Need Help...ping Levels Got Me Blue...:-(

[rebelliont56]

ok so yea...i have a blazing fast pc for years i have been playing ut 2004 when i moved to this pc the one i built this past summer it was great i was the fastest pc on the server with the lowest ping usualy around 50-68 ping.....two days ago i was playing and i was kicked becuase it said i had a ping of over 200 !!!...i tired again today and my ping was up in the 150's and climbing....
im not running anything else on my pc its running very cool (its liquid cooled)
my internet is just the same as it was before (freakishly fast :-)) but now somehting has gone amuck....can anyone help me......:-(

[killergamer]

Can You tell use what your computer is composed of? Hard ware wise.

[NightrainSrt4]

50-70 doesn't exactly sound like the server is very close to you. It could be jumping up to 150-200 because the packets are taking a different route to get to the server. They don't always take the same route and sometimes you get a crappier connection to the servers because of this.

You can monitor the route the packets are taking by running a tracert and comparing the paths from a good ping to those of a bad one.

[Spawn-Inc]

HA i would love those, well i do sometimes, at night, get 20-40 but most of the time i get what other people get on the same server.

if you really have money to burn then grab a killer network card (http://www.killernic.com/) to get a i think 5-10 ping decrease.

[rebelliont56]

50-70 doesn't exactly sound like the server is very close to you. It could be jumping up to 150-200 because the packets are taking a different route to get to the server. They don't always take the same route and sometimes you get a crappier connection to the servers because of this.

You can monitor the route the packets are taking by running a tracert and comparing the paths from a good ping to those of a bad one.

how do i runn a tracert...sorry...im more of a hardware guy...thus the reason why i am a member of this forum...we deal with hardware crazy cooling and mods mods mods lol

[NightrainSrt4]

Click the start button

Then run

Then type "cmd" and then click ok

Then type tracert "the site/ip of the server" (without quotes).

Here is a pic of me running a tracert to my website.
http://img407.imageshack.us/img407/6268/10130702ou9.jpg
You can see the amount of steps I am taking. You can see it jumps around to quite a few towns over the state of MA, and then on to the server.

If I ran this tomorrow it would probably be a different path. If I do it right now theres no guarantee it will be the same route. There isn't anything you can do about it though if you do notice a difference. I was just stating its something to try before blaming it on a hardware issue. Takes but a few seconds each day, and you would notice a big difference between the hops of the slow days and the fast days if its the path the packets are taking.

You may have to allow your firewall to let you run the tracert. Its a process you haven't run before so there may not be an exception for it in your firewall. You can just allow it for a temporary session though.

[NightrainSrt4]

Just to clarify, as I may not have been clear as I haven't had to use these tools in a while.

While tracert will give you the steps or hops it takes to the server, it doesn't tell you your latency or bandwidth or anything like that. If you want more info on latencies for each step, you would run a pathping.

All this is probably overkill. Just the first thing that came into my mind to play around with as it didn't really look like a hardware issue to me. The difference in latency really isn't all that much(.1 seconds). Just something to play around with and see if you notice a big difference in the path it is taking when your having an issue as compared to when your not.

It could also be a server side issue. Too many people then it can efficiently handle and pings start rising...

[Outlaw]

Don't forget to keep in mind your Internet Provider. I don't know how yours handles the network, but mine (Time Warner Road Runner) groups large areas together. If you are in a densely populated area, your network my be loaded more then usual at times which could also cause that. I know I can tell sometimes in my area. I pay for a 6mb download and sometimes I get closer to 8mb and sometimes I am down to 2mb...all depending on time of day and how many people are on the network. Just thought I would throw my 2cents worth in there.

[D1337]

To summarize it + add a few more possibilities

Distance from your computer to the server
Quality of the PC + connection the server has
People around you using the internet/downloading
New interference from a wireless phone/etc.
Firewall is intercepting the packets and slowly sending them out/vice versa