Fixing Lag issues/Connection Timeouts

[mo-seph]

I notice alot of people who post about issues with screen freezing, connection drop out, lobbys emptying, slow laoding on game screen (such as joining DM, Race, MIssion etc).

 

Alot of these issues relate to your connection, lag, ping and packet loss. Before you jump the gun and blame (whos fault it may or may not be) its best to rule out some stuff from your connection.

 

 

The very first check to make, reset your router.... Often a stale session can become laggy, so refreshing gives you a new session with hopefully a new IP address. It also resets your SNR to the target SNR for your line, If your still getting the same problem... we move on.

 

Wireless

 

FIrstly dont use wireless, as convenient as it might be, its a gamers nightmare and is the most common cause of issues with lag/latency in game. Wireless works in the same way as remote control cars, theres only a limited frequency range that all wireless devices can use. Most routers allow you to change the wireless channel to overcome this. However, wireless channels each overlap by 3 channels, meaning to get a truley independent channel only channels 1,6 and 11 are worth testing. The rest will have some form of overlap so if theres interference on channel 1 it will overlap upto channel 4.

 

This image shows how the wireless frequencies work

 

 

 

Now as theres only a maximum of 13 channels, of which only 3 are truly independent, if there are more than 13 wireless routers within range of yours (which can be upto 100m) then its going to cause congestion, as theres two or more devices per channel.

 

These devices are sharing a limited bandwidth of frequency, of which all the data need sto pass. Where theres more data it goes slower, the same as you would on the freeway at rush hour, compared to going at 1am when theres no traffic.

 

In highly populated areas its not unreasonable to expect 100+ wireless routers all broadcasting within range of each other.... thats a lot of data flying about all of which can congest each other, slowing down transmission speed and increasing packet loss and ping, which for you means lag, loading freezes, delays and stuff jumping about all over your screen.

 

So the first and most important test to begin with is to connect your console wired and see if you get the same issues. If you dont then wireless is the cause and its recommended to only use a wired connection. If you really cant run a long ethernet cable to your router consider something like HomePlug Adaptors, which utilize you house wiring to share the ADSL signal from your router to your device.

 

 

Speed

 

Altho most people think that speed is the be all and end all when it comes to gaming (and streaming or any "live" service) its a fallacy, the quality of your connect bears far more importance than merely how fast it goes. Speed is measured base don the transmission rate of data, however its an average of a number of packets sent... Now if they all arrive on the average time, your connection quality is good. but a bad connection quality can still give good speed results, on the basis that some packets are arriving much faster than average, whereas others are taking much longer (or not arriving at all). This gives the impression of a good speed, but the actual quality of the connection is rubbish, causing lag.

 

So how do we test connection quality?

 

 

Ping

 

Now assuming youve already ruled out wireless and your speed looks reasonable, the next step is to check your ping. There's a slot of website that will do this for you but i would not recommend using them. The reason being that an independent site will use a server for your computer to ping. if there's a lot of people pinging it at once you wont get an accurate result and it may send you on a wild goose chase.

 

So your best option is to pull up a command prompt on your pc/laptop and type "Ping google.com". Using google means you know the services wont be suffering high laods, with the size of google data centres its pretty much impossible that they will be congested.

 

Your ping results will come back looking something like this.

 

 

 

 

Now with the above example you can see that the average ping is 249ms (thats pretty high) but the individual packets sent vary in their transmission rate, from as little as 32ms to as high as 455ms.

 

To make this a bit more real, a ping works like sonar. It sends a small packet to a server, and waits to hear a response. When response is received it records the time. In the above example id expect some pretty sh*tty lag occurring, slidey cars, disappearing textures etc.

 

The reason you see cars sliding or NPC's randomly spawning out of nowhere is because the packet sent from your console to say "im here on the map" takes a while to be received by the R* servers and returned back to your console to say "well if your there, heres an NPC's theres another player and heres a bullet"... Athough were only talking milliseconds its important in terms of smooth gameplay, where everything renders nicely.

 

If your getting high pings your gonna have problems, so how do you detemrine what is causing the high ping?? Run a Traceroute...

