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Geek Culture / needing help determining specs for a dedicated game server.

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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 06:49
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i know all there is to know about pc hardware. i built this pc last yr, and in the time i've had it, it's crashed so rarely (even under windows) then i once forgot where the reset button was. when it comes to graphics card's and AMD vs intel, i know whats good for what etc, but now i want to make a server, and im stuck.

The server's going to be for hosting games such as CS:source, and BF2, and i need to know what kind of specs would be needed. I realise water cooling and a decent graphics acrd would be unnessecery, but anything other than that i;m stuck on. any ideas on what type of RAM i should get? whether i need loads of memory or FSB, or if it doesnt matter much. i'm pretty much decided that i should get an intel CPU, but which one in particular? i wont be needing a sound card and i'll be trying to aim for a mbo with on board graphics.
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Oneka
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 07:21 Edited at: 26th Jun 2005 07:29
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I think a server with a 2gigs of ram or more would be good for running the server btw how many poeple is the max?

Making better games everday!
Oh yeah and just so you know its Oh-nek-a not One-ka!
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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 07:23 Edited at: 26th Jun 2005 07:27
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I would think only the top-of-the-line PC will do (you dont want the server to be responsable for any lag), so even though the games aren't 64-bit, I would go for an AMD 64-bit (and possibly the 64-bit version of Windows). At least 2Gb of DDR RAM (preferable 4 or 8 of the fastest 4400 type), SATA hard drives (possibly in RAID 1+0 formation).

As its hosting, you dont really want much in the way of graphics card, so it doesn't really matter about that.

You'll also need ADSL 2Mb (or 4/8 if your in London and you can get that). Preferably fast SDSL or bonded ADSL


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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 07:58 Edited at: 26th Jun 2005 08:00
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i wouldn't have thought that hard drive type would have mattered for a games server, only web servers since they have actual storage needs, i was thinking i could make do with just a plain old 20gb ide hdd i had lying around...

i also plan on using linux aswell...

and its 64 players max
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Raven
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 08:33
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You can setup Dedicated Source Engine and BattleField Servers on moderately pathetic systems.

No graphics card requirement for them, as Dedicate Servers run as console only.

Given Source will be the most demanding your looking at under Windows XP:

Intel Pentium III 700MHz
128MB Ram (recommend complimentary to your CPU FSB)
2GB Free Hard Disk Space (for Virtual Memory)
Broadband Connection

As far as the most important part being, is actually a very quick Ethernet Setup; with High Data Bandwidth Broadband.

Upload Speed
256Kb = up to 8 Players
512Kb = up to 16 Players
1Mb = up to 32 Players
2Mb = up to 48 Players
3Mb+ = up to 64 Player

The more you can upload the quicker the games will run.
As far as Pings go this is directly proportional to the Download Speed of the Client.

A good example is that is my connection.
256Kb Upload, if I connect to myself I get 100ms Ping; While I didn't tweak the datarate (which I probably should've) the fact is that my connection was trying to download more often than my server connection could handle, as such this caused a higher ping as my connection flooded the server calls.

Hense why setting up your DataRate is so important.

Generally you want to make sure that you have the connection (upload) speed higher than what you expect from your quickest client; and also enough bandwidth to accomidate the players you want.

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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 08:37
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players playing on servers with those kinds of specs wont notice any high ping etc?
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Raven
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 08:49
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the actual machine specifications are pretty unimportant.
All Source Servers need to do is Handle Game Data, and Handle Physics Data.

Really you could probably easily get away with a Pentium II 400MHz.
It's the broadband connection that is the main issue.

To have some sort of reasonable ping for your players I'd comments a DSL 3Mb Connection.

3Mbit Down 1Mbit(atleast) Up is what you need to be aiming for to get reasonable pings.

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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 18:41
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Quote: "At least 2Gb of DDR RAM (preferable 4 or 8 of the fastest 4400 type)"


you meant preferably have 4-8 gb of ram?!?!?!?!?
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Mnemonix
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 19:06
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I think he means sticks

4 if its 512mb and 8 if its 256mb

WE SHALL BECOME ALL POWERFUL! CRUSH THE LESSER RACES! CONQUER THE GALAXY! UNIMAGINABLE POWER! UNLIMITED RICE PUDDING ! ! ! ETC. ! ! ! ETC.! ! !
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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 19:50
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and where the hell do i get a motherboard with 8 ddr ram slots?
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Mnemonix
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Posted: 26th Jun 2005 19:52
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hmm

mobos 'r' us?

