Server lag on race starts

Discussion in 'Hosting Help' started by Chris English, Feb 7, 2016.

  1. Chris English

    Chris English Registered

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    I run a server for World Series Racing, we've had numerous problems with lag on both rF1 and rF2. It's been narrowed down to 2 things causing it:

    • Windows Update with queued updates (rF2 only) - this causes lag as soon as the connection number goes above 15
    • LiveRacers plugin - this causes race-start lag, or lag with lots of cars close together when there's more than 20 people on the server

    Over the last 6 months I've figured out that once removing LiveRacers plugin and disabling Windows update the lag disappears even with a high number of connections (we had 27 on Friday).

    I'm wondering if anyone else has seen issues like this?

    We're running on a VMware virtual server with the following spec - server load is minimal even with 25+ connections:
    Windows Server 2012 R2
    6 vCore CPU @ 2.1GHz
    20GB RAM
    100Mbit/100Mbit connection
     
  2. SRGP

    SRGP Registered

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    Hmm... Interesting you have the Windows Update on your list, because it is on mine, along with "Skins Transfer", a bug in the Remote Desktop (specially with Win10) and a few other thing we won't have in common.
    You say it causes troubles when there are 15 connected drivers, I would say when the Data Rate reaches 25%.

    (Same OS and comparable hardware)
     
  3. Chris English

    Chris English Registered

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    I could go with the data rate theory. With 27 people it was at ~40%

    I've disabled Windows Update on my server now, we're expecting another large turnout next week, will see what happens.
     
  4. Chris English

    Chris English Registered

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    A quick update on this - we ran our series last Friday with 26 cars on the grid, LiveRacers enabled, Windows Updates disabled and saw no lag at all.

    I'm now about 90% confident that the problem lies with Windows Updates mixing with rF2, we don't see lag on any other server (both other racing sims and non-racing games) with Windows Updates enabled.

    I'd be interested to hear the ISI view on this as I believe they had similar lag problems a while ago.
     
  5. Christopher Elliott

    Christopher Elliott Registered

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    Sure, you probably do want to avoid your server downloading Windows updates during a race, if it can be avoided.
     
  6. Chris English

    Chris English Registered

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    It's not downloading updates, the updates we had were queued waiting for install.
     
  7. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    This is exactly what I'm experiencing this season in our league! The lag lasts for the first 3 laps and after that, perfectly fine :) I've asked one of our server admins
    to take a look and see if the problem can be traced, and hopefully use your solution :)

    Our next race will be on Adelaide, don't want any lag during those first turns, not at any track, but especially not there!
     
  8. SRGP

    SRGP Registered

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    I can too say there has been no problem since Win Update was turned Off. Thanks to the date tag, I know it did check for available updates during the race we had issues. We'll see in the first days of March, since it is the usual update period... rF2 has been updated too in the mean time.
    Could it also be related to the track or mod or combination of both ?
     
  9. wgeuze

    wgeuze Registered

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    I can also confirm that turning replay recordings OFF helped a lot too. Windows update was turned off on the server, not a single hickup for me during a 31 driver start on Adelaide :)
     

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