 

 

 

Packet Loss

 

So using the example above we can see that although ping is high, each and every packet sent was received and returned (12 packets sent, 12 reiceved, 0% loss).

 

Now packet loss is really important. If a packet doesnt make the round trip then theres some data missing, this can also lead to in game lag and disrupted gameplay in the same/similar pay to ping.

 

An anaolgy of this is to use the Ferrari/Tractor analysis. So in this example we assume your connection/line is like a road. Ferrrari's are fast, Tractors are slow. If the road is smooth (i.e high quality connect, high quality line) then your ferrari can go at top speed, reaching its destination quickly. If we were to send 10 letters, in the hands of 10 ferrari drivers, we expect each one to arrive nicely and quickly.

 

However if your road (connection/line) is more like a ploughed field than an autobahn, sending your letters in a ferrari comes with a risk. Although the ferrari goes fast, on a ploughed field it will be unstable and potentially 1 or 2 will crash. If they never reach their destination your missing 20-30% of the information sent, or getting 20-30% packet loss. IN these cases its much better to use a tracktor, which although slower is more likely to get to its destination.

 

The ferrari and the tractor are the Target SNR (signal to noise ratio) set by your ISP. If your SNR is low (i.e 6db) this is like the ferrari, its fast, but not very accommodating to noise/interference on the line. A higher SNR has a greater degree of tolerance to noise, so is more like the tractor, slower but steadier. You can check your SNR on your router, if its jumping around alot it means you've got noise on your line, which contacting your ISP to change the target SNR can resolve, by improving the connections tolerance to errors and noise. It could also point towards a line/server fault.

 

To check your SNR you need to access your router admin page. For most routers all you need to do is open a browser and type 192.168.1.1 into the address bar (you may need to consult your router instruction manual to check the IP address, but thats the most common one). It will prompt you for a username and password, by default this is usually "admin" in both cases. Your SNr will usually be shown on the front page and will fluctuate depending on time of day.

 

So to measure your packet loss (and see if you need a ferrari or a tractor), again go to a command prompt and type "tracert google.com". Again we're using google to ensure high server capacity and to minimise erroneous results.

 

Now after you hit enter your gonna get a screen that looks like this.

 

 

 

 

 

nice clean trace which follows the packets from the router (192.168.1.1) to google (173.194.36.2) No packets lost and all data sent is received. For a connection like that id expect a pretty smooth gaming experience.

 

If you get something like the below... your in trouble.

 

 

 

 

This is a trace of a chinese computer, trying to access feed-burner. The packet leaves the users pc nicely, hits their router ok, but as it passes to the external service (the chinese ISP) the packets are blocked... This prevents a return from the destination site and leaves the user with something like a 404 error (or if their ISP built a wallgarden to inform them they are trying to access a restricted site)

 

 

Ok so now you know how to look at your connection quality. how do you interpret it.

 

With a traceroute each hop represents a different node (server) that the data is passing through.

 

The usual transit path of data looks something like this...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the above image "router" can be either the users router, the ISP's router (or server) and the host "router" (server) for the site your trying to access. In the case of GTA:O this path would be something like

 

(Console) - (Your router) - (ISP) - (host) - (Rockstar Cloud server)

 

 

To interpret the traceroute you need to be looking for either a) lost packets, which show a "request timed out" error (like hops 7-10 in the image above) or b) packets with a very high ms time, like hop 10 in this image,

 

 

 

The next thing to do is find out who is responsible for the IP address that has the high ms. To do this all you need to do is go to your command prompt and type "whois [iPaddress}) and hit enter. This will bring back the details of who owns the servers for that IP address. You coudl also use a third party website such as WhatsMyIP.com to run this check

 

Going back to our path of (console) - (router) - (isp) (host) (rockstar cloud) everything before the router is your responsibility, The ISP is your ISP and the Host/R* Cloud is a rockstar issue.

 

So if your getting really high times between console and router your probably using wireless with congestion. going to the wireless section at the top of this page should help you resolve it. If your using a wired connection you might want to check your SNR in your router and if this is fluctuating contact your ISP.

