AnimeSuki Forums

-KarumA- · 2011-02-20, 14:53

Hey guys,
I am looking for a program that allows me to measure my speed online properly. Some might say that there are plenty of websites that do this however I always end up with a site that does not give me the proper thing I am looking for, that or they all seeminly lie in my face.

I mean I tried several sites suck as the http://www.speedtest.net/ that I saw posted around on several boards I visit. The darn website gives me an ms meter of about 52 but as soon as I hop online to game or anything it just so happened that the number is missing a 0 or in some cases a zero and then times 2.

I mean I was just gaming online with an ms of between 1500 and 500 while the website is now telling me I have an ms of 60 and very good internet compared to the ISP average ;D

I am looking for something that can actually tell me proper whether or not any given time is a good time to go online and game or not. I've seen something with like a graph meter in which the connectivity to a website is measured every second or so but other than that I have no idea what program is trustworthy and not completely a hoax and which is. I'd like it to be free as well.

synaesthetic · 2011-02-20, 15:19

Ping is not constant.

You'll see different ping when connecting to a speed tester than you'll see connecting to an online game two hours later, because it's two hours later!

Your latency depends on how busy your ISP is. How busy your LAN is if you have multiple devices on it. How busy your chunk of the neighborhood is if you use cable internet (if the guy down the street is torrenting porn, your latency goes to shit, yeah?)

Speedtest.net and such are good for giving you a general idea of your downstream and upstream speeds.

Random32 · 2011-02-20, 15:53

speedtest.net is good.

how good your connection is is a variable thing. the isp runs a box to your neighborhood, then runs a connection from that box to you and your neighbors. anything that your neighbor does affects your connection.
ping also depends on what server you are connecting to, if I am at home connecting to my friend's server 10 minutes drive away, the ping will be very low, if I connect to a server in Europe or Japan, the ping will be very high. speedtest connects to the best server possible for you automatically, it might not be the same situation you will run into connecting to a server that isn't the best possible. if you know where the server you wish to connect to is, try to find a server for speedtest near that.

-KarumA- · 2011-02-20, 16:05

The thing is there wasn't a 2 hour difference, it was less than 4 minutes in total. Did a speed test to determine whether or not my connection is stable it would then say a low number, join a game and something around 1K hits me in the face in under 4 minutes difference. Even while being in laggy games I've run a test and it would be telling me an unlogical number (there are times when my connection would be stable but some hours not at all). I know I don't have glass viber cables in my street, I also have housemates where I live but there are programs that you can run in the BG that can determine your speed individually are there not?
Not something like speedtest but that gives you a more truthful number that is measured every 1 second and shown in a graph of your computer and not your area or the entire house perse.

Simon · 2011-02-20, 16:38

Quote:

Originally Posted by -KarumA-

Not something like speedtest but that gives you a more truthful number that is measured every 1 second and shown in a graph of your computer and not your area or the entire house perse.

Thing is, latency is something you measure between points, not at a point. It doesn't really make sense to talk about your computer's latency on its own, only the latency between it and whatever server you're connecting to. That will depend on the latencies of each link your traffic goes over, and the various providers involved may route different packets over different links as traffic conditions change.

Ideally you want something like speedtest.net but where you can choose a ping server close to the gaming server you're interested in. Failing that, you might as well concentrate on latency between you and your ISP, since that's where a lot of the variability will come in - it won't give you a "true number", but if you monitor it over time you'll get a picture of how local conditions change.

synaesthetic · 2011-02-20, 17:11

Plus, the ping you see in-game may be affected by the game itself. The netcode may be poorly optimized.

The solution is to throw away the old socks, stop playing MMORPGs and pick up a good single-player game.

Random32 · 2011-02-20, 18:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by -KarumA-

The thing is there wasn't a 2 hour difference, it was less than 4 minutes in total. Did a speed test to determine whether or not my connection is stable it would then say a low number, join a game and something around 1K hits me in the face in under 4 minutes difference. Even while being in laggy games I've run a test and it would be telling me an unlogical number (there are times when my connection would be stable but some hours not at all). I know I don't have glass viber cables in my street, I also have housemates where I live but there are programs that you can run in the BG that can determine your speed individually are there not?
Not something like speedtest but that gives you a more truthful number that is measured every 1 second and shown in a graph of your computer and not your area or the entire house perse.

have you tried choosing a speedtest server near where you gaming server is located? latency is time between you and the server, it varies depending on where the server is. No matter how low the ping is between you and the speedtest server in the city a few exits down the highway, you will still have crap ping when connecting to a server in Asia and Europe and vice versa.

OceanBlue · 2011-02-20, 20:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by -KarumA-

The thing is there wasn't a 2 hour difference, it was less than 4 minutes in total. Did a speed test to determine whether or not my connection is stable it would then say a low number, join a game and something around 1K hits me in the face in under 4 minutes difference. Even while being in laggy games I've run a test and it would be telling me an unlogical number (there are times when my connection would be stable but some hours not at all). I know I don't have glass viber cables in my street, I also have housemates where I live but there are programs that you can run in the BG that can determine your speed individually are there not?
Not something like speedtest but that gives you a more truthful number that is measured every 1 second and shown in a graph of your computer and not your area or the entire house perse.

If you don't like speedtest, you could always run cmd.exe and type in:
ping.exe <Website or IP address>
or just ping.exe and play with the commands. -t might be helpful for you as well.

As for a program with a graph... I don't know.

I personally think it's the game. What kind of MMO is it? Are you sure it isn't like SC2 in that it connects to a server which connects you to your friend?

