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  1. #1

    Game Server Experts..

    I'm planning to order a sempron 2600 server from resellerworkz with their current special. Here are the specs:

    1.8 GHz Sempron 2600 CPU
    512 MB DDR RAM
    10 MB uplink (may want to upgrade that?)

    Or

    Athlon xp 2400+ (I know this is a better CPU)
    512 MB DDR RAM
    10 MB uplink

    How much counter-strike or half-life servers do you think this server can handle? And I'm talking about pub servers, not private. Thanks

  2. #2
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    Considering my notebook is faster I would say one moderate CS maybe two..

  3. #3
    I don't think that's a fair comparison..thanks for the feedback though.

  4. #4
    ALee I'm not an expert but I don't think you would be pleased with either of those for a game server.

  5. #5
    Well, i'm already sure they can run half-life servers just fine. Half-life mods such as counter-strike don't require much power, I could run the flawlessly with my old p3 computer. The question is just how many servers I CAN run with either one of those servers.

  6. #6
    ALee It's your choice of course, just saying I would use better equipment.

  7. #7
    Yeah I know, but I'm just on a low budget right now so I have to go with one of those. I can upgrade in the future.

  8. #8
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    ALee, I would strongly recommend waiting for an upgrade mate.

    512mb is ok, but your only looking at hosting1-2 x12 man servers, like I said in another post regarding something similar, Steam is actually resource intensive, and it will suck your resources when all slots can be full or at peak rate of them 2 servers being 80% full.

    10mb uplink is fine, unless you want to host more than 2-3 servers.

    Regards
    Danny

  9. #9
    I think I have enough in my budget to upgrade the ram to 1 GB, how many servers could it handle then?

    Also, I'm considering getting this server:
    • AMD 3000+ Barton
    • 80GB IDE Hard Drive
    • 1024MB RAM
    • Bandwidth: 1000GB

    My budget is a little under $90, so I think I can allow that.

  10. #10
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    NOW your talking dude.

    Nothing wrong with them specs, excluding bandwidth I would put a nice cap on around 50-70 players slots dependant on how you optimize your server, if its running windows try to save resources by limiting apps that are open.

    One recommendation on the dedicated server, is to right click my computer, properties > advanced, performance settings > Advanced and optimise the dedi to run on background services and set the memory usage to system cache.

    Knowing all these sort of things can improve the performance of your gameservers, I'd be here all day telling you everything that I know from experience, PM me if you wish to ask any questions.

    And good luck

  11. #11
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    errr what network is this on and are you trying to host a clan server or a business?
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  12. #12
    I'm looking to host just a few public servers. Not looking to use them for business. However, I may lease some servers out just to pay for the server rent.

  13. #13
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    a few public does not go in the same sentence as that server
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  14. #14
    what about this server? (as i mentioned before)

    • AMD 3000+ Barton
    • 80GB IDE Hard Drive
    • 1024MB RAM
    • Bandwidth: 1000GB

  15. #15
    Join Date
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    Do a search for 'scheduling latency' to see my previous posts on exactly why the options you have posted are underwhelming for what you intend to do.
    Game Servers are the next hot market!
    Slim margins, heavy support, fickle customers, and moronic suppliers!
    Start your own today!

  16. #16
    Originally posted by hiryuu
    Do a search for 'scheduling latency' to see my previous posts on exactly why the options you have posted are underwhelming for what you intend to do.
    Thanks, I will take a look

  17. #17
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    ALee,

    With 1 GB of Ram, you can run 3-4 12-16 pubs.
    Synergy Blue LLC
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  18. #18
    Originally posted by VapoRub
    ALee,

    With 1 GB of Ram, you can run 3-4 12-16 pubs.
    Well, technically you can run any amount you want, but I doubt they would be too stable...3-4 12-16 pubs on that machine is kind of stretching things...

    I can't believe that someone would even tell someone how many servers or slots you can run on the machine. THERE IS NO MAGICAL NUMBER! All servers have different hardware/software/OS configurations! The only thing you can do is test the darn thing, is that so hard to understand -- people have been asking this same question numerous times and expect that maybe some kind of magical equation popped out of nowhere. Put up public test servers, fill it up, and see how it performs under a certain amount of load.


  19. #19
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    Originally posted by CyanoX
    I can't believe that someone would even tell someone how many servers or slots you can run on the machine. THERE IS NO MAGICAL NUMBER! All servers have different hardware/software/OS configurations!
    Not true.

    If he gives the specs then it IS possible to come up with a 'magical number' as you call it.

    Its not only just about the OS and the system specs, its how you configure the games to run too. MaxRate also plays a big part in how much data each client connected to a server can take each second, thus calculating how much bandwidth would be used etc.

    sv_maxping allows a max ping to be set, so anybody pinging over 200 for example cant enter the server.