 

If your finding the high times on your ISP's IP addresses you need to speak to them. It could be a fault with their servers, overload or indeed an issue with the quality of your line. They can run some capacitance testing on your line to determine if the current settings are appropriate or if there is a line issue that needs to be addressed.

 

If the really high times show on the last couple of hops, your looking at a possible R* issues, prepare yourself for a looong and arduous time submitting support tickets for that.

 

I my experience 80% of all gaming issues lie either with your connection to your router, or your ISP... Its rare that the game servers are overloaded, and when they are this is usually temporary.

 

 

Interleaving vs Fastpath

 

In your router settings you can usually see if interleaving is active on your line. Interleaving is a way your router can overcome minor errors in the connection stream,, without you losing connection. However interleaving can also cause issues with "live" services such as online gaming or streaming. The reason for this is each packet has an overhead. The overhead is basically a set of instructions to your router in how to interpret the information. The reason different target SNR's work is to change the information and size of the overhead, to make the line more stable.

 

The way interleaving works is to send/receive the packets in a non sequential manner. This means they are sent out of order which can help to reduce the total amount of data lost, in the event of packet loss or connection interruption.

 

So to visualize it interleaving works like this.

 

 

 

As you can see the packets are sent out of sequence. This give a greater stability to your connection. However it takes longer to do this, so from a gaming perspective although interleaving is good to retain a strong connection, it can increase ping times compared to a fastpath profile. As we all know increased ping can cause lag, whicyh makes for a rubbish experience... So how does fastpath work.... well like this..

 

 

Now this image works in two ways, its shows us both the benefit, and the danger of fastpath profiles.

 

Fastpath sends the data sequentially. As such it doesnt require the overhead in each packet like interleaving does... What does that mean? It means each packet of data has slightly more actual data in it... in turn it means more data is transmitted per packet, so it reduces the ping (i.e on fastpath to send 100b data sent in 10 packets = 10b per packet.... for interleaved if they have an overhead of 10% each packet can only carry 9b of data, meaning that a total of 12 packets need to be sent, 11 x 9b packets and 1 x 1b packet)... Reduce ping means better gaming experience as data is moving back and forth much faster.

 

Sending the same amount of data over more packets takes longer than sending them in less packets and this is why fastpath can benefit gamers.

 

However the danger is that any lost packets (the red ones in the image above) can cause a fastpath connection to drop, whereas a interleaved profile may retain a connection (although slowed slightly from lost packets) because of the non sequential way in which data is sent. This is like sending the 10 letter in 10 peice, split over the 10 driver. As such if one goes missing its not a full letter your missing, but just one or two lines from each letter, making it easier to interpret the overall information sent becuase theres not a hugh chunk missing in the middle.

 

 

Now I know this has been a pretty long and arduous thread... but rather than my type this to everyone who has problems its easier to write once and link many times over. I hope it helps anyone with lag or server troubles determine if Rockstar really are to blame, or if you need to look slightly closer to home.

 

If you've got any questions (or better still any more advice, things like port forwarding, clearing DHCP tables, using NAT etc... i kinda ran out of time and didnt want to put too much in the OP. ) feel free to post them.

 

 

 

So a quick summary and checklist

 

1- Test a wired connection

2- run a ping test

3- Run a Tracert

4- Check SNR

5 - Contact ISP.

 

 

 

Solutions

 

 

Before you try any of the below options try uninstalling and reinstalling the latest R* update from your console. This will overcome any corruption with data received when installing the latest updates.

 

Also try Clearing your Cache (xbox) or Clear your Cache (ps3)

 

 

1 - Use Wired connections, a wired connection will always reduce the lag caused between your console and your router and eliminate any wireless congestion. a 10m ehternet cable will set you back about 10£/$ so its not a massive expense.

 

2 - Ensure your Router is connected to the first socket after the line comes into your house. This is often know as the "master socket". Using the master socket as opposed to an extension/slave socket ensures your reducing interference from internal wiring issues.

