Help Diagnosing rubberbanding/lag with EA games

Twirlywoos · 18 Dec 2012 at 21:55

Up until 2 weeks ago I could play BF3 and BC2 fine. But now I have really bad lag and rubberbanding.

I'm running out of ideas what to try as people say that these games are playing fine for them.

I'm on a wired ethernet connection, and my speedtest results are:

- I've updated my NVIDIA drivers to the latest 310.70 WHQL
- My Network adapter drivers are up to date, I checked it against Intel's Utility.
- I've gone back to previous Setpoint drivers instead of using Logitech's gaming software which made no difference.
- Windows Defender shows no Virsus.
- WIndows 8 64bit is fully up to date.
- I've gone back to default stock speeds on my GPU and CPU (i53570K) and that made no difference.
- I've rebooted my modem and tried both the Home Hub and Asus RT56U (which I've tried various firmwares on)

What else can I do?
:confused:

macca672 · 19 Dec 2012 at 00:20

manually updated punkbuster?

Suarez7 · 19 Dec 2012 at 13:17

Might be BT Infinity. I get it in Fifa 13 and it's a known problem with BT and they still haven't fixed it.

~>Dg<~ · 19 Dec 2012 at 14:13

could be utilization in your area check your bt in your area or report it

Twirlywoos · 19 Dec 2012 at 14:51

Thanks. I’ve not manually updated PB as it normally keeps itself up to date but I will do it tonight.

@DG I did check via BT’s site to check if the service is down in my area, but it showed no service disruptions. The problem with BT is their “Phone Jacker” support. It really is dire and even when I’ve done the basic sanity checks myself (checking cables, resetting modem, running speed checks through BT’s own speed test utility) which they’d run me through I know from experience there is nothing else they can or will do.

It’s only EA games which is my I’m bemused. When I run or walk in the game, it’s so slow; like Neo dodging bullets in the Matrix.

@Aceowner What’s this known Problem?

Suarez7 · 19 Dec 2012 at 15:35

majnu said:
Thanks. I’ve not manually updated PB as it normally keeps itself up to date but I will do it tonight.

@DG I did check via BT’s site to check if the service is down in my area, but it showed no service disruptions. The problem with BT is their “Phone Jacker” support. It really is dire and even when I’ve done the basic sanity checks myself (checking cables, resetting modem, running speed checks through BT’s own speed test utility) which they’d run me through I know from experience there is nothing else they can or will do.

It’s only EA games which is my I’m bemused. When I run or walk in the game, it’s so slow; like Neo dodging bullets in the Matrix.

@Aceowner What’s this known Problem?

It's a known problem with certain BT Infinity users getting lag when connecting to the EA servers.

Twirlywoos · 19 Dec 2012 at 19:46

I re-installed PB from the BF3 directory and it's made no difference.

VeNT · 19 Dec 2012 at 19:47

Format + reinstall windows.
you know it makes sense

setter · 19 Dec 2012 at 19:47

I think it's a fault at ea's end majnu, bf3 has been very laggy since aftermath was released. Im having the same issue on two systems. Before am it was fine on both.

BassPunk · 19 Dec 2012 at 19:55

Trace root to a server and it will show you the troublesome hop with a much larger number.

Twirlywoos · 19 Dec 2012 at 20:01

http://community.bt.com/t5/BT-Infinity/DNS-Server-failing/m-p/458975#M34249

I tried changing DNS to Google's and I'm getting annoyed of the issue. I can't understand it what's happening. Nothing seems to be working. Formatting will be my last resort. If the trouble is down to my ISP, then I'll have to see if I'm out of contract then I'll swap over to Sky.

Here is my Tracert result to EA.com. Does it look normal?

