I am experiencing unusually high ping times. I have been averaging roughly 80 since I started playing in January.... now I am floating anywhere between 400 and 300.

I have tested my interent connection, talked to my provider, etc... and it seems to be VO specific. Also, I have pinged numerous websites and vendetta-online.com is consistent with my ingame ping times when other sites are below 20.

My rig:

Dual 2ghz G5
2.5 gigs Ram
OSX 10.3.8

Gavan

Do a traceroute...

Ok, heres the result of the traceroute. Now I am a complete noob at this kind of stuff, so if someone could maybe decipher it for me? Obviously it would appear that things are getting hung up at:

atlas.cogentco.com

and

38.112.26.190

But I don't know what this means or what to do about it.

Traceroute has started ...

traceroute to 207.67.118.34 (207.67.118.34), 30 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 d154-20-64-254 (154.20.64.254) 7.895 ms 9.89 ms 8.893 ms
2 208.181.240.62 (208.181.240.62) 7.581 ms 6.874 ms 7.687 ms
3 vancbc01gr01.bb.telus.com (154.11.4.97) 9.082 ms 8.838 ms 7.782 ms
4 vancbc01br01.bb.telus.com (154.11.10.89) 61.856 ms 62.466 ms 63.288 ms
5 clgrab21br01.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.42) 61.794 ms 62.221 ms 62.077 ms
6 wnpgmb38br00.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.78) 62.27 ms 61.999 ms 62.828 ms
7 wnpgmbabbr00.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.157) 62.159 ms 62.187 ms 61.74 ms
8 toroonnlbr00.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.146) 62.773 ms 62.976 ms 62.305 ms
9 * * *
10 toroonxngr00.bb.telus.com (154.11.11.54) 60.737 ms 61.978 ms 61.074 ms
11 * * *
12 p13-0.core02.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.213) 189.733 ms 190.104 ms 191.661 ms
13 p12-0.core03.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.3.154) 319.294 ms 315.04 ms 307.209 ms
14 p4-0.ca02.mke01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.1.154) 184.003 ms 185.191 ms 194.001 ms
15 38.112.26.190 (38.112.26.190) 324.925 ms 339.679 ms 335.574 ms
[extraneous * * *'s trimmed -a1k0n]

edit: I pinged 12-15 all seperately, and they all delivered +300 pings conistently, with number 15 dropping 10% of its packets. I don't know what this means though. I am now officially in over my head.

Yeah, our isp had problems with connectivity last week and we had to switch over to a different network.

HOST: Darkmere Loss% Snt Last Avg Best Wrst StDev
5. rif4-cr1-png-nrk.se.sn.net 0.0% 10 5.0 4.5 3.9 5.4 0.4
6. rif5.cr2.png.nrk.se.sn.net 0.0% 10 4.8 4.6 3.9 5.4 0.5
7. rif17-rs2-t4-sto.se.sn.net 0.0% 10 6.2 19.8 5.5 79.3 28.5
8. rif1-cr3-t4-sto.se.sn.net 0.0% 10 7.2 6.8 6.2 7.4 0.4
9. ge0-0.tg4-p1.sto.se.sn.net 0.0% 10 6.0 6.6 5.7 7.2 0.6
10. ae1.joo-peer1.ams.nl.sn.net 0.0% 10 27.8 31.1 27.1 58.6 9.7
11. portch1.core01.ams03.atlas.c 0.0% 10 27.6 28.1 27.4 29.4 0.6
12. p5-0.core01.lon02.atlas.coge 0.0% 10 37.2 65.8 36.3 187.5 61.3
13. p6-0.core02.jfk01.atlas.coge 0.0% 10 112.6 115.1 112.4 119.6 2.4
14. p12-0.core02.jfk02.atlas.cog 0.0% 10 112.8 116.1 112.4 131.0 5.6
15. p14-0.core02.ord01.atlas.cog 10.0% 10 227.2 214.2 139.8 334.4 58.1
16. p12-0.core03.ord01.atlas.cog 0.0% 10 139.6 142.0 139.3 146.1 2.5
17. p4-0.ca02.mke01.atlas.cogent 0.0% 10 142.5 144.0 141.8 148.6 2.3
18. 38.112.26.190 10.0% 10 144.2 145.9 142.6 152.4 3.5
19. 207-67-118-42.guildsoftware. 10.0% 10 143.6 145.4 142.9 152.0 3.1

Highlighted the first one that seems to really do strange things here.

majikthise.guildsoftware.com

Tracing route to majikthise.guildsoftware.com [207.67.118.42]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

