New box suggestions

[KennyM]

Currently we have a Xeon 5130@ 2.0Ghz with 2 GB of RAM, and we're hitting limits on it. We looking at a 2x Xeon 4 core@1.6Ghz Low Voltage. Does anybody know how much better this will perform or does anybody have any other suggestions in the $260 price range? We definitely want this box in Chicago. Thanks for the help.

P.S.- We will be running SRCDS instances only.

[jbiloh]

If you're in the dedicated market, a Core2Quad (2.4Ghz x 4) is the best, most cost effective way to go. You get the most performance for your buck, and the Core2Quads just love to host game servers.

 

Many respected Chicago providers rent them. Since we're in the business I'll refrain from recommending anyone.

[KennyM]

Thanks for the response jbiloh. Does anybody have any suggestions for C2Q servers in Chicago? I was looking at this server before: http://www.singlehop.com/servers/dual.php The top one for $259/month. Does that seem like an able server for the money, or do you think the single C2Q servers would be better?

[swish]

http://www.colocrossing.com

[Todd Holley]

http://www.colocrossing.com

or

http://www.colocrossing.com

or

http://www.colocrossing.com

 

And I highly recommend core2quads with 4 gb ram. Works perfect.

[KennyM]

Ok, I looked at Colocrossing.com but their website is a little confusing because the C2Q is listed under multi-proessor multi-core, and some of their website is unfinished. Also, forget the $99 setup fee. That's ridiculous.

So does anyone know of a better provider for the C2Q, or will the 2x5310's work good?

[Todd Holley]

Talk to Jon personally through AIM or email. He can do some good deals for you. Trust me. And the reason their site is slightly unfinished as it is only about a week old or so.

 

I highly recommend, I have all of my machines with him in 3 datacenters over the mid to eastern united states.

[KennyM]

What's him AIM?

[adamnp]

jbiloh@colocrossing.com <-- email

 

I sent you an email aswell.

 

Regards :}

[Todd Holley]

clarkbark is his aim.

[jbiloh]

Ok, I looked at Colocrossing.com but their website is a little confusing because the C2Q is listed under multi-proessor multi-core, and some of their website is unfinished. Also, forget the $99 setup fee. That's ridiculous.

So does anyone know of a better provider for the C2Q, or will the 2x5310's work good?

 

 

We're getting the multi-core single processor/etc bit fixed by our design team. Sorry for the confusion. I see your AIM msg and have responded.

[KennyM]

We're getting the multi-core single processor/etc bit fixed by our design team. Sorry for the confusion. I see your AIM msg and have responded.

Yep, thanks for the help, will be buying Friday like I said.

http://www.colocrossing.com is pro.

[Scott]

Not that Jon hasn't gotten enough recommendations in this thread, but I figured I'd add my own

 

I had a couple boxes with ColoCrossing when I was running my GSP and he and the rest of the people there were top notch! Always helpful and professional.

 

Looks like you made the right choice!

[KennyM]

Does anybody have a test IP I can ping to test my latency on Colocrossing.com's Chicago network?

[ECF]

You should probably give them a call and ask for an IP in the area you are looking to get your server. They have multiple locations to choose from.

[JasonF]

216.246.108.100

[HIS-MOTHER]

216.246.108.100

 

14MS BOOO LOL ..

 

 

Tracing route to unknown.ord.colocrossing.com [216.246.108.100]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

 

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms wr850g.hsd1.il.comcast.net [192.168.10.1]

2 * * * Request timed out.

3 7 ms * * ge-2-10-ur01.mtprospect.il.chicago.comcast.net [

68.86.116.25]

4 9 ms 9 ms 9 ms po-10-ar01.area4.il.chicago.comcast.net [68.87.2

29.110]

5 * * 13 ms 68.86.90.178

6 12 ms 11 ms 11 ms COMCAST-IP.car2.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.71.182.34

]

7 12 ms 12 ms 11 ms te-4-2.car2.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.71.182.33]

8 150 ms 29 ms 13 ms ae-23-56.car3.Chicago1.Level3.net [4.68.101.167]

 

<b>9 41 ms 13 ms 47 ms 261.xe-0-3-0.cr2.ord1.us.scnet.net [4.71.100.26]</b>

 

