A possible tip for smoother performance, network related

[fogpipe]

So it occurred to me that some of the performance glitches i was suffering with il2 looked a lot like lag, so i thought i would look at the network settings.

 

I assigned my machine a static ip, disabled the wireless connection, disabled file and print sharing, disabled qos and ipv6, disabled nagles algorithm (dont try this if you arent comfortable editing the regisry) and am running steam in offline mode. In general just trying to optimize the network connection and minimize the data sent over it.

 

All in all my hardwired internet connection is noticeably snapper than it used to be and il2 seems to be running smoother than it used to be. 

 

Im playing in career mode, which requires an internet connection, and im assuming communication with an il2 server and steam as well. 

 

Now this improvement might be my imagination, but things seem smoother and the theory is sound, if anyone who knows what they are doing and feels comfortable making the changes above, i would love to hear the results, just to corroborate what i think im seeing.

 

Nagles algorithm, what it is and why gamers may be better off without it https://www.electronicproducts.com/Programming/OS/How_to_optimize_Windows_10_for_gaming.aspx

Edited May 19, 2019 by fogpipe

[Velxra]

I have to admit, this is a placebo result from all effort you put into changing settings or researching. An online connection does not affect single player as SP is hardware dependant and disabling file/printer sharing could only affect a connection under heavy load from a local lan network like a large office building. When we login into the game from the menu our connection will be used briefly then it goes idle. Perhaps steam cloud will save a few files but that is it. Then when you connect to a server your connection will be under normal ethernet/router/modem use by that point. If anything the suggestion above should only be considered if someone cannot connect to the game servers at all. Which would mostly like be a firewall issue or a router is blocking the server IP address. So for anyone reading the above suggestion looking for solutions to game lag. Do not expect to see any changes and a massive headache if these settings are incorrectly done.

As for Nagles, I do not know enough about it to comment. 

Edited May 20, 2019 by Geronimo553

[Jade_Monkey]

If you are playing SP then your internet connection has nothing to do with the lag you are experiencing, it's probably your PC specs are not enough to play at your current graphical settings.

 

What graphic settings are you using and what are your PC specs? CPU, GPU, RAM? Do you have an SSD?

 

An internet connection is only required in the Career mode in order to generate a mission file, once it's generared it will be on your PC and you don't depend on your internet during the mission.

[fogpipe]

I dont have any more lag or graphical issues.

The wireless connection had an ip address, dhcp was turned on and so was network quotas. My guess is that windows 10 has these turned on by default. Knowing windows 10, qos was probably trying to meter the bandwidth between two connections on the same machine,  two dhcp lease requests were being submitted to the router every how often and for all i know the two dhcp network connections were asking for netbios info, which had to go south because they are on the same machine.

Thats a lot of network activity at cross purposes that i stopped with the steps i followed. At any rate, my problem is solved, i just posted the above in case the information might be of use to someone else.

 

And i doubt that the connection to il2 servers is just to generate mission files. Time, careers, game assets, and awards probably need to be kept track of and that means ongoing maybe continuous monitoring. Ack and syn packets being transmitted back and forth and the game waiting to receive and process them, is my guess.

1 hour ago, Geronimo553 said:

As for Nagles, I do not know enough about it to comment. 

I do. I spent some years doing neworking for various clients as part of my job. If you are using a windows machine for online gaming and you feel confident doing it, you will very likely see a difference in online play.

 

And what i did might not be the cause of the drastic improvement im seeing, thats why i posted it to get some feedback from someone who was having issues and might be willing to try it. Otoh i dont see how the steps i did could not have had at least some positive effect.

 

I just want to add to anyone who might try the steps i did, you do them at your own risk.

Edited May 20, 2019 by fogpipe

[1PL-Husar-1Esk]

In career mode ? Game do not send packets to master during mission. So I think this is just placebo. Something completely different is during multiplayer where latency and other parameters are the key to smooth gameplay.