Lag Problems

[Linra]

Hello everyone...

First I want to say sorry if this is in the wrong forum, I couldn't find a forum dedicated to in-game problems. If there is one and I missed it, sorry again D=

Anyway on to my problem... Ever since my bf got me the game I've been having a lot of fun. But one thing kept bothering me, lag. Before it usually happened at a set time, around 8-9ish pm my Connection Status Meter would show R dropping to 0. It would then spike up to 250ish then drop back to 0. And my % would slowly make it's way to 0%, occasionally going back to 100% before lowering again. About half of the time this whole situation would end with me completely disconnecting from the game (lucky me for playing with friends and not a pick up group). And when I finally get past the "That character is still online" stuff, and get back on the game the lag is usually still there for a few more minutes, sometimes disconnecting me all over again. The other half of the time the problem would just fix itself and I could go on playing normally. This whole thing usually takes about 5 - 7 minutes to finally calm itself down.


I was able to live with it though, since I'm not really an expert when it comes to this time of computer stuff, and it was only happening once a every other day on average. However, today it just got completely out of hand. When I first logged on this morning about 30 minutes into it I got the lag spike, imagine my surpise it happening this early... and about an hour later it happened again. Both being the disconnection version. Luckly I had to go afk before attempting my Ramuh battle... after attempting my Ramuh battle and going afk for about 10 minutes I see it happened again..

Has anyone else experienced something like this? I would really love a fix to this... there's a lot of stuff I can put up with, but something like this is just not one of them...

Thank you so much for your time, and sorry for making this such a long read,
Linra

P.S.
If it helps, I have Cable internet and have a Router.

P.P.S.
I forgot to add, that this is only FFXI, nothing else internet wise is giving me any problems whatsoever...

[Anaki]

is it possible that at 8-9ish pm a program in the background pops up? for me at 8pm on fridays norton antivirus turns on and makes really bad lag for me at which i usualy temp log and turn off norton o.O

[Linra]

Sadly that's not it ;.; Norton for me is set to start up at 3am, and it's also not a Frames lag, it's like I can walk around normally, but other people, monsters, spells, chat, everything take forever to work.

[Anaki]

hmm another problem i had was when my mom woud log onto the internet (cable connection through a router, i use a wire mom uses wireless on her laptop) i would get for about 5 mins or so really bad lag. R going back and forth between a number and 0 my % getting to 0 i couldn't log out due to lag (it could get to 5 seconds t log then stop responding) and i wouldn't d/c for some odd reason. so by any chance wen you get this lag is someone logging ont te internet when it starts?

[Jei]

I used to have that problem when I still use DSL. Around 9PM PST everyday my connection will go bad. This affected everything not only FFXI. Sometimes it lasted only couple minutes, but more often it would last until mid night... so that's 3 hours of me not being able to access the internet at all. It's not my modem, it's not my router, no matter what I used, I would still have the problem. I called my ISP, they said my connection was fine and if the problem keeps on going I have to recall them so they can send in technicians to me. And they will fix my line if that's what needed to be done... but... I will have to pay.

So after bearing with is for about 3 months I said screw it. I got myself a comcast cable internet and it's 100 times better -.- and im paying only $10 more per month compare to DSL.

[Linra]

hmm another problem i had was when my mom woud log onto the internet (cable connection through a router, i use a wire mom uses wireless on her laptop) i would get for about 5 mins or so really bad lag. R going back and forth between a number and 0 my % getting to 0 i couldn't log out due to lag (it could get to 5 seconds t log then stop responding) and i wouldn't d/c for some odd reason. so by any chance wen you get this lag is someone logging ont te internet when it starts?

Hmm... that could be... I noticed this morning my sister was on the computer, and other nights my brother usually gets on the computer around that time of night... Is there anything I can do about that? ;.;

[Spinnthrift]

Hmm... that could be... I noticed this morning my sister was on the computer, and other nights my brother usually gets on the computer around that time of night... Is there anything I can do about that? ;.;

Well.. abject violence and the fear of God will oft deter a younger sibling from interrupting your game time.

The downside is if you're younger than them, the above method doesn't work.

Other than that - you could ask them to warn you when they're going to go online. Certainly won't always fix the problem, but might help - or set times when they can download stuff while you're not in the middle of a boss fight.