Random32 · 2011-02-20, 20:20

I was going to write a software that took ping output and graphed it, but it looks like someone beat me to it.
http://download.cnet.com/WinPing/300...-10699972.html

-KarumA- · 2011-02-21, 05:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Random32

I was going to write a software that took ping output and graphed it, but it looks like someone beat me to it.
http://download.cnet.com/WinPing/300...-10699972.html

That's the one I'm looking for, thank you =)

cyberbeing · 2011-02-21, 23:00

If anybody reading this thread desires something more advanced, you could look into setting up SmokePing locally. Think of it as the ping equivalent to bandwidth monitoring tools like mrtg or cacti.

It takes a bit of initial effort to setup, especially on Windows*, but once finished, it's basically set-and-forget.

*Windows Requirements: Smokeping (of course), ActivePerl 5.8.x, rrdtool (win32-port) for Perl 5.8, fping (win32-port), a webserver supporting cgi (like lighttpd), and basic knowledge of webserver configuration & Perl to fix things like file paths & disabling a few unneeded/unsupported *nix specific calls in SmokePing. Although extremely outdated, a google search revealed this blog entry, which should at least point you in the right direction if having trouble getting things working.

2011-02-20, 14:53	Link #1
-KarumA- (｡☉౪ ⊙｡) Author Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: In Maya world, where all is 3D and everything crashes Age: 36	Speedtest or ping measure meter for free? Hey guys, I am looking for a program that allows me to measure my speed online properly. Some might say that there are plenty of websites that do this however I always end up with a site that does not give me the proper thing I am looking for, that or they all seeminly lie in my face. I mean I tried several sites suck as the http://www.speedtest.net/ that I saw posted around on several boards I visit. The darn website gives me an ms meter of about 52 but as soon as I hop online to game or anything it just so happened that the number is missing a 0 or in some cases a zero and then times 2. I mean I was just gaming online with an ms of between 1500 and 500 while the website is now telling me I have an ms of 60 and very good internet compared to the ISP average ;D I am looking for something that can actually tell me proper whether or not any given time is a good time to go online and game or not. I've seen something with like a graph meter in which the connectivity to a website is measured every second or so but other than that I have no idea what program is trustworthy and not completely a hoax and which is. I'd like it to be free as well.

2011-02-20, 15:19	Link #2
synaesthetic blinded by blood Author Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Oakland, CA Age: 40	Ping is not constant. You'll see different ping when connecting to a speed tester than you'll see connecting to an online game two hours later, because it's two hours later! Your latency depends on how busy your ISP is. How busy your LAN is if you have multiple devices on it. How busy your chunk of the neighborhood is if you use cable internet (if the guy down the street is torrenting porn, your latency goes to shit, yeah?) Speedtest.net and such are good for giving you a general idea of your downstream and upstream speeds. __________________ Indie science fiction author and all-around weirdo: Check out my original fiction here! Read an excerpt from my sci-fi novel Binary System!

2011-02-20, 17:11	Link #6
synaesthetic blinded by blood Author Join Date: Jun 2009 Location: Oakland, CA Age: 40	Plus, the ping you see in-game may be affected by the game itself. The netcode may be poorly optimized. The solution is to throw away the old socks, stop playing MMORPGs and pick up a good single-player game. __________________ Indie science fiction author and all-around weirdo: Check out my original fiction here! Read an excerpt from my sci-fi novel Binary System!

2011-02-21, 23:00	Link #11
cyberbeing Senior Member Join Date: May 2006 Location: California	If anybody reading this thread desires something more advanced, you could look into setting up SmokePing locally. Think of it as the ping equivalent to bandwidth monitoring tools like mrtg or cacti. It takes a bit of initial effort to setup, especially on Windows, but once finished, it's basically set-and-forget. Windows Requirements: Smokeping (of course), ActivePerl 5.8.x, rrdtool (win32-port) for Perl 5.8, fping (win32-port), a webserver supporting cgi (like lighttpd), and basic knowledge of webserver configuration & Perl to fix things like file paths & disabling a few unneeded/unsupported *nix specific calls in SmokePing. Although extremely outdated, a google search revealed this blog entry, which should at least point you in the right direction if having trouble getting things working. __________________

2011-02-20, 15:53	Link #3
Random32 Also a Lolicon Join Date: Apr 2010	speedtest.net is good. how good your connection is is a variable thing. the isp runs a box to your neighborhood, then runs a connection from that box to you and your neighbors. anything that your neighbor does affects your connection. ping also depends on what server you are connecting to, if I am at home connecting to my friend's server 10 minutes drive away, the ping will be very low, if I connect to a server in Europe or Japan, the ping will be very high. speedtest connects to the best server possible for you automatically, it might not be the same situation you will run into connecting to a server that isn't the best possible. if you know where the server you wish to connect to is, try to find a server for speedtest near that.

2011-02-20, 16:05	Link #4
-KarumA- (｡☉౪ ⊙｡) Author Join Date: Jul 2004 Location: In Maya world, where all is 3D and everything crashes Age: 36	The thing is there wasn't a 2 hour difference, it was less than 4 minutes in total. Did a speed test to determine whether or not my connection is stable it would then say a low number, join a game and something around 1K hits me in the face in under 4 minutes difference. Even while being in laggy games I've run a test and it would be telling me an unlogical number (there are times when my connection would be stable but some hours not at all). I know I don't have glass viber cables in my street, I also have housemates where I live but there are programs that you can run in the BG that can determine your speed individually are there not? Not something like speedtest but that gives you a more truthful number that is measured every 1 second and shown in a graph of your computer and not your area or the entire house perse.

2011-02-20, 20:20	Link #9
Random32 Also a Lolicon Join Date: Apr 2010	I was going to write a software that took ping output and graphed it, but it looks like someone beat me to it. http://download.cnet.com/WinPing/300...-10699972.html