tab of your DUN for the
designated Modem. Read the booklet that comes with your modem for the
initialization strings you need.
NOTE:
Some people are under the mistaken belief that a slower connect speed
will take longer to get to the host, resulting in higher latencys
(pings) etc. This is totally false.!!!
The connection speed of your modem, is a false analogy, as the
connection speed only refers to how much bandwidth the modem is capable
of sending at any given time, NOT how fast it can send it.
Hence, the ammount of data that a GPL host requires from a client will
get to the host at exactly the same time, whether the client is using
26400 baud or 56000 baud, and 99.9% of the time, the 26400 baud rate
from the client will have a lot less errors and be more stable than
the 56000 baud's best effort, unless you are lucky enough to live in a
area where optical fibre abounds, all the way from you to the host,
which is very unlikely. :)
I only ever use a maximum of 26400 on-line with GPL, as the lines in my
area, leave a bit to be desired, but with my normal internet dun, i use
33 to 56k baud, and let the error correction fix any problems i
encounter, which is fine for surfing and general internet use etc.
(error correction is a definite no-no for gPL)
To make more than one DUN with different modem initialization strings,
you will need to go to the MODEMS in the control panel and ADD another
modem. This will not overwrite your present modem settings, but will
add another modem to the modems you have listed in the modem list. As
you add more modems to the list, Windows will simply add a #2 #3 #4
etc etc to the end of the modem name. That way you can set up as many
DUN's as you have modem names, each one with different initialization
strings.
Once you have your on-line DUNS and modem set up correctly, you will
actually find that disco's, error filled connections and high latency's
will simply become a bad memory...
NOTE:
The FIFO buffers should be set no higher than the 2nd mark from
the left, unfortunately these are global settings, so if you set them
at the 2nd setting from the left, that is where they will remain
regardless of which DUN you are using. I have not noticed any lesser
performance in surfing or downloading with the buffers set there
anyway, so i just leave them there all the time.
Make sure you turn Error Correction off, also turn off the Data
Compression and select Hardware Flow Control in you modem's properties
tab for the On-Line gaming DUN. If you are a paranoid type, as i am,
you could also add those commands to the extra settings in the modem
initialization string, just in case you don't trust windows to carry
out your wishes and let's face it, who trusts windows to do anything
right when it comes to gaming anyway..
I have included the following line for my US Robotics modem in my
On-Line Gaming DUN..
&F1&K0&M0&U10&N13
&F1 Resets modem to standard, in case windows messed it up.
&K0 Disables Data Compression, in case windows forgot.
&M0 Disables Error Correction, as per above scenario..
&U10 Sets the floor connect speed to 19200.
&N13 Sets the ceiling connect speed to 26400.
The above is an example for the US Robotics modem, different modems
will vary slightly in the initialization strings, so read your manual
for further details to achieve similiar results.
Secondly.. Windows in it's infinite wisdom sets up the Port settings
on the extra conservative side by default.
This needs to be changed manually.
To do this:
Go to the Control Panel, go to System, go to Device Manager, go to
Ports (com & lpt).
Select Com1 , go to Port Settings, and adjust the following to read as
follows:
Bits per second 115200
Data 8
Parity none
Stop Bits 1
Flow Control Hardware
Go to Advanced and adjust the FIFO Buffers so they are 1 mark from
the left side.
Do the same for Com Port 2.
The following topics, are relevant to the new CORE.INI file, that ships
with GPL 1.1
NOTE:
This file is called: COREINI.SAMPLE and must be re-named to: CORE.INI
before GPL 1.1 can make use of it.
It is located in the: SIERRA\GPL\ folder, after the GPL 1.1 patch has
been installed...
A couple of slight adjustments are needed to get the best out of the
new CORE.INI file.
Following, is a brief example of a couple of changes i made to my
CORE.INI file, to suit on-line play on VROC.
The parts you need to alter from the CORE.INI that ships with GPL1.1
are the two lines concerned with band width:
net_mdm_client_send =2 & net_mdm_server_send_every =2
Change both of those to 3, like below in the pasted example.
net_mdm_client_send_every = 3 ; Client packet freq on dialup
net_mdm_client_send_size = 84 ; Client packet size on dialup
net_mdm_server_send_every = 3 ; Server packet freq on dialup
net_mdm_server_send_size = 84 ; Server packet size on dialup
That is the standardized band settings that VROC uses, for clients
and hosts, and everyone running on VROC, should alter the relevant
lines to
...
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