10 25 ms 19 ms 20 ms v21.ar1.ord1.us.scnet.net [216.246.95.243]

11 12 ms 14 ms 14 ms ge-1-45.cr.ChicagoEquinix.colocrossing.com [66.2

25.194.1]

12 14 ms 14 ms 14 ms ge-0-2.q3305.Chicago.colocrossing.com [216.246.1

09.249]

13 13 ms 16 ms 11 ms ge-0-1.q2308.Chicago.colocrossing.com [216.246.1

09.254]

14 12 ms 13 ms 14 ms unknown.ord.colocrossing.com [216.246.108.100]

[tonyf]

For reference ... we run 2 x quad core 5770s with 8Gb Ram.

We built/own this machine and run it here in Australia.

I chose this particular CPU because it has the higher FSB (1333Mhz) and bigger cache.

We are currently running over 500 slots on this server spread across over 40 games and it is using between 30% to 45% CPU power at peak loads and about 4.6Gb of available RAM. There is no lag and and Full FPSs are acheived ... it is important to note however that you must have good bandwidth in & out. Most rental servers usually can only sustain about 5Mbit/s even though they advertise 100Mbit/s. I wont go into the technical reasons for this ... but suffice it to say that if you exceed the bandwidth available, you lag will go thru the roof and your CPU % will also peak out because of the extra work it has to do in retransmission of dropped packets.

At our current loadings as above, we consume about 9Mbit/s continously.

Hope this helps you ...

Regards

Tony Freeman

Quadeye.com.au

[Monk]

Most ethernet cards have checksum offloading and TSO. Therefor; your statement about "you lag will go thru the roof and your CPU % will also peak out because of the extra work it has to do in retransmission of dropped packets" is invalid.

 

Higher FSB speed is not always better. The design of intel's server stuff is still inferior to AMD's, because a shared FSB will become the bottleneck under load. Also; intel's generally suck at memory bandwidth speed, lack of NUMA, etc etc etc.

[KennyM]

Hmm well I looked up some benchmarks and Intel's server processors perform better in this area. It all depends on what you want to do with your chip. There is no one size fits all in computers.

[Monk]

benchmarks are not real world loads. benchmarks are more like, bench-marketing

 

-M

[jbiloh]

For anything other than 1000 FPS game servers (Opterons have certain advantages when it comes to high-accuracy time keeping, required for 1000 FPS) the Kentsfield Xeon is far superior. Don't worry about your choice with a Core2Quad, you won't be let down AT ALL.

[KennyM]

Thanks for the input Jon. I can't wait to get my box. BTW, do you think you could email me at Cr85bro13<at>gmail<dot>com with an ETA for my box? My contract with ThePlanet expires the 12th and I still need to transfer all my game servers over.

 

(Also, for anyone who hasn't bought from Jon before, it's been great so far. Very helpful.)

[tonyf]

Most ethernet cards have checksum offloading and TSO. Therefor; your statement about "you lag will go thru the roof and your CPU % will also peak out because of the extra work it has to do in retransmission of dropped packets" is invalid.

 

Higher FSB speed is not always better. The design of intel's server stuff is still inferior to AMD's, because a shared FSB will become the bottleneck under load. Also; intel's generally suck at memory bandwidth speed, lack of NUMA, etc etc etc.

I am talking from real world experience.

The bandwidth issue is not a hardware one ... it is a srcds issue...

The game will resend packets if the client does not recieve them in a timely fashion. It recalculates rather than buffering and resending ... thus the increase in CPU usage. Mutiply that by a few hundred slots ... results in major increased resource usage.

 

Secondly, when it comes to quadcores for game servers, the Intel runs rings around the AMD. If you really knew what you were talking about instead of giving biased personal opinions, you would not make such comments.

We have built and compared these machines in commercial use, and I agree in the early days you would of been correct, but not anymore for quite a while now.

We have one monster Intel based machine that will run over 1000 slots at its peak load and it does so quite happily. Try doing that on any type of AMD server currently available. .... Can not wait to tryout the new 8 core chips in the next few months !!

[swish]

I'd like to know the specs of the machine you have setup to run 1000 slots at peak load.