Talk:Lag/Archive

MUCH cleaner!

Thanks for this page. It's much cleaner than the two competing ones earlier. (MTU and Nagle)

This will also drastically help people, as I found myself searching for "Lag" myself when I first started experiencing it. ~Zallist 00:40, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

It'll be a LOT cleaner once I'm done with it. There are several major problems with the article when I first read it. Some of them are technical, but most of the problems are English problems. --Irjustman 05:53, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Automatic Programs

Should programs that automatically set MTU and Nagle be included? I can create both. ~Zallist 00:40, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

A heads-up...

I'm very likely going to give this thing a once-over because there are a few flaws, not the least of which, the network we use is called "the Internet" (capital "I"). It is not "internet" (lower-case "i"), which is a generic term. Has nothing to do with being a "trademark", but more being a proper name; it's the name of a very specific internet, the Internet. Not to mention, the article needs a lot of overall cleanup anyway. --Irjustman 03:07, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

No offense to those working on it, but this entire piece is very poorly worded and written. Also, I might save this multiple times throughout my edit session to make sure any changes I make don't get wiped due to a system crash (as Windows is wont to do). --Irjustman 05:30, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

As I'm going on, there are even bigger flaws. For example, netstat -a does not determine what a remote host has for channels. netstat -a determines which ports your computer is listening to. I am striking that. I also struck how cable has lower ping times than DSL due to "shorter distances". Distance alone does not dictate ping times. --Irjustman 06:29, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

I put it down for now, but there are still a lot of fundamental problems with this article, most of which concern proofreading. It's getting late and I should sleep soon. --Irjustman 07:24, 9 September 2009 (UTC)

Incorrect and misleading information corrected

I've edited the Nagle and MTU sections to emphasis the dangers of changing the MTU. The MTU really should never be changed, as it's actually an advisory factor, not a algorithm or buffer size. If you change your MTU, you are only changing the MTU between your computer and your router or ADSL/Cable modem, and nothing upstream, hence, any perceived improvement is from Mabinogi fragmenting packets larger than the MTU, resulting in more ACK's. This causes lag, not reduces it. If Nagle is also turned off, setting the MTU to 48 results in more overhead than data and quite honestly make the internet unusable. The only theoretical scenario where lowering the MTU would improve anything is a 1 on 1 PvP on a channel with no other players for the game to generate ACK's about. KisaiTenshi 07:19, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

perphaps you haven't tried using it yet. It ONLY works with mabinogi. Do you live on the west coast and are you lagless enough that this doesn't imporove your skill speed? You should ask people in austrialia/east coast to try it. No thoery needed when you can try it yourself. I have tested from CN mabi to NA mabi with 30/10mbps connections to 20/20mbps fibre optics to 10mbps and 768kbs connections before writing all this. Decreasing MTU does increase your MAXIMUM latency, but decreases you MINIMUM latency (which is determined by one's location). This means that large packets will lag (browsing the internet/ summoning you pet), but small packets (such as using a skill) will transfer very fast because it decreases the payload and the needed processing power among the routers. --Hengsheng120·^TALK_CONTRIBS 09:03, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

This is extremely bad advice. It's like giving a child the keys to the car and not telling them how to drive. Don't ever decrease MTU without checking that the software is sending packets thats small. At 48MTU you are sending 28 bytes at a time. Mabinogi's smallest packets are 10 bytes. All communication however is much larger, so setting the MTU to stupid values below 576 is only going to make it fragment all the communication packets, and essentially break the rest of the game and all your internet applications. Changing it on routers and upstream devices is even more dangerous. Unless you know exactly what kind of internet connection you have going all the way to your ISP's backbone(GigE? ATM? Frame Relay? DSL? DOCSIS? etc), changing the MTU will cause more problems then it solves.KisaiTenshi 09:12, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