WE SHALL BECOME ALL POWERFUL! CRUSH THE LESSER RACES! CONQUER THE GALAXY! UNIMAGINABLE POWER! UNLIMITED RICE PUDDING ! ! ! ETC. ! ! ! ETC.! ! !
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lagmaster
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 00:34
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on average most internet games would have a ball park data transfer rate of 4-5kb/s per person.

so for the average broadband user in the uk to get 256kbits you can roughly handle 5-6 players with a decent ping, any more users and gameplay will go down the pan.

for example if you wanted to rent a tfc server, jolt.co.uk offer a 12 player server for £18 (cs 1.6 £22) which is not bad value for money if you have a decent sized clan. if you wanted just a private server, you'll set it up to nearly how much you can take on the upload.

most dedicated servers should run off next to poor quality computers, but i think steam will be the only one that wants more memory and stuff.

p.s. only posting this because i think raven's comments are not all true.

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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 03:32 Edited at: 27th Jun 2005 03:36
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Quote: "you meant preferably have 4-8 gb of ram?!?!?!?!?"

Yes, 1GB RAM is cheap now, £77 per GB, so 4Gb would cost £312

I've got 4 slots in my machine, so I could take it up to 4GB
Oh, and you can get 2GB chips too - they are expensive.


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mm0zct
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 03:54 Edited at: 27th Jun 2005 03:56
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to add to what raven said i actually have a 400MHz PII with 256MB RAM and an 8MB aiw pro graphics card as my server on my lan, the source dedicated server runs at 20fps with no player however, i'd hardly call it a capable source server.

it will soon be replaced by a 1.3GHz duron with 256/512MB ram and a 32mb TNT2 graphics card when my sis gets her next upgrades to her pc

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Raven
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 05:01
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Quote: "p.s. only posting this because i think raven's comments are not all true."


I did some practical studies of this a few months ago, because I originally thought that speed was proportional to the U/D Speed; but it isn't true.

I was able to run 1-8 people on my CS:S Server at 100ms, there was no difference on how many. So it's more the refresh, the tests were done with both dedicated and standard .. no difference could be shown.

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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 06:17
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100ms is a poor ping rate imo...
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lagmaster
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 08:52
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with 256kb/s it can hold 6 players at 20-50ms, any more and the server will have random moments at lag spikes, never a good thing to get 1000ms ping when your trying to snipe, only to find when you return your dead.

any broadband user will tell you, 100ms is barely acceptable. on a good day i can get 19-20ms on a server.

ask the question, which sniper will beat the other sniper, the 20ms player or the 100ms player.

i would only accept ~100ms pings on a server outside the uk. but in the uk i prefer <25ms

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0_x
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 09:13 Edited at: 27th Jun 2005 09:31
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I've done a bit of searching on the good old internet and found these specs for a bf2 server ->

http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?s=ee2757a1192d048592d7db5919dd38ca&p=1002861#post1002861

Quote: "Linux:
Minimum specifications for 16 players - Processor: 1.0 GHz and Memory: 256 MB RAM

Recommended specifications for 64 players - Processor: Intel Pentium IV or Athlon XP 3.0 GHz or Opteron 64-bit 1.8 GHz and Memory: 1 GB RAM

Windows:
Minimum specifications for 16 players - Processor: 1.0 GHz and Memory: 384 MB RAM

Recommended specifications for 64 players - Processor: Intel Pentium IV or Athlon XP 3.0 GHz and Memory: 1 GB RAM

Bandwidth: 2.5 Mbit. Recomended: 5 Mbit"


http://www.firingsquad.com/guides/battlefield_2_linux_server_setup/

Quote: "Now, the required specs for a 16 player server is 2.5 Mbit throughput, 1 ghz processor and 256 MB of RAM. Not too steep, really, but you'll want more than that to run even a 16 player server smoothly."


Check the url out for a guide on setting up a bf2 server along with the various settings etc.

I have also looked at bf2 game servers which you can rent and their specs go something like this ->

Quote: "Dual 2.8GHz Xeons / with Hyper-Threading
2 x 80GB IDE HDD
2048mb DDR"


Hope that helps

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Raven
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 09:58
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Quote: "with 256kb/s it can hold 6 players at 20-50ms, any more and the server will have random moments at lag spikes, never a good thing to get 1000ms ping when your trying to snipe, only to find when you return your dead."