 

3 - Some master sockets (particularly in the UK) have a removable faceplate which your internal extension/slave sockets are connected. If you remove it and there is a test socket behind the faceplate, test there to rule out your internal extensions as a cause. They look like this

 

 

 

 

4 - Keep your router away from other electrical devices where possible. Your internal telephone wiring is basically a huge aerial that can pickup electromagnetic radiation from other electrical devices. Although a difficult one routers are notorious for picking up interference fro other electrical items such as your tv, microwave, stereo etc. A Particular (although laughable cause) is Xmas tree lights. As they draw a varied voltage from the mains wiring, this can cause spikes in noise detected by your router, leading to lag and ping spikes.

 

5 - DONT plug your router into a multiway power adapter, these are usually badly fused/earthed and can cause your router to detect interference from the other devices connected.

 

6 - Contact your ISP and request a fasthpath profile, this can help reduce packet overhead and improve your Ping, but watch out, if your connection has high packet loss a fastpath profile might cause connection drops.

 

7 - If your getting high ping and packet loss shows this to be on an IP addressed owned by your ISP, call them and request a capacitance test on your line.

 

8 - in the unlikely event you are getting packet loss from the Rockstar servers (the last couple of hops on a traceroute)....... Good luck.

Edited March 10, 2014 by mo-seph

[johnwontscore]

Thanks for posting such an informative article. This is the best thing I've read on the subject so far. I'm going untie the girlfriend, give her her clothes back and let her out of the kitchen so she can do all these tests for me.

 

If I could ask your advice about something related: I live in Spain and I play quite a lot of deathmatches with American players. I notice that American players tend to move in a jerky way onscreen and they are a lot harder to kill than European ones. Sometimes they seem almost impossible to kill and when they kill me it's like they do it with the first shot so there's no warning and no chance to roll out of the way. If I invite them to a game I'm hosting, the reverse sometimes seems to be true, they die too easily. When the lag favors them, it seems to me like I am shooting at a target that isn't there, blood spurts out from their heads, but they don't die, kind of like I'm shooting into the past. I thought that maybe I could predict where their heads are likely to really be and shoot into the future, so to speak, but it's very impractical to do this. I've noticed that high fire rate weapons like the AP pistol and the advanced rifle work better and that scoping the weapon works better, but the results still aren't what I would hope for. Any advice on this would be very welcome.

 

She's just tested the ping speed on Google.com with a cable and the results are minimum 9mls, average 10mls, max 12mls.

 

Thanks again for a great article.

Edited March 11, 2014 by johnwontscore

[mo-seph]

Thanks for posting such an informative article. This is the best thing I've read on the subject so far. I'm going untie the girlfriend, give her her clothes back and let her out of the kitchen so she can do all these tests for me.

 

If I could ask your advice about something related: I live in Spain and I play quite a lot of deathmatches with American players. I notice that American players tend to move in a jerky way onscreen and they are a lot harder to kill than European ones. Sometimes they seem almost impossible to kill and when they kill me it's like they do it with the first shot so there's no warning and no chance to roll out of the way. If I invite them to a game I'm hosting, the reverse sometimes seems to be true, they die too easily. When the lag favors them, it seems to me like I am shooting at a target that isn't there, blood spurts out from their heads, but they don't die, kind of like I'm shooting into the past. I thought that maybe I could predict where their heads are likely to really be and shoot into the future, so to speak, but it's very impractical to do this. I've noticed that high fire rate weapons like the AP pistol and the advanced rifle work better and that scoping the weapon works better, but the results still aren't what I would hope for. Any advice on this would be very welcome.

 

She's just tested the ping speed on Google.com with a cable and the results are minimum 9mls, average 10mls, max 12mls.

 

Thanks again for a great article.

 

 

well your ping looks pretty good dude, its possible that the lag your seeing is from the other peoples connections, but a 9ms ping your connection certainly aint lagging.

 

the jerky motion is because the data is going from their console, to r* cloud, to your console, via your respective IP,s... so when they are moving, the fractional delay in that data reaching you means where you see them is where they were, not where they are...

 

if your regularly playing with the same people try switching host, let each guy in the room host and see who has the better connection... i know in my crew theres a few guys who avoid hosting because they get lag, so when racing if the host has lag we all tend to see it, sometimes dropping out of lobbies, whereas if someone else hosts only the person with a dodgy connection sees the lag, and the rest of us tend to have a pretty smooth ride (apart from the one guy jumping all over the screen)...

