Can Port Forwarding help reduce my lag?

[Nematode]

Hihi, Im playing UO from the opposite side of the world and being in the 250 - 320 ms lag range is quite normal for me.

Though Im not experiencing any extra lag recently, I was wondering if I can better my connection to UO. Im not much of a multitasker, and UO is usually the only programme that is being run when I play.

Any "techies" out there can assist with this?

 

[Littleblue]

Make sure your computer is clean of spyware and malware. Spybot Search and Destroy and Ad Aware are both good programs that are free and easy to use, and pretty effective of removing bad stuff.

If you have Windows Updates waiting to be applied, run those as soon as you can. Also turn off any extras like program helpers and icons that fire up on startup. Usually you never use these extras and they just take processing power away from your main task.

Increasing the page file size to enable more of your harddisk space to be used as virtual memory can be a little help, especially if you don't have alot of RAM in your system.

Don't know if these are the kinds of tips you are looking for or not...I apologize if you have already done these.

 

[Maplestone]

If you're on the opposite side of the earth from a server, you are unfortunately starting to bump up against the speed of light.

It takes about 70ms for light to get halfway around the earth - much longer if to bounces off any satillites or if it has to zig-zap through ocean cables not going straight between continents along its way. In addition, there is a slight hesitation for the signal to be processed through each device it touches.

There's always a chance that you can find some slightly faster route if your ISP has any inefficent connections, but talking to a server on the far side of the world, the laws of physics are starting to get in the way.

 

[Bomb Bloke]

Specifically speaking, no, port forwarding will not aid you against UO lag in the slightest.

 

[Harlequin]

When you say port forwarding, are you saying you are running with a router?

Port forwarding is normally linked to routers doing NAT (network address translaction). It is required to play certain games, or else you can't even connect.

However, if you can already connect, it will not impact your lag. It can be improved if your ISP works out a deal with another carrier which requires less "hops" between their routers. But you have to talk to your ISP regarding that, fat chance of it happening just because 1 customer asked for it though.

Alternatively, try playing servers nearer to you.

 

[Nexus]

If you're on the opposite side of the earth from a server, you are unfortunately starting to bump up against the speed of light.

It takes about 70ms for light to get halfway around the earth - much longer if to bounces off any satillites or if it has to zig-zap through ocean cables not going straight between continents along its way. In addition, there is a slight hesitation for the signal to be processed through each device it touches.

There's always a chance that you can find some slightly faster route if your ISP has any inefficent connections, but talking to a server on the far side of the world, the laws of physics are starting to get in the way.

Don't forget attenuation and the the need for a repeater along that line Even Fiber connection need them after a certain distance. I think 4bd/km is the standard deviation these days though if your network is using photonic crystal cable that has less effect since you start off with a stronger signal to begin with. Spliced lines can make the attenuation a more serious issue though and from personal experience most fiber is sent to cablers in 30 kkm spools (I used to work for Corning making optical fiber for telecommunications). This would mean that to cross even a continent your going to have several splices in the line leading to the need for signal repeaters.

 

[Nevyn]

If you're willing to pay a bit, you could probably shave 100+ ms or so off your ping by looking into SSH tunneling to a server nearish to the server you play on. I know there are dedicated services doing this targetted towards players of other games, dunno what the current state of things with UO is though.

 

[Warrior of Time]

I have played from the Eastern time zone to Formosa before. I think I was getting hit 3 sec before I could react.

No matter what you buy or do your going to deal with that. Best thing to do is play a closer shard. Don't get me wrong I liked it there for diff reasons, but the lag was not one of them.

In the end it is best to play a closer shard. There is a big diff between have in less lag and no more than normal.

 

[WarUltima]

No it will not help in the slightest way.
If you provide more info it will be easier maybe some people can help you.

1. Ping to the shard you play on.
2. tracert to your server is even better.
3. Spend some bulks and do a raid 0 array w/ two really fast harddrives (e.g WD Raptor) and run a stripped down version of windows and UO exclusively
4. Unlawful to talk about here.

and so on. ok it's getting too geekish I am done.

Anyways, if you are simply too far away from the server you are SOL. Unless you got a super ISP. My friend in Japan is running on 100Mbps fiber and pings 25ms to sonoma... and he out runs me all day everyday. Crazy thing is I am paying well over 60 bulks a month for the fastest COX HSInternet premium which has 12Mbps download stream and he gets that 100Mbps for around $45 per month. And he said its very common in Japan.