[Anaki]

oh ya another note. for me it was only when my mom used her wireless. my sister had her laptop hooked up using a wire and that wouldn't cause any lag. (even when she turns on kazzaa and such to download) i think the problem for me went away when i got a new router but i dont really remember the exact time and such :x

[Aeolus]

I had this problem once because of my ISP. We had been using to much bandwidth between peak times in my flat so we put on with the heavy users between peak times. This screwed our net up something rotten, had to eventually complain to get taken off the heavy users, but I would dc at 6pm when we were shifted then dc again at 11pm when we were taken back off. Sometimes it would lag awfull like you seem to be getting, 15 mins was the longest Id lagged for before getting dc eventually. Doubt thats your problem tho but just in case o.O

[MisterCookie]

It may be a router problem, when I first started using mine to play FFXI I'd occasionally get a day of intermittant lag. I changed the router firmware and it suddenly started working again. Also, double check that the ports are open on your firewall for those used by FFXI.

[Rinaminori]

This happened to me months ago. I'm not sure if it's the same problem, it never happened at a certain time, but just running a good virus scan over night worked for me. Maybe you could try that before spending any money to get it fixed.

[Kadenmire]

If you are using an 1102b router you might try upgrading to an 1102g. The g class routers allow up to gigabit transfer rates. a little pricey but definetly worth it.:thumbsup:

[Eohmer]

I get this too. :-P

[little ninja]

I used to have that problem when I still use DSL. Around 9PM PST everyday my connection will go bad. This affected everything not only FFXI. Sometimes it lasted only couple minutes, but more often it would last until mid night... so that's 3 hours of me not being able to access the internet at all. It's not my modem, it's not my router, no matter what I used, I would still have the problem. I called my ISP, they said my connection was fine and if the problem keeps on going I have to recall them so they can send in technicians to me. And they will fix my line if that's what needed to be done... but... I will have to pay.

So after bearing with is for about 3 months I said screw it. I got myself a comcast cable internet and it's 100 times better -.- and im paying only $10 more per month compare to DSL.

lol we are the oppisite. i was once a fed up comcast user who switched to dsl an couldnt be happier. comcast use to boot me off at odd times. seems they were always fixing something.

sounds like its more ISP then anything else. an something you should contact them about.

[Linra]

If you are using an 1102b router you might try upgrading to an 1102g. The g class routers allow up to gigabit transfer rates. a little pricey but definetly worth it.:thumbsup:

I understood Router... the other stuff just flew right over my head...

[Jarre]

There are various problems with different ISP's with certain "busy" times where to stop the servers frocrashign due to load, they limit the bandwith of everyone so no doubtly the connection is slower.

Also if you have more computers taking to the router, the bandwith is further limited as your allocated bandwith is split between the computers, if they decide to download a large file, it take up more bandwidth and in no doubt can take all he bandwith starving your game as the route prioritises the data transfer to the download.

thats what happened to my mates when he was playing counterstrike and I downloaded a file.

[Kadenmire]

I understood Router... the other stuff just flew right over my head...

My bad I was half asleep and typed it wrong it should be 802.11b/g not 1102. 802.11b/g is the IEEE standered for small scale routers such as D-Link and Linksys.
Class B routers can only handle 10 mps (MB per Sec) while the G class can handle a range starting at 10 mps and going up to 1 gigabit (1 gig packets). If you would like some more info check out the links below.

http://grouper.ieee.org/groups/802/11/

http://www.howstuffworks.com/router.htm

[Meth]

Sounds like an ISP problem to me. I used to live in an apartment complex with this problem. The issue was the amount of bandwidth allotted to the complex was to small, and during peak hours my high-speed cable resembled a dial-up modem. I mean it could be the router, but the fact that it's happening during peak user hours consistently would have me calling my ISP and complaining. A simple test you can try would be this: Go to www.toast.net (look for "internet speed tests" under "channels") and run through their speed tests. Do the tests a few different times during the day and run them through your router and directly through the modem if possible for best results. You should notice a slight slowdown when going through the router, but nothing big. If I'm right you'll notice a huge difference during peak hours even when running directly through the modem.

[Linra]

Thank you all, I'll look into each and every one of these ^^

[little ninja]

i hate routers, i had to reset mine so many times it wasnt even funny. not to mention always having to reconfig it. in the end i just got fed up an ran ethernet cord to the other computers.