 

Lag is certainly a bigger issue for shooters than racers... altho it is funny when the guy behind you suddenly appears in front of you at 150mph.

 

 

ps. you can tie the girlfriend up again now and put her back where she came from

 

 

also try pinging these two addresses

 

173.236.165.116

173.236.164.205

 

From what ive found these seem to be the IP's for the R* cloud servers

Edited March 11, 2014 by mo-seph

[johnwontscore]

Thanks for replying mate. She finished the testing and she says it's a tractor and not a Ferrari but everything else checks out very well, at least that's what I thought she said through the gag. I'll try hosting deathmatches if I can in future. It does get irritating when some of these laggers think they are wonderful players when it's all down to their crappy connections, but at least I know why now.

 

Good luck with the racing.

[Avenger664]

That is a detailed answer! It s good that some people really help.

Tahtnks for your contribution.

[mo-seph]

cheers for the props avenger, i do try and be as helpful as i can.

 

but ive given quite a few people advice on fixing/improving connection quality issues, seemed a waste of time to constantly repeat myself so i wrote up a guide that i can link to instead and if anyones got troubles ill always try and help

[johnwontscore]

Pinged those two Rockstar sites. First one was min 117ms, max 124ms, average 121 ms. Second was min 122ms, max 125ms, average 122ms. No packets lost on either. I could maybe copy and paste a full set of tests on those two sites if it would be useful for you, but right now I'm happy with my connection. Thanks for clearing this up for me. If I can ever do you a favour back, just ask.

 

Btw, I hope I didn't give the impression that American players are crappy laggers. Americans are cool to play with, but some players just lag like hell and in deathmatches they teleport a few meters and in between times they headshot you. Quite frustrating.

[Biggie Kaniff]

I have huge problems with playing online. Timed out often and unable to connect to sessions. Invite only works fine, but when connecting and staying in sessions with other people I often get trouble.

 

Read this nice tutorial and it would seem like my ping is very high, how do I fix that?

 

I'm useless with stuff like this and always thought the problem was my NAT type, which is type 2, but that's normal I guess, I have no possibility to bypass my router which is required to get type 1.

 

I have a mac but I could find test ping stuff and that on mac. Would appreciate some guidance!

[mo-seph]

Pinged those two Rockstar sites. First one was min 117ms, max 124ms, average 121 ms. Second was min 122ms, max 125ms, average 122ms. No packets lost on either. I could maybe copy and paste a full set of tests on those two sites if it would be useful for you, but right now I'm happy with my connection. Thanks for clearing this up for me. If I can ever do you a favour back, just ask.

 

Btw, I hope I didn't give the impression that American players are crappy laggers. Americans are cool to play with, but some players just lag like hell and in deathmatches they teleport a few meters and in between times they headshot you. Quite frustrating.

 

oi accept payment in roubles or sexual favours ... haha no but serious im jsut glad it helped

 

and i dont think anyone expects your accusing an entire country of lagging, but i know the way the american telecoms works there can be big variance in the quality of connection,,, bearing in mind USA is a pretty huge and diverse country... some in cities will have an awesome connection, some out in the sticks wont

 

lag is frustrating for everyone, both those affected by it and those seeing it... but we cant all have 1g fibre optic direct to door lines (like in some oriental countries that have aaaaaawesome telecoms infrastructure)

 

 

I have huge problems with playing online. Timed out often and unable to connect to sessions. Invite only works fine, but when connecting and staying in sessions with other people I often get trouble.

 

Read this nice tutorial and it would seem like my ping is very high, how do I fix that?

 

I'm useless with stuff like this and always thought the problem was my NAT type, which is type 2, but that's normal I guess, I have no possibility to bypass my router which is required to get type 1.

 

I have a mac but I could find test ping stuff and that on mac. Would appreciate some guidance!

 

 

do you get the same issue is you bypass the router (i presume you have a seperate modem and router combo)...

 

also are you connecting to your router wireless or wired?

