wifi vs LAN for gaming (dota 2)?

[Tama Handika]

Hello all,

This is my first post on networking section, so sorry if i make some mistakes.

I am a dota 2 player. I play in SEA (singapore) while im in Indonesia.I have generally good ping, its about 40-60ms. However, sometimes i get lag and my ping become very high suddenly.

After doing some research, people said it might be because im using wifi instead of LAN cable. Is it true? My laptop position is around 3 meter away from the router, and theres no thick wall between us.

I tried to ping "sgp-1.valve.net" (dota 2 SEA server) from my PC (attached by LAN) and from my laptop via the CMD. The result is confusing, because its more or less, is same.

I also tried to use some utilities, like "the great" WTFast and "free" TCP Optimizer, none of them is really working. Sometimes, WTFast helping a lot, but sometimes its not working. (i dont know why)

And i tried to change my DNS,from google's to singapore free DNS...but i think it has no effect. I also turn off any chat/browser and antivirus while playing.

I think maybe my real problem is i dont know how to troubleshoot what is wrong with my internet.

Important note :

I just remembered that my internet speed is faster than it should be. My internet package is only up to 512 kbps, but i got around 700 kbps. Do you think this is the source of my problem?

Thank you very much for your help, and sorry for my bad english.

 

[Yingda Wang]

Lag spikes are often caused by packet lose, which is related to ur wifi strengh, and ur router. But lan is always more reliable. Use it when u can.

 

[Tama Handika]

Lag spikes are often caused by packet lose, which is related to ur wifi strengh, and ur router. But lan is always more reliable. Use it when u can.

Thanks for your help. I forgot to mention that my packet loss is (almost) always 0

 

[Yingda Wang]

There are SO many factors that can cause a ping spike. Changing to lan will eliminate some of them, but it doesnt garantie that it will solve the problem.

 

[Solandri]

After doing some research, people said it might be because im using wifi instead of LAN cable. Is it true? My laptop position is around 3 meter away from the router, and theres no thick wall between us.

While there's no way to be sure what's causing your lag spikes, yes they're right. Proximity to the router does not guarantee a good wifi signal. Microwave ovens (2.15 GHz) for example can wreak havoc with 2.4 GHz wifi signals. If you're that close to the router, just try an ethernet cable and see if the problem goes away.

I just remembered that my internet speed is faster than it should be. My internet package is only up to 512 kbps, but i got around 700 kbps. Do you think this is the source of my problem?

Another possibility if your Internet speed is that slow is that you may be saturating your upload bandwidth. TCP/IP requires computers to send confirmation packets to each other ("Did you get that packet?" "Yeah I got it" "Ok here's the next packet"). If your upstream bandwidth is saturated, the "Yeah I got that" can be delayed, resulting in a delay before you receive the next packet. Games use UDP to avoid this problem (skips the confirmation). But some parts of Steam use TCP, and there are basic network protocols which rely on TCP.

The problem happens most frequently when someone in your house is also filesharing and hasn't limited their upload bandwidth. The fix is to limit the upload bandwidth in the filesharing program, or to turn on QOS in your router and limit the upload bandwidth to about 80% your max.

 

[Tama Handika]

After doing some research, people said it might be because im using wifi instead of LAN cable. Is it true? My laptop position is around 3 meter away from the router, and theres no thick wall between us.

While there's no way to be sure what's causing your lag spikes, yes they're right. Proximity to the router does not guarantee a good wifi signal. Microwave ovens (2.15 GHz) for example can wreak havoc with 2.4 GHz wifi signals. If you're that close to the router, just try an ethernet cable and see if the problem goes away.

I just remembered that my internet speed is faster than it should be. My internet package is only up to 512 kbps, but i got around 700 kbps. Do you think this is the source of my problem?

Another possibility if your Internet speed is that slow is that you may be saturating your upload bandwidth. TCP/IP requires computers to send confirmation packets to each other ("Did you get that packet?" "Yeah I got it" "Ok here's the next packet"). If your upstream bandwidth is saturated, the "Yeah I got that" can be delayed, resulting in a delay before you receive the next packet. Games use UDP to avoid this problem (skips the confirmation). But some parts of Steam use TCP, and there are basic network protocols which rely on TCP.

The problem happens most frequently when someone in your house is also filesharing and hasn't limited their upload bandwidth. The fix is to limit the upload bandwidth in the filesharing program, or to turn on QOS in your router and limit the upload bandwidth to about 80% your max.

Thanks for your help. I think no one in my house is uploading something big. Well we always download something (streaming video, open web page). What do you think about this?

 

[bill001g]

You need to test for a while on a lan connection. It is really tough to try to find problems when you have wireless involved. If you have issues on your lan then you can spend time trying to debug that. It tends to be very hard to narrow things down when you have too many variables.

When you download you always have some corresponding upload. It tends to be very small but you computer must send small messages back telling the serer you have received the data. This is a over simplification but it avoids getting into the discussion of how tcp really works. It tends to happen more often on small dsl connection like yours since the upload is so small. Still I would not even go down the route to look at this possibility until you have made sure it is not the wireless...QoS is not a trivial thing to get configured correctly.

 

[Rugl]

LAN is always the answer.

When your ping decides to jitter you can lose a whole bunch of UDP connection. LAN is never going to fail and be spot on since it is the same connection as yours, just maybe a 2-10 ms difference.

 

[Tama Handika]

Thanks a lot everyone 😀

I will try LAN shortly.