Hey, as long as it works, it's good for those desperate people who want less lag for PVP. Hence, why i said it's only for mabinogi. There's already plenty of warnings that you have to change it back every time. I don't think it's "dangerous" unless one forgets to change it back (which shouldn't be much of hassle as long as shortcuts batch files are made), which even for me, it does happen. Maybe i'll delete the part for xp and router/modem, because it's hassle for normal users to do it without breaking their internet.--Hengsheng120·^TALK_CONTRIBS 02:10, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I'm from the east coast and I lowered my MTU to 140, and because of that I can use skills much faster. Before the recent G8 patch, summoning a pet with this low MTU took a very long time (about 3 seconds or more). Now it's normal. Also, when I do not lower my MTU to 140, I cannot do Icebolt>Charge combo, Charge would not load right away after I icebolted, of course now with lowered MTU I can use Icebolt>Charge every time without fail. Now for the side effects that I have experienced. With lowered MTU, some websites that hosts videos (i.e. crunchyroll) would not be able to load videos. Also the Exploration Chronicle takes a extended amount of time to load up as previously stated. Finally, my download speed has dropped to a extremely low amount (12.3 kb) although it jumps at times to a normal speed. But to just comment on this, we should say that people should lower MTU if you are facing a significant amount of lag due to distance or some other reason afterall the side effects could be detrimental to non-Mabinogi activities. I don't have much problems dealing with the side effects so lowered MTU is a win for me.--BIassreiter 04:08, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Blass, TCPOptimizer is a good way to figure out what MTU to set to. That's what I did. --κєνıи _{(»тαıĸ«)} 04:15, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Yeap, I used that in the beginning. It plopped me on 1500 MTU for optimal, so I was like (whuh?). I ignored the optimal settings since 1500 MTU was no good. I kept reducing my MTU from 384 and got to 140 where I could use Icebolt>Charge with ease and get up like modders by pressing ESC only since it pops up extremely fast. I set it to a slightly higher MTU of 192 since low MTU screwed my download speed, but I could not do Icebolt>Charge when it's 192 MTU. So 140 is the best for me. I just looked for a way to be able to do Icebolt>Charge so I can kick a certain Ikkisuki's Blass in PvP =D --BIassreiter 04:26, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

There's a tab where it pings a server and suggests a MTU for you. Apparently, you didn't use it. --κєνıи _{(»тαıĸ«)} 04:27, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

I did pinged mabinogi.nexon.net but it just told me my results and there was no "suggestion" --BIassreiter 04:37, 17 January 2010 (UTC)

Believe or not the 48-mtu lag fix can make you almost lagless/latency-free when you are in the right channel. I will write about in-game lag tests in order to define what "lagless" means. TCP optimizer does not work for vista or 7 nor is it optimized for mabinogi. On vista or 7 there are ways to nullify the side effects (simply change back to 1500 while in-game). 48 mtu is very counterintuitive, but it work ONLY for mabinogi.--Hengsheng120·^TALK_CONTRIBS 14:39, 12 March 2010 (UTC)

Disabling Nagle no longer has any effect?

It appears as of the r55 update, disabling nagle no longer allows for rapid skill firing. Anyone want to confirm that this happens on all servers? KisaiTenshi 20:12, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

...game updates don't affect your internet settings. You (or someone else that uses your computer) turned nalge back on, did a system restore, or just did something wrong.--Sozen Cratos Focker 20:30, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

If you use a laptop, or use wireless settings, or if your router has reset, the nagle will have to be turned off again every so often due to IP changes. --- Angevon (Talk) 20:37, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Not true. I know the game update shouldn't change it. The only instance where Nagle should have to be re-enabled is if the network card is changed, or re-installed in a different slot/port. The page doesn't identify this either, but it may not be obvious if someone has their pc serviced. Particularly if the network cards have the same name as before. Replacing the router/adsl modem/cable modem or any of the switch gear between the computer and the ISP's termination on the house won't affect Nagle. It can affect MTU though, but people shouldn't be changing MTU to begin with.KisaiTenshi 21:09, 16 January 2010 (UTC)

Registry Editor

If you use the Export command in Registry Editor, it makes a copy of the current registry. You can then use the Import button to overwrite an altered registry with a saved registry. This seems like a good way to "back up" the registry, but it's not covered in the article.