3 14 ms 13 ms 14 ms 10g-9-2-ur02.rehoboth.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.144.97]
4 16 ms 14 ms 12 ms 10g-9-1-ur01.rehobeth.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.145.33]
5 13 ms 13 ms 11 ms 10g-9-3-ur02.foxboro.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.144.117]
6 27 ms 14 ms 15 ms 10g-9-3-ur01.brockton.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.144.37]
7 13 ms 15 ms 12 ms 10g-9-4-ar02.needham.ma.boston.comcast.net [68.87.144.29]
8 16 ms 14 ms 23 ms 68.87.145.250
9 14 ms 13 ms 14 ms 12.125.47.49
10 36 ms 39 ms 41 ms 12.123.40.222
11 50 ms 50 ms 42 ms tbr2-cl5.cgcil.ip.att.net [12.122.10.106]
12 37 ms 40 ms 38 ms ggr2-p390.cgcil.ip.att.net [12.123.6.37]
13 41 ms 36 ms 38 ms p5-2.core01.ord03.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.11.
205]
14 37 ms 38 ms 39 ms p12-0.core02.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.2.
241]
15 40 ms 39 ms 49 ms p12-0.core03.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.3.
154]
16 39 ms 45 ms 39 ms p4-0.ca02.mke01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.1.154
]
17 39 ms 59 ms 54 ms 38.112.26.190
18 39 ms 39 ms 39 ms 207-67-118-42.guildsoftware.com [207.67.118.42]

Trace complete.

Sorry for the windows tracert, but my firewall on linux doesn't let me traceroute.

Snax, can you use traceroute -I (you might need to be root to use that switch) during the peak hours (whenever it's at its worst) and post that?

a1k0n, I don't see an option for -I. What does this do... I'm on OSX, not linux, so there might be a different command for this. These are the options I do have....

traceroute [-m max_ttl] [-n] [-p port] [-q nqueries] [-r] [-s src_addr]
[-t tos] [-w waittime] host [packetsize]

Gavan

traceroute (on Linux) has two methods of operation, the default uses UDP datagrams, and the other method (invoked with the -I option) uses ICMP Echo Request packets. When I read the manual page for Mac OS X's traceroute ( http://www.hmug.org/man/8/traceroute.html ), it seems like it only supports the UDP method.

Here's what I get, with both methods (interesting difference highlighted):
# traceroute -I majikthise.guildsoftware.com
traceroute to 207-67-118-42-rev.redanvil.net (207.67.118.42), 30 hops max, 52 byte packets
<snip>
5 p9-0.cr01.bois.eli.net (207.173.114.65) 17.274 ms 22.081 ms 16.043 ms
6 srp3-0.cr02.bois.eli.net (208.186.20.178) 16.978 ms 33.142 ms 17.494 ms
7 p9-0.cr01.ptld.eli.net (207.173.115.37) 43.386 ms 32.005 ms 30.762 ms
8 srp3-0.cr02.tkwl.eli.net (208.186.21.4) 31.877 ms 33.653 ms 31.446 ms
9 so-1-0-0--0.er01.sttl.eli.net (207.173.114.42) 32.413 ms 37.329 ms 33.023 ms
10 eli-pni-peering-COGENTCO-COM.sttl.eli.net (209.63.173.26) 47.210 ms 31.893 ms 32.257 ms
11 p15-0.core01.den01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.102) 71.735 ms 70.570 ms 77.976 ms
12 p5-0.core01.mci01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.30) 72.812 ms 69.325 ms 70.744 ms
13 p5-0.core02.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.34) 70.173 ms 73.849 ms 79.641 ms
14 p12-0.core03.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.3.154) 69.367 ms 73.789 ms 80.976 ms
15 p4-0.ca02.mke01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.1.154) 72.146 ms 72.826 ms 72.647 ms
16 38.112.26.190 (38.112.26.190) 73.203 ms 80.348 ms 73.225 ms
17 207-67-118-42-rev.redanvil.net (207.67.118.42) 75.305 ms 71.402 ms 71.999 ms

# traceroute -m 17 majikthise.guildsoftware.com
traceroute to 207-67-118-42-rev.redanvil.net (207.67.118.42), 17 hops max, 52 byte packets
<snip>
5 p9-0.cr01.bois.eli.net (207.173.114.65) 16.917 ms 18.361 ms 15.898 ms
6 srp3-0.cr02.bois.eli.net (208.186.20.178) 18.933 ms 19.822 ms 16.816 ms
7 p9-0.cr01.ptld.eli.net (207.173.115.37) 28.826 ms 33.130 ms 28.197 ms
8 srp3-0.cr02.tkwl.eli.net (208.186.21.4) 31.344 ms 31.024 ms 39.001 ms
9 so-1-0-0--0.er01.sttl.eli.net (207.173.114.42) 32.748 ms 38.415 ms 39.902 ms
10 eli-pni-peering-COGENTCO-COM.sttl.eli.net (209.63.173.26) 235.532 ms 208.007 ms 212.074 ms
11 p15-0.core01.den01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.102) 80.396 ms 81.639 ms 70.140 ms
12 p5-0.core01.mci01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.30) 69.557 ms 69.410 ms 70.032 ms
13 p5-0.core02.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.34) 85.322 ms 69.696 ms 73.889 ms
14 p12-0.core03.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.3.154) 70.822 ms 69.801 ms 69.416 ms
15 p4-0.ca02.mke01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.1.154) 72.427 ms 75.751 ms 79.473 ms
16 38.112.26.190 (38.112.26.190) 88.101 ms 83.928 ms 72.558 ms
17 * * *

On hop 10, traceroute -I consistently shows around 30-40ms; traceroute using UDP datagrams on hop 10 shows anywhere between 30 & 600ms.