 

for your ping it kinda depends whats causing the issue, if you run a tracerout to google and check if your getting packet loss, or if your getting very high hops... finding the big hops can help detemrine where the high ping is... if its the first two hops its something your side, next couple its your ISp, last few its r*

 

this might help you ping on mac and heres a little info on running a traceroute on a mac

[grand theft spaghetti]

its always your fault, never rockstars.

just ignore the fact the issues with your game happen only after the latest patch.

 

go buy more cash cards!

 

...not to be a complete dick but if your topic helps out a few players fix their issues well done sir.

until the next update/patch anyways.

Edited March 13, 2014 by ijustcameheretobeeotch

[mo-seph]

its always your fault, never rockstars.

just ignore the fact the issues with your game happen only after the latest patch.

 

go buy more cash cards!

 

i love a productive post, dont you.

 

no its not always your fault, but people who complain about lag, blame rockstar, then say they use a wireless connection often need a bit of guidance about how to get the best connection for gaming..

 

if you wana game seriously, you need to be making the most out of your connection before you start blaming R* or your ISP (where a majority of the issues actually lie)...

[mikezilla2]

great post mate

[mo-seph]

cheers mike, sometimes its nice to actually contribute, rather than just flame and troll...

 

with badges, comes great responsibility hahahaha

Edited March 13, 2014 by mo-seph

[lann3fors]

edit

Edited March 15, 2014 by lann3fors

[I_Rock_Totally]

Guys I have a problem.

Everytime I host a mission and my friends join, Istart the mission solo and it says that my friends left the job. But they are also in the job but are also solo. What the hell is wrong? I can't host any mission for my friend. I always have the same problem

 

Anybody an Idea what causes this problem?

My internet is perfectly fine and it never lags or anything, so I don't think it's the reason. Same with the internet of my friends.

[mo-seph]

Guys I have a problem.

Everytime I host a mission and my friends join, Istart the mission solo and it says that my friends left the job. But they are also in the job but are also solo. What the hell is wrong? I can't host any mission for my friend. I always have the same problem

 

Anybody an Idea what causes this problem?

My internet is perfectly fine and it never lags or anything, so I don't think it's the reason. Same with the internet of my friends.

 

 

does the same thing happen if one of your friends hosts and not you?

 

if not then try running a ping and traceroute to see what the results are. theres an IP address for the R* servers above so you can actual traceroute to them directly.

 

did you try the solutions in the OP

[JoeBoneless]

I have suffered many time outs, freezes, and lobbies emptying. My wireless worked good for awhile but today I am going to do what I have to to get wired, hoping this solves my problem

[mo-seph]

I have suffered many time outs, freezes, and lobbies emptying. My wireless worked good for awhile but today I am going to do what I have to to get wired, hoping this solves my problem

 

hey joe, wireless is the bain of gaming, theres so many ways in which wireless can suffer interference which will affect your game quality in most senses its just not worth it if you want a good connection.

 

Give is a shot wired and if your still getting probs run a ping and traceroute to try and get an idea of whats going on

 

there have been some cloud errors the last few days but if youve always had the same problem its definitely worth checking out a bit more.

[JoeBoneless]

Update: I am now wired.

 

WOW

 

all problems SOLVED.

 

Game did freeze once on me but NONE of my usual issues at all anymore!!!

[mo-seph]

Update: I am now wired.

 

WOW

 

all problems SOLVED.

 

Game did freeze once on me but NONE of my usual issues at all anymore!!!

 

 

does make a hhuuuuuuge diference when you mov from wireless to wired mate, which is why thats the first step that i always recommend.

 

As your probably using other wireless devices you might wana take a look at InSSIDer (prob gonna add this to the OP as well) which basically scans all the wireless channels (frequencies) in range of your device and tells you which ones are congested, suffering interference etc.

 

Although id say definitely stick to wired connection for your gaming, you might have previously notice video buffering or some slowdowns in downloads from other devices (pc's laptops, tablets, phones) when using wireless, inSSIDer will help you find out why and which channel is the best to use in your area.

[mo-seph]

its always your fault, never rockstars.

just ignore the fact the issues with your game happen only after the latest patch.

 

go buy more cash cards!

 

...not to be a complete dick but if your topic helps out a few players fix their issues well done sir.

until the next update/patch anyways.