Speaking of backing up, I found this warning in the Registry Editor help file:

Caution: Incorrectly editing the registry may severely damage your system. 
Before making changes to the registry, you should back up any valued data on your computer.

Should we include this warning in the article? Maybe Nagle's Algorithm needs its own article altogether? --Zkin 09:34, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Why does this article go into great detail to explain the origins of Nagle's Algorithm, but all we get for MSMQ is "This isn't usually on"? I perfer knowing what something does before messing with it.

In case you didn't know,

Microsoft Message Queuing (MSMQ) is a component of the Windows operating system that allows cooperating applications to send and receive messages to each other, even if the intended recipient application is not running or the computer on which the sender or recipient application is running is disconnected from the network. - [MSMQ:Frequently Asked Questions]

We shouldn't just send people into advanced stuff like this. I know it's a simple process and we're not supposed to make things too complicated, but the idea of someone breaking their computer trying to do this stuff concerns me. I'm probably just freaking out because I'm a computer... enthusiast, but do we have to be so vague? --Zkin 10:13, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

The following should be done in addition to the above if MSMQ is enabled...

How would the adverage user know if MSMQ is enabled?

From Desktop: Start > Programs > Accessories > System Tools > System Information

From System Information: Software Enviornment > Services > Message Queing (MSMQ)

(I don't think you even have to modify the registry to fix MSMQ anyway. In System Configuration, there's this checkbox that says "Message Queing" next to it. Why do we have to reprogram the computer if the button's right here?)

I really think all these modifications need to be explained in their own article(s), and leave this one for definitions. --Zkin 10:30, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Zkin, technically none of this stuff should even be in the Wiki as it has nothing to do with the game, but certain people insist on providing misinformation to other players based on ill conceived notions of what is appropriate. For example, setting the MTU below 140 is pretty much guaranteed to cripple your connection to the point of unusability (it should always be 1500 except for PPPoE(1454[[1]]) and Dial-up(576.)) Changing the MSMQ is pointless as the service is rarely even turned on, primarily used by Windows Update, and is never used by Mabinogi. The Korean players actually have a little tool that flips all these switches in the Registry automatically and makes the overly complicated pages like this useless. Anyone who tinkers with the registry does so at their own risk. There are dozens if not hundreds of settings that can damage the operating installation, of which only the MTU setting on this page can cripple a PC to the point of not being able to go on the internet and figure out how to undo it. If someone gets the non-brilliant idea to change the MTU on their router, kiss them good-bye as we won't see them till they buy a new router or PC.KisaiTenshi 11:55, 3 July 2010 (UTC)

Minor corrections due to lack of sleep. The http://www.mynetwatchman.com/kb/ADSL/pppoemtu.htm link actually nicely explains why some people (ON ADSL where ATM is used) experience an improvement, but it depends specifically on the number of bytes used. To clarify, if one had the exact ISP configuration as in the page (PPPoE over ADSL over ATM) you would need to have a MTU +26 bytes that is divisible by 30. So a MTU of 94 bytes (4 ATM cells) is probably as small as one could make it and still have the connection function. However packet analysis of Mabinogi clearly indicates this is a bad idea to have a small MTU because all non-chatter traffic results in TCP/IP packets needing to be broken up anyway. If you aren't running a store, shop, or party ad, and don't talk, you might get away with a low MTU. Otherwise these activities will result in more lag than they would have if MTU not been changed. On the flip side, if you know exactly what your ISP is using upstream, you might be able to adjust the MTU for less latency, but the average person won't know this. This page might be more useful to everyone else: http://www.speedguide.net/analyzer.php KisaiTenshi 10:40, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

IP Addresses vs Ports

I'm not sure when Nexon changed it, but all of Alexina except the housing channel points to one IP address, on 5 different ports. This is somewhat significant as a source of lag, since that may be either a firewall/loadbalancer (and not the real server,) or it may be the IP address of the physical machine, with each channel running on separate ports. I'm not sure at this point in time if Mari, Ruairi and Tarlach have the same changes. This is however significant for players who need to know why they are being blocked if they are behind a restrictive firewall/router. KisaiTenshi 14:09, 24 February 2011 (UTC)