So what would that mean?

It doesn't mean anything. It means the router isn't bothering to respond to UDP "TTL-exceeded" packets as quickly as it does to pings. The hops after it have lower pings, so it's obviously able to forward packets in less than 200ms. Their Seattle to Denver link might be a bit heavily utilized, but the pings aren't terrible.

Ok, I'm still in the dark though. How come my ping's went up so drastically all of a sudden. The game is unplayable for me right now. My service provider has said its not their problem, cogentco has said its not their problem, whos problem is this?

Well, I'm not sure. From our end it looks like telus.com's network is picking up the most latency:

traceroute to 154.20.65.254 (154.20.65.254), 30 hops max, 38 byte packets
1 207-67-118-33-rev.redanvil.net (207.67.118.33) 0.435 ms 0.400 ms 0.307 ms
2 38.112.26.189 (38.112.26.189) 0.723 ms 1.445 ms 1.605 ms
3 * p10-0.core01.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.1.153) 3.598 ms 4.393 ms
4 p10-0.core02.ord01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.3.153) 3.250 ms 2.937 ms 3.060 ms
5 p6-0.core02.jfk02.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.85) 29.281 ms * 29.832 ms
6 p15-0.core01.jfk02.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.13) 29.233 ms 31.069 ms 29.577 ms
7 p4-0.core02.dca01.atlas.cogentco.com (66.28.4.81) 37.573 ms 34.927 ms *
8 p14-0.core01.iad01.atlas.cogentco.com (154.54.2.198) 35.562 ms 36.729 ms 35.644 ms
9 asbnvacygr00.bb.telus.com (154.11.3.185) 149.845 ms 135.319 ms 136.673 ms
10 CHCNIL23GR00.bb.telus.com (154.11.11.125) 258.021 ms 256.690 ms 258.013 ms
11 CHCNIL23BR00.bb.telus.com (154.11.11.13) 306.853 ms 311.497 ms 307.647 ms
MPLS Label=207 CoS=3 TTL=1 S=0
12 wnpgmbabbr00.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.129) 316.439 ms 316.192 ms 311.317 ms
MPLS Label=558 CoS=3 TTL=1 S=0
13 WNPGMB38BR00.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.158) 316.407 ms 314.604 ms 309.280 ms
MPLS Label=574 CoS=3 TTL=1 S=0
14 CLGRAB21BR01.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.77) 313.499 ms 288.773 ms 286.442 ms
MPLS Label=601 CoS=3 TTL=1 S=0
15 VANCBC01BR01.bb.telus.com (204.225.243.41) 280.091 ms 284.006 ms 285.104 ms
MPLS Label=560 CoS=3 TTL=1 S=0
16 vancbc01gr01.bb.telus.com (154.11.10.90) 282.086 ms 278.368 ms 280.480 ms
MPLS Label=183 CoS=3 TTL=1 S=0
[ ^ i can ping this host with 70ms]
17 vancbc08dr01.bb.telus.com (204.174.217.49) 280.232 ms 277.054 ms 273.379 ms
[ ^ but this one pings with 320ms]
18 208.181.240.57 (208.181.240.57) 276.851 ms 275.345 ms 272.145 ms
19 d154-20-65-254.bchsia.telus.net (154.20.65.254) 287.255 ms 304.381 ms 296.542 ms

there's some weird multi-link stuff going on there, too.

OK, a1k0n i sent this traceroute to telus, I'll post their response. But I was thinking, would this indicate that the problem sits with whoever is inbetween cogentco and telus?

Possibly. I don't know, something more complicated than what traceroute is showing is going on.

Ok, so Telus is giving this a thorough looking at. They think its got something to do with their connection to Cogentco. Again, I'll post the results of this looking into.

Ok, so after two go arounds with telus, and one with cogentco, I have officially run out of options. Neither say that they have any ability to do anything about it. Cogentco blames Telus, Telus blames Cogentco. I wonder if switching providers would make any difference?

lovely.

Ok so, after reading the in progress update, I noticed that there was a mention of Cogent and png times. So this would be what others and myself are experiencing? And this is something that will be fixed on the dev side of things?