 

 

i appreciate the edit fella, and rather than my response seeming dickish, i thought id update my reply.

 

obviously with patches come changes, with changes comes problems. The idea with this troubleshooting guide isnt to jump on the R* fanboy "everythings perfect" bandwagon... not by a long shot

 

but, before people do go running off to R* submitting tickets to a flawed and extraneously superfluous automated ticketing system (ive been through it and know how annoying it is), that they do everything they can on their side to make sure it is in fact R* that are at fault.... In alot of cases youll find it is internal setup or an ISP issue, but then if you have ruled these out it leaves only one culprit (well technically 2, R*'s coding and dreamhosts hosting on the cloud server)

 

thing is the majority of internet users dont have a clue how it works, hopefully this guide (and it seems to be working) can help people to overcome some of the common problems online gamers have, and get a much better and more enjoyable GTA:O and general gamin experience.

 

 

I have huge problems with playing online. Timed out often and unable to connect to sessions. Invite only works fine, but when connecting and staying in sessions with other people I often get trouble.

 

Read this nice tutorial and it would seem like my ping is very high, how do I fix that?

 

I'm useless with stuff like this and always thought the problem was my NAT type, which is type 2, but that's normal I guess, I have no possibility to bypass my router which is required to get type 1.

 

I have a mac but I could find test ping stuff and that on mac. Would appreciate some guidance!

 

 

how did you get on after our PM buddy?

[Biggie Kaniff]

 

its always your fault, never rockstars.

just ignore the fact the issues with your game happen only after the latest patch.

 

go buy more cash cards!

 

...not to be a complete dick but if your topic helps out a few players fix their issues well done sir.

until the next update/patch anyways.

 

 

i appreciate the edit fella, and rather than my response seeming dickish, i thought id update my reply.

 

obviously with patches come changes, with changes comes problems. The idea with this troubleshooting guide isnt to jump on the R* fanboy "everythings perfect" bandwagon... not by a long shot

 

but, before people do go running off to R* submitting tickets to a flawed and extraneously superfluous automated ticketing system (ive been through it and know how annoying it is), that they do everything they can on their side to make sure it is in fact R* that are at fault.... In alot of cases youll find it is internal setup or an ISP issue, but then if you have ruled these out it leaves only one culprit (well technically 2, R*'s coding and dreamhosts hosting on the cloud server)

 

thing is the majority of internet users dont have a clue how it works, hopefully this guide (and it seems to be working) can help people to overcome some of the common problems online gamers have, and get a much better and more enjoyable GTA:O and general gamin experience.

 

 

I have huge problems with playing online. Timed out often and unable to connect to sessions. Invite only works fine, but when connecting and staying in sessions with other people I often get trouble.

 

Read this nice tutorial and it would seem like my ping is very high, how do I fix that?

 

I'm useless with stuff like this and always thought the problem was my NAT type, which is type 2, but that's normal I guess, I have no possibility to bypass my router which is required to get type 1.

 

I have a mac but I could find test ping stuff and that on mac. Would appreciate some guidance!

 

 

how did you get on after our PM buddy?

 

 

My ISP did some stuff after I talked to them and it works much better now. Still not perfect, but it's pretty good so I'm happy with it for now.

 

Thanks for your help!

[Raylaann]

I don't know where to post this, don't even know how to explain it.. But does anyone keep having the problem where you can't join your friends? I try to join their session but it says "please make sure all players have the latest title update." How can I fix this!?!? I would love to play with my friends.

[mo-seph]

 

 

its always your fault, never rockstars.

just ignore the fact the issues with your game happen only after the latest patch.

 

go buy more cash cards!

 

...not to be a complete dick but if your topic helps out a few players fix their issues well done sir.

until the next update/patch anyways.

 

 

i appreciate the edit fella, and rather than my response seeming dickish, i thought id update my reply.