I can promise you this isn't true. I can't even connect to my own server at less than 100ms, that is at 256Kb Upload and 3Mb Download.

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Undercover Steve
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Posted: 27th Jun 2005 10:10
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I dont have a huge connection (qwest 1.5mb adsl)....
So it would lag bad? I really want a server...and I meet all other specs completely.
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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 28th Jun 2005 01:25
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Quote: "I have also looked at bf2 game servers which you can rent and their specs go something like this ->

Quote: "Dual 2.8GHz Xeons / with Hyper-Threading
2 x 80GB IDE HDD
2048mb DDR""


seems a bit overkill to me

Quote: "Bandwidth: 2.5 Mbit. Recomended: 5 Mbit""


is that upload speed or overall connection?
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0_x
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Posted: 28th Jun 2005 01:27 Edited at: 28th Jun 2005 01:37
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Raven, yesterday I started a single player game in bf2 and froog joined in just like a co-op game with 30 bots & 2 people and his ping was around 40-50ms and my upload is 256kbit / 2mbit down so I don't know what you are doing wrong lol

EDIT: Not sure on that one froog :S

Quote: "its saying recomended 2.5mbps required 5.0 reccomended, remeber this is not download speed, this is upload speed, as other people will be downloading information from you, your download speed will most likely be much much higer than the upload speed you have, i would double double check this"


That's gonna cost a bit for that kind of upload

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MiR
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Posted: 28th Jun 2005 01:45
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Wow. 5mbps upload. Unless you get ADSL dedicated to uploading (I remember seeing connections where the upload is far faster than the download) that would mean you´d have to have a connection with 10-20mbps download. That´s beyond standard ADSL surely. How many bloody players is that for?


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dre
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Posted: 28th Jun 2005 12:41 Edited at: 28th Jun 2005 12:44
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For a server, you need a good connection, I'd recommend 2mb/s. Next, get a capable cpu, like a 2 ghz or equivelant, with as much cache as possible, 1mb recommended, or even better, a dual core system. When it comes to memory, running an athlon 64 with dual-channel ddr 400 will do you good, if you buy the best timings you can, for example 2-3-2-6-1 is pretty much the best you can get, because you want the fastest response time, and 1 gig should do you fine for dedicated games. If you decide to get an intel cpu, take a look at the prescott and dual core p4 series. Also, consider getting WD Raptors in RAID 0 because they have such low seek times and do great in server benchmarks in response time, compared to more expensive SCSI drives. If your budget wont allow for Raptors, then get Seagate Barracuda 7200.7 instead. Well, there's a little bit of my know how, hope it helps.

Athlon 64 X2 4400+, nForce 4 Ultra chipset, 1 gig ddr400 d-channel,Radeon X850XT PE PCI-E,2 WD 74 gig Raptors in RAID
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Raven
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Posted: 28th Jun 2005 13:13
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Quote: "Raven, yesterday I started a single player game in bf2 and froog joined in just like a co-op game with 30 bots & 2 people and his ping was around 40-50ms and my upload is 256kbit / 2mbit down so I don't know what you are doing wrong lol"


dunno.. I didn't try BF2, although for some reason almost all of my games run at 100ms ping for anyone connected.

I could try running a Quake2 server later and see what ping everyone gets as that has a highly optimised network engine.
The Steam variations of Half-Life though all seem to use the same network engine now, it isn't quite as good as the standard on imo.

Also might stem from my HDD issue atm; I need to strip a HDD and reinstall Linux & Windows dual-boot again actually. Probably do that later today.

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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 04:13
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no ones explained why i'd need fast hard drives yet... i just dont see the point :/

I just want a games server, not a website server where i'll be needing to store loads of webpages and access them quickly. and why would i need more than 1 hdd?

0_x, the reason for low ping was probably because i was the only human player playing
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the_winch
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 04:33
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Do any of these people suggesting top of the range stuff actually have any experiance running a server?

I would find some people that play the same games as you and ask what they use for servers.

You really shouldn't need anything special, the clients usually need to be a fair bit more powerful than the server.

