Slow Torrenting + Gaming = High Ping

MrSneis

2[H]4U
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Apr 5, 2006
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Long story short I have an e4200 router that I was very excited with at first but now it seems the times have caught up to me. Our internet provider didn't like the new modem I introduced and I ended up having to register it with them to get our internet back. Ever since then it's not been smooth sailing; had to reset to factory settings and upgraded the firmware of the router to get over constant dropouts and slow speeds.

In the process I noticed that even slow-speed torrenting (under 20kb/s) KILLS in-game ping with BFBC2. I realize torrenting while gaming is not a good idea, but is there any way to set this up so that the two can exist in harmony without destroying the in-game ping?

If I setup QoS I have to give it a range of ports which doesn't jive well with randomize ports -- if you know what I mean :(
 
You get one or the other, you can't have both.

So you either game with good ping, torrent quickly, or game and torrent at the same time but stick wtih the same port set.

Also realize that the way that RIAA / MPAA track torrents, and the way your ISP throttles your bandwith when you have excessive P2P traffic has nothing to do with what port number your torrent client is on. All randomizing your port number does is get around possible blocked ports by a corporate / school / ISP firewall so you can download.
 
Just set the torrents to a fix port, one you know works and put that port in your routers QoS as low importance so everything else will run normally. If there is any bandwidth left then the torrents can run and your ping might be a little higher but probably better than now.
 
^ Usually it hogging the upload is more of a ping killer than hogging the download. At least it has been in my experience.
 
if you want faster internet that is able to handle dozens of torrent connections and still give you a low ping for gaming, subscribe to a faster service. you cant fit 10 pounds of poop in a 5 pound bag.
 
if you want faster internet that is able to handle dozens of torrent connections and still give you a low ping for gaming, subscribe to a faster service. you cant fit 10 pounds of poop in a 5 pound bag.

you have a 5 pound poop bag ?


In all seriousness, jump up internet plan if you can, or turn torrenting off when doing BC2...
 
Try limiting the number of connections to your torrent client. The number of connections, as opposed to the bandwidth per connection, can play a difference in how the router performs. I'm not saying the e4200 is a weak router, but often times you can have hundreds of connections open when torrenting.
 
Ok so I set a fixed port and set that port's QoS to low and capped my upload speed, going to give it some time to see how it performs!

I also set high priority to port 80 and the ports BC2 uses, was this necessary or could it cause conflicts?

Bear in mind I'm not the only person using the intranets at my home, we're also using the middle-level internet package that cox offers.
 
My connection has a 20 Mbit download / 4 Mbit upload (in other words fairly respectable), and I too have had these problems for quite a while. Limiting the number of connections is definitely the best place to start because by default, your torrent client will usually set the max to much more than you'll ever need anyway. I limited mine to 100 and have had good results so far.

If all else fails, you could try setting NAT in your routing settings to open, though this compromises security somewhat.
 
Yeah, I set my torrent client (transmission) to use one port.

Then I set that port to the lowest QoS priority in my router.

Then I set the ports i use for gaming to the highest QoS priority.

I also set the upload in my torrent client to 80% of my actual upload speed.

Doing both of these in the end allowed me to be able to torrent and or seed while gaming with no perceivable affect on measured latency at all.
 
If all else fails, you could try setting NAT in your routing settings to open, though this compromises security somewhat.

"somewhat" is a bit of an understatement. you dont want to turn off the NAT functions.


to give you an example of how much torrenting taxes your connection- there are several heavy internet users in our house. normally in the evenings when everyones home and using the web, there will be 100-300 open connections on the router. if a few people open bittorrent, that number can jump to 1500-2000 connections and CPU usage on the router gets up to 60-70%.
 
Try limiting the number of connections to your torrent client. The number of connections, as opposed to the bandwidth per connection, can play a difference in how the router performs. I'm not saying the e4200 is a weak router, but often times you can have hundreds of connections open when torrenting.

Bingo, low speeds isnt the problem it is the amount of requests hitting your router, it cant handle it.
 
Lower the upload, and use DD-WRT or Tomato. It will let you use 4096 connections. That feature alone makes a tremendous difference.
 
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limit the simultaneous connections in utorrent. you may only be downloading/uploading 20-50kb/sec but if you have 50 people connected to you, that's going to hurt.

*read above, and see it was already mentioned.*
 
Interesting on tomato or ddwrt; I'm not sure if they are ready yet for the e4200. I haven't used a custom firmware in a while for a router, bad exp. with my old wrt54g :)
 
This is why you build your own router :)

You can give it enough CPU power to handle 10,000+ connections if you want without it affecting your ping.

"Consumer" routers are mostly garbage IMO (well, garbage for [H]ard users :p), but DD-WRT does help a lot.
 
if you want faster internet that is able to handle dozens of torrent connections and still give you a low ping for gaming, subscribe to a faster service. you cant fit 10 pounds of poop in a 5 pound bag.

What if you compress the 10lbs of poop so much that it fits into the 5lb bag? :D
 
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