DSL Problems

[King of Camelot]

Hah! Second thread. Now, on to bussiness.

Having problems with my dsl connection. It is a wireless network connection to another computer which has a wireless access point and the dsl connection. It works fine except for one thing. When playing Starcraft online I have major problems. I can connect to battle.net. If I join a game I download the map(or it indicates I am) but when the person tries to go they can't but they can without me. Also if I make a game no one can join it because: 'The creator's latency is too high.' I have tested this all with my friend so I know it has something to do with my connection. Hope you can help.

 

[damunzy]

What location are you in? (Country, state)
What location are you playing on Battle.net? (US East/West, etc.)
We can try playing sometime and see if we have the problem also.

 

[starlifter]

A properly running wireless connection should not in and of itself create a high latency. The latency is most likely due to your CPU usage, and the lack of CPU cycles to process the communications, plus run the server, plus play your game, plus any background programs & OS services.

Have you checked your latency? If so, what is it? Have you run a traceroute? If so, at what node did the latency jump?

The overall latency is a cumulation of the entire connection, and not just the wireless part, so there are many possible sources... it might be a trial and error method to track it down, but then that's where "troubleshooting" get's its headaches ...

 

[King of Camelot]

Answers for Palehorse:
1.California, USA
2.US West

Answers for Starlifter:
1.No
2.No
Mind telling me how to check my latency? Starcraft's method of indicating your latency says I have 1 block out of a possible 6 blocks. And how do you run a traceroute?

 

[damunzy]

To run tracert you will need bring up the command prompt:

• To get to command prompt in win9x/ME click Start, Run, then type command.
• to command prompt in winNT/2000/XP click Start, Run, then type cmd (actually, command will work for 2000, and probably NT and XP also).

Once you have the command prompt up type in "tracert xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx" without the qoutes and where xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx is the ip address you want to test. Try tracert www.yahoo.com or tracert 64.58.76.177.

 

[King of Camelot]

Ok, did a traceroute and it had 1 hop at 10 ms. That what you wanted?

 

[Lucky]

Another thing not yet mentioned is that Battle.net is using UDP datagrams to transmit the game data, not TCP/IP.
So you might want to check your settings concerning that protocol.

 

[starlifter]

Ok, did a traceroute and it had 1 hop at 10 ms. That what you wanted?

Yes... and that result is not a high latency! So I return to my feel it is a CPU cycle issue, or a game issue.

I don't play Starcraft, so I can't personally speak to SC issues . But it does not seem like it's a hardware issue to me... if it is a hardware issue, then its related to the game somehow, IMHO. I have no way of testing it at my end, though.
Close all excess programs before running SC. That's about all I can suggest, except talking to experienced Starcraft players, or maybe writing the folks at Blizzard.

 

[King of Camelot]

I'm gonna check my UDP datagrams protocol like Lucky said and like you said starlifter I doubt it is a hardware issue because I played starcraft all the time before I got the dsl and it was fine.

 

[King of Camelot]

Well, after sitting in the Blizzard Tech Support chat for 2 hours waiting to talk I found out that it most likely has to do with the fact that the dsl provider uses a firewall. So the only way I can play is use my old 56k modem. Grrr!

 

[damunzy]

Contact the DSL provider and ask them if they do have a firewall up. It seems weird for an ISP to have a firewall up and blocking stuff that you should be able to get to. I am looking up what ports SC needs. I have had problems playing SC before when I was running a firewall which was also part of my router so I couldn't get rid of it completely.

Oh, just though of something: Is the firewall built into your DSL modem? What type of DSL modem do you have? Give us brand and model #. The firewall could be built in there and you may be able to disable it to play SC. Also, do you have a router/fiewall combo devide that shares your internet connection between multiple computers?

 

[damunzy]

Port Information for Firewalls, Proxies, and Routers



Who should I contact regarding the configuration of my firewall, proxy, or router?
Blizzard does not support proxies (Internet connection sharing), firewalls, or routers. The settings provided are suggested settings only. You may need to contact your ISP or network administrator for assistance if you have opened the correct ports but still cannot connect or get others connected to you.

What do I need to know about ports?
Anytime your computer receives incoming data, it is sent to a "port". Your computer has many ports that can receive data, and different activities will utilize different ports.

How are ports being restricted?
Most proxy servers, firewalls, and other Internet connection sharing methods can restrict port access. Your configuration may be restricting packets from "unknown sources". In this case an "unknown source" would be defined as any IP address that you have not initiated the contact with. Once you contact the IP address, your proxy and/or firewall considers it "safe", or a "known source", since you initiated the contact. When you create a game on Battle.net, other users need to be able to contact you in order to join. In other words, they need to be able to initiate the contact. This becomes the real problem if your connection is restricting them from contacting you.

What ports need to be open?
In order to connect to Battle.net, connect to others over a Local Area Network, and allow others to connect to you using any Blizzard Entertainment game, the following ports need to be opened:
4000 UDP
4000 TCP
6112 up to 6119 UDP
6112 up to 6119 TCP
Some firewall programs have preset ports available in their configurations that are often necessary to be open. One in particular is a connection to your DNS server. This usually takes place on UDP port 53. If you are playing over a Local Area Network and using a firewall you will need to open port 6111 for UDP and TCP.


This information ripped from: http://www.blizzard.com/support/?id=msi0445p

 

[damunzy]

Firewall type programs like blackice defender and ZoneAlarm could possibly give you problems. Are you running any of these?

 

[King of Camelot]

I am not running any firewall programs myself. I am going to call the isp provider and it is shared on 2 computers by a wireless access point router thinige. I am pretty sure the dsl modem itself doesn't come with a firewall and the dsl modem make is: Infinilink; and the model # is: i500. Hope you can do something with this info!

 

[starlifter]

I am going to call the isp provider and it is shared on 2 computers by a wireless access point router thinige.

You are probably running a software program or driver to split this. ISPs are notorious. The hardware router.... a "good" one like the Cisco 675, has its own processor and the downstream computer(s) could care less... it is just another router node, like the other dozen or more in a data path.

Your ISP should know what they've enabled, and the tech details, BTW. If they don't (or can't) give you tech advice on their own system, I'd switch ISPs.

(Personally, I never get a new ISP without talking to a chief tech first... just to see if they are competent... if they won't help or don't have good tech contacts, then I don't sign up. )