Latest releases dll_tool v0.9 28 june | patch tool v0.6 22 June | exe_shrink v0.5 15 May
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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 07:18
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well, time for my own input:

im gonna use an old burnt out tnt2, if its too burnt out i'll just get an old gf2 off a mate. Intel Pentium 4 @ 2.4GHz CPU, 4*128mb ram, an old 20gb ide hdd...

anyone know where i can get a REALLY small monitor?

and i still need to decide on the internet connection i'll need

would be easier if people didnt send mixed messages
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OSX Using Happy Dude
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 07:29
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Quote: "anyone know where i can get a REALLY small monitor?"

EBuyer ? Dabs ?

Quote: "would be easier if people didnt send mixed messages"

But thats half the fun


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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 07:49
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i mean around 7 inches or less... theres only so much clutter my desk can allow.
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Raven
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 08:47
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Quote: "Do any of these people suggesting top of the range stuff actually have any experiance running a server?"


I didn't suggest top-end hardware, in-fact I said it didn't need to be anything special. Just need a fairly quick connection.
As yup I have quite a bit of experience running servers on Dial-Up, xDSL, Cable and IPX Connections. Currently downloading Quake though, I'm going to see if my connection speed is going to ping better now that I'm using a DMA/6 Hard-Disk again.

Somethings gone wrong with my other one and it's forcing itself into PIO Mode 4. Try multi-tasking and what it slug the system. heh

Quote: "would be easier if people didnt send mixed messages"


True, but then you don't have a wider experience to take from.

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mm0zct
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 10:04
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don't get a second monitor, get a kvm switch or us realvnc, as for ram source dedicated server requires 256mb ram, since you can get that for about £16 on ebuyer i don't see any reason to use 128mb other than you hve it already.

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0_x
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 10:12 Edited at: 29th Jun 2005 11:07
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Quote: "don't get a second monitor, get a kvm switch or us realvnc, as for ram source dedicated server requires 256mb ram, since you can get that for about £16 on ebuyer i don't see any reason to use 128mb other than you hve it already."


VNC sounds like a good idea

Here's an url for your viewing pleasure -> http://www.tightvnc.com/

Quote: "TightVNC is a free remote control software package derived from the popular VNC software. With TightVNC, you can see the desktop of a remote machine and control it with your local mouse and keyboard, just like you would do it sitting in the front of that computer."


EDIT:
Quote: "0_x, the reason for low ping was probably because i was the only human player playing"


I was playing too

I think you should setup a demo server and we should get a bunch of people to try connecting to your comp and just see what happens as far as ping and playability is concerned.
I say the demo because most people can downlod that for free and as far as I know you can't connect to a full version server with the demo version because of the timelimit in the demo (and therefore also the server game config files will be different and it'll give you an error when you try and connect).

The whole multiplayer thing seems a bit fickle to me as earlier I tried to connect to a server with my full version of the game and I couldn't join the server because I'd altered how many bots there are in singleplayer mode

Quite odd how any alteration of the number of AI bots for singleplayer has any effect on purely human-only multiplayer.. lol for co-op it's understandable though..

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Raven
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Posted: 29th Jun 2005 10:23 Edited at: 29th Jun 2005 10:28
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[href]www.rstudio.co.uk/public/Quake.msi[/href] 10MB Includes WinQuake, GLQuake, and DosQuake ver.1.0.9 all in a handy installer.

Minimum System Configuration:
CPU • Intel Pentium 166 MMX
RAM • 96MB (Under WindowsXP)
GFX • OpenGL1.1 (GLQuake), DirectX3 (WinQuake) or VESA2.0 (Dos Quake) Compliant Graphics Card with 4MB Video RAM
NET • Broadband (not sure with the sync rate ISDN will handle it)
SND • 16-bit Sound Blaster-Compatible

Heh yeah I know, 'break-neck' speeds. Well anyways this should be a relatively good test.

Liandri Server: 81.106.5.37:2600
Game it setup for 16 players, with a refresh of 0.5

There are only 2 levels, however I'll probably crack open Qoole later make some custom things.

[edit]
If you experience any issues with speed, just reboot as the mouse look is fussy without being .qc in.

To enable it ingame just bring down the console (~ or ¬) and type '+mlook'

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Teh Go0rfmeister
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Posted: 30th Jun 2005 05:25
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with this vnc thing it means i have to minimize in the middle of the game to do something on the server, i'd rather get a small 2nd monitor if i could.
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