(ScArab)
04-02-2004, 09:55 PM
Informational study on:
Hosting dedicated Counter-Strike servers, & what hosts’ need to know... Questions asked, and questions answered.
I’ve been hosting dedicated Counter-Strike servers on my T-1 connection for over a month now, and I’ve noticed that my hosted games occasionally freeze. It may just be my XBox, but if you experience this problem also then read on...
Note this is an informational text for gamers who are interested in hosting dedicated Counter-Strike servers and what they need to know before they host a dedicated server.
QUESTION 1
Why do my dedicated Counter-Strike servers freeze up on random occasions?
ANSWER 1
Dedicated Counter-Strike servers seem to freeze at TWO specific times while hosting.
Time ONE- Counter-Strike freezes after the player’s “buy time” has just ended (“buy time” is the time a player has before the round time starts to purchase weapons, once the “buy time” has ended the players are allowed to move about the level). Lets assume that our “round time” is 3 minuets long, and our “buy time” is 6 seconds. With those hypothetical times the game is expected to freeze immediately after (and not before) the “buy time” has ended. The specific times at which dedicated Counter-Strike servers freeze is precisely 2:59, 2:58 & 2:57 (2-minuets 57-seconds) remaining until the round would end (note: the 3 minuet “round time” counts down from 3 minuets).
Time TWO- The game freezes while loading the information required to load the next map. Meaning, after a game has ended and the next map is starting to load up it will freeze while trying to load. On the progress bar it loads to about 15% complete before it freezes. But it is inconsistent. It will not always freeze while trying to load a level, nor does it freeze while loading a specific level. However, it will always freeze at 15% progress complete. I do not know why.
The above-mentioned, are the only two times that dedicated Counter-Strike servers appear to freeze at.
QUESTION 2
What can be done to help prevent dedicated Counter-Strike servers from freezing?
ANSWER 2
It seems to depend on the max number of players allowed to join a server. Initially I hosted 16-player games all the time, and when the game got full (or nearly full) these games seemed to freeze up rather quickly; sometimes right in front of my eyes.
But I noticed times that the server would run an amazing 8 hours straight! ...These times being through the night, when the server never seems to get totally full. So, based on this observation I decided to lower the max number of players in my server from 16, to 14-players. ...So far the lower max-player limit seem to lower the frequency of freeze ups.
My suggestion to every host out there is to limit the max players in a dedicated Counter-Strike server to 12, or 14-players.
-Acid Snow (ScArab)
Hosting dedicated Counter-Strike servers, & what hosts’ need to know... Questions asked, and questions answered.
I’ve been hosting dedicated Counter-Strike servers on my T-1 connection for over a month now, and I’ve noticed that my hosted games occasionally freeze. It may just be my XBox, but if you experience this problem also then read on...
Note this is an informational text for gamers who are interested in hosting dedicated Counter-Strike servers and what they need to know before they host a dedicated server.
QUESTION 1
Why do my dedicated Counter-Strike servers freeze up on random occasions?
ANSWER 1
Dedicated Counter-Strike servers seem to freeze at TWO specific times while hosting.
Time ONE- Counter-Strike freezes after the player’s “buy time” has just ended (“buy time” is the time a player has before the round time starts to purchase weapons, once the “buy time” has ended the players are allowed to move about the level). Lets assume that our “round time” is 3 minuets long, and our “buy time” is 6 seconds. With those hypothetical times the game is expected to freeze immediately after (and not before) the “buy time” has ended. The specific times at which dedicated Counter-Strike servers freeze is precisely 2:59, 2:58 & 2:57 (2-minuets 57-seconds) remaining until the round would end (note: the 3 minuet “round time” counts down from 3 minuets).
Time TWO- The game freezes while loading the information required to load the next map. Meaning, after a game has ended and the next map is starting to load up it will freeze while trying to load. On the progress bar it loads to about 15% complete before it freezes. But it is inconsistent. It will not always freeze while trying to load a level, nor does it freeze while loading a specific level. However, it will always freeze at 15% progress complete. I do not know why.
The above-mentioned, are the only two times that dedicated Counter-Strike servers appear to freeze at.
QUESTION 2
What can be done to help prevent dedicated Counter-Strike servers from freezing?
ANSWER 2
It seems to depend on the max number of players allowed to join a server. Initially I hosted 16-player games all the time, and when the game got full (or nearly full) these games seemed to freeze up rather quickly; sometimes right in front of my eyes.
But I noticed times that the server would run an amazing 8 hours straight! ...These times being through the night, when the server never seems to get totally full. So, based on this observation I decided to lower the max number of players in my server from 16, to 14-players. ...So far the lower max-player limit seem to lower the frequency of freeze ups.
My suggestion to every host out there is to limit the max players in a dedicated Counter-Strike server to 12, or 14-players.
-Acid Snow (ScArab)