Tracing route to ea.com [98.129.150.221]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms my.router [192.168.1.1]
2 5 ms 4 ms 4 ms 217.32.142.2
3 5 ms 4 ms 5 ms 217.32.142.30
4 5 ms 5 ms 5 ms 213.120.163.70
5 5 ms 5 ms 5 ms 31.55.165.205
6 5 ms 5 ms 5 ms 31.55.165.109
7 5 ms 5 ms 5 ms 109.159.250.244
8 20 ms 15 ms 15 ms core2-te0-4-0-0.ealing.ukcore.bt.net [109.159.250.131]
9 69 ms 14 ms 14 ms peer1-xe11-1-0.redbus.ukcore.bt.net [62.6.200.93]
10 13 ms 13 ms 13 ms ge-2-1-0.mpr1.lhr2.uk.above.net [195.66.224.76]

11 17 ms 16 ms 17 ms ge-4-1-0.mpr1.lhr2.uk.above.net [64.125.27.145]

12 86 ms 86 ms 86 ms xe-5-2-0.cr1.dca2.us.above.net [64.125.26.21]
13 117 ms 117 ms 117 ms xe-2-2-0.cr1.iah1.us.above.net [64.125.29.37]
14 117 ms 117 ms 138 ms xe-2-1-0.cr1.dfw2.us.above.net [64.125.30.58]
15 117 ms 117 ms 121 ms xe-8-2-1.er1.dfw2.us.above.net [64.125.30.85]
16 124 ms 124 ms 124 ms main1.above.net [209.133.126.42]
17 127 ms 127 ms 127 ms coreb.dfw1.rackspace.net [74.205.108.40]
18 124 ms 124 ms 124 ms core7.dfw1.rackspace.net [74.205.108.31]
19 137 ms 137 ms 137 ms aggr502a-2-core7.dfw1.rackspace.net [98.129.84.23]
20 124 ms 124 ms 124 ms 98.129.150.221

Trace complete.

setter · 19 Dec 2012 at 20:04

Reformatting my second system made no difference whatsoever, hence i havent done that on my main rig. Also been through router settings etc and it's still the same.

Twirlywoos · 19 Dec 2012 at 20:30

Just got of the phone with India (BT) and the advisor said he removed all errors of my line :rolleyes:

Suffice to say the problem still exists. :mad:

Suarez7 · 20 Dec 2012 at 17:54

I think you can be asked to be put on a different route or something to bypass the hop that causes the lag. I've tried finding the thread on the infinity forums and I've had no luck.

Twirlywoos · 20 Dec 2012 at 19:48

I raised the problem with BT Infinity forums.
http://community.bt.com/t5/BT-Infin...mes-are-Rubberbanding-and-Lagging/td-p/720376

I'm waiting for someone to get back as it seems my ping is spiking at one of the hops.

Bennehmaru · 20 Dec 2012 at 21:52

From that trace route it looks like it's getting through BT's network fine, the problem seems to be when it hits abovenet's nodes in the US and carries through all the way to the end.

Would probably point more to an internal routing issue with abovenet rather BT.

Twirlywoos · 20 Dec 2012 at 22:01

I'm uploading some videos into Youtube. This video is to demonstrate the problem. When I get large spikes in the console's "perfoverlay" both on cpu is this a hardware problem or can spikes be caused by the network- therefore down to BT/EA?

Edit - Here's one video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zx3HvxTmqLA&feature=youtu.be

Twirlywoos · 21 Dec 2012 at 13:24

now fixed.... I hope

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_QXFTKfgBQ

arknor · 21 Dec 2012 at 14:59

you need to use pingtest.net not speedtest

Twirlywoos · 21 Dec 2012 at 15:41

I may as well post this too:

Thanks for your email. Before we go any further I have to clarify that the widespread issue reported with connections to EA's servers a few months ago has been resolved so this will not be what is causing your issue.

Going back to your forum thread, the traceroutes you posted are going to EA's servers in the US so a ping of around 100-130ms is expected. Since I believe the Battlefield 3 servers aren't hosted by EA in-house anymore (i.e. they are private) and the ones you play on almost certainly aren't hosted in the US considering the ping shown in your Youtube video is around 35ms (which is perfectly normal and acceptable for online gaming) we'll need to see some traceroutes to the server IPs you are actually playing on to see if there is any packet loss on those routes. I'm not particular familiar with the console commands on Battlefield 3 but if there's the ability to display a lagometer it might prove useful to see if you are getting much packet loss when playing.

Please provide the above information when you can as well as pathping results so I can see where exactly (if anywhere) the packets are dropping. Once I have this information I'll be better placed to advise on what needs to be done.

Kind regards,

Dean
BTCare Forum Moderator

what is a lagometer and where can I buy such a device? lol