 

obviously with patches come changes, with changes comes problems. The idea with this troubleshooting guide isnt to jump on the R* fanboy "everythings perfect" bandwagon... not by a long shot

 

but, before people do go running off to R* submitting tickets to a flawed and extraneously superfluous automated ticketing system (ive been through it and know how annoying it is), that they do everything they can on their side to make sure it is in fact R* that are at fault.... In alot of cases youll find it is internal setup or an ISP issue, but then if you have ruled these out it leaves only one culprit (well technically 2, R*'s coding and dreamhosts hosting on the cloud server)

 

thing is the majority of internet users dont have a clue how it works, hopefully this guide (and it seems to be working) can help people to overcome some of the common problems online gamers have, and get a much better and more enjoyable GTA:O and general gamin experience.

 

 

I have huge problems with playing online. Timed out often and unable to connect to sessions. Invite only works fine, but when connecting and staying in sessions with other people I often get trouble.

 

Read this nice tutorial and it would seem like my ping is very high, how do I fix that?

 

I'm useless with stuff like this and always thought the problem was my NAT type, which is type 2, but that's normal I guess, I have no possibility to bypass my router which is required to get type 1.

 

I have a mac but I could find test ping stuff and that on mac. Would appreciate some guidance!

 

 

how did you get on after our PM buddy?

 

 

My ISP did some stuff after I talked to them and it works much better now. Still not perfect, but it's pretty good so I'm happy with it for now.

 

Thanks for your help!

 

 

 

no probs and glad you got some improvement

[Spuds725]

Excellent OP... you seem very knowledgeable so was wondering if you could provide insight on this problem.

 

My PS3 is in my basement and is only about 15 feet from my router (almost directly below it which is in the room above)- I had it run wired previously and it worked fine. I run it wirelessly now and haven't noticed any issues either-- so this issues is not pressing or anything.

 

I have 2 ethernet cables ran to my basement but recently added a smart TV to the basement also-- this TV is used to stream VUDU & NETFLIX and while still close to the router, had issues streaming VUDU in HDX (1080p) over wifi. Because of this I moved the ethernet from the PS3 to the TV-- my other ethernet is connected to my satelite dish box (I use a sling box occassionally to stream video from my sattelite box DVR to my phone/tablet).

 

I have an ethernet switch that I installed in the basement and tried connecting everything to the switch via a single ethernet cable connected to my router-- TV and Sattelite box work fine. The PS3 does not.... it will do it's normal connections stuff and get an IP address (I set all IP addresses on my network from my router)-- and the connection test fine other then the speed test FAILs.

 

After connecting-- the internet works on it-- can stream netflix but does not look to be of the normal quality and it also takes a while to load up. I am unable to game with the connection. So in my case, the wireless connection works ALOT better then my wired.

 

Any thoughts as to what would cause this? Or a suggestion to fix it? I tried releasing the IP address from the router and let the PS3 get assigned one but thats about it.

 

I have used this switch before but not downstream of my router (a few years ago)--- I used to have it between my Modem and router and connected the PS3 to it outside my network so I could get a NAT 1 connection (this allowed my PS3 to grap an IP address directly from my ISP and was super fast)-- I moved the PS3 inside my network so I could stream video to it from a media server.

 

Like I said above, connecting over wifi is not an issue for me but is just bugging me that the PS3 won't connect through the ethernet switch.

[mo-seph]

hey spuds, can you view speed stats from the TV or the satellite box?

 

first port of call would be to take a laptop downstairs and run a speedtest through the switch, if you wireless works fine down there (your lucky) and a direct ethernet cable works as well, then running a speedtest, ping and traceroute through the switch will shed some more light on it...

 

try this:

 

take a laptop down and run a ping and traceroute over wireless,

then if you can using a direct etherent connection (presume form behind the existing switch)

then try one through the switch...

 

if you get big ass hops in the first stage when using the switch but nothing else, your switch might be the cause...

 

given youve got quite an internal netowrk setup its a case of trying to rule out the different components, find out what works and what doesnt and narrow it down.

[Dat_SaintsFan]

Wired but I still have problems

[mo-seph]

Wired but I still have problems

 

you tried ping and traceroutes?

[Dat_SaintsFan]

 

Wired but I still have problems

 

you tried ping and traceroutes?

nope.im not good at using the com.afraid I might screw things up

[mo-seph]

there's literally nothing you can break when you run a ping or traceroute,

 

if you follow the guide youll be fine...