    Posts like this cyanox wont help the dude to understand what it means running gameservers. He's asking an average amount, I never specified a magical number if your referring to my post, I 'suggested' a sufficient amount on the specs he gave me.

    Regards
    Danny

  20. #20
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    BUT I do agree with you when you say he should just learn by Trial And Error. Totally.

    Just set the servers up, fill them up and test them, you will learn the knots yourself by using different configurations etc.

  21. #21
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    You guys make gameserver hosting out to be this elusive thing ... there are "magic numbers" ... i have no clue why you won't tell them a good estimate

    you make it seem as if 1 dual xeon 2.4 is different from the next.

    In making up these numbers assume that 1) All servers will be at least 75% full at all times (this way you don't oversell) 2) All servers will use the maximum amount of bandwidth and resources it can

    unless you're trying to protect your "trade secrets" - you can easily calculate this as the gameserver engines don't differ from 1 instance to anoter
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  22. #22
    Quote Originally Posted by StingUK
    If he gives the specs then it IS possible to come up with a 'magical number' as you call it.
    Quote Originally Posted by The Broadband Man
    you make it seem as if 1 dual xeon 2.4 is different from the next.
    Well, obviously, this guy wouldn't have the exact OS, exact kernel configuration, and exact RAM speed as your server, now would he? For all we know, he could to new to this, and use the server with all the services still running, and without a custom kernel, then he tries to cram all these servers on that machine, since StingUK came up with this 'magical equation' of his, then becomes upset when they don't run as he has suspected.


    Quote Originally Posted by The Broadband Man
    unless you're trying to protect your "trade secrets" - you can easily calculate this as the gameserver engines don't differ from 1 instance to anoter
    I can understand that if you colo your equipment and know exactly how each of your servers are configured and try to match them up as much as possible. However, depending on a dedicated server from a company who probably varies in the hardware (RAM speed probably plays a small role in this, what if the RAM is PC100? It doesn't state whether it's SDRAM or DDR and what speed it is. I doubt that the system with 1GB of PC100 RAM will perform equally as a system with 1GB of PC2700 RAM) and operating system (what if he chose FreeBSD and wasn't aware of tweaking it? Sometimes, using a stock FreeBSD leads to performance decreases since, for some odd reason, FreeBSD has trouble running real-time software without modifying the HZ settings in the kernel, and tweaking other settings. I know this first hand by testing the actual server tickrates, and comparing them to what is configured on the actual game server), there is no equation you speak of.


    Quote Originally Posted by StingUK
    Posts like this cyanox wont help the dude to understand what it means running gameservers. He's asking an average amount, I never specified a magical number if your referring to my post, I 'suggested' a sufficient amount on the specs he gave me.
    You are just encouraging more people to post on these forums, the specs on their machine to ask how many of this, can fit on this. The most logical thing to do is actually test it yourself. For goodness sake, if you look on this forums, you will see many posts like this, and some of them are even trying to open up their own game host operation off these magical equation of yours. Just tell them to test it on their own, and they will learn wonders.

    Quote Originally Posted by StingUK
    If he gives the specs then it IS possible to come up with a 'magical number' as you call it.
    Quote Originally Posted by StingUK
    I never specified a magical number if your referring to my post, I 'suggested' a sufficient amount on the specs he gave me.
    But based on what? Have you actually used a machine of that exact specs, on that exact OS and kernel configurations as he will run it on (which he didn't state?). What about those things I pointed out, you do not know what speed of the RAM, what OS, whether he's going to actually configure his own kernel, whether he will actually stop the running services (apache, proftpd server, etc.), etc. from his post on this thread. All he did was post the speed of the CPU; the amount of RAM (for all I know, this could be 1GB of PC100 SDRAM), or the OS and whether he has basic system administration skills (knowledge of stopping those uneeded services, kernel optimizing [especially on FreeBSD],etc.) was not mentioned. I'm guessing this equation you guys speak of has basically no variables in it? Kind of a fishy equation if you ask me, actually being able to use one where you don't know much of the machine.
    Last edited by CyanoX; 06-29-2005 at 09:51 AM.

  23. #23
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    That's why I said estimate - this isn't rocket science ...

    CPU categories - Dual Xeon, Dual Opteron, Dual AMD MP, P4 HT, P4 non HT, Athlon, barton

    RAM - the speed of it is negligible as most companies use 2100 or 2700

    HD - SATA or SCSI? IDE?

    That's all you need to make a solid estimate ... so I don't know what you're griping about
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  24. #24
    Did you consider operating system and whether he has basic administrating skills? I didn't see an operating system posted here. What if it's the FreeBSD scenario where he didn't tune the HZ settings and stop uneeded services? FreeBSD has trouble running things at real-time without tweaking the kernel first, due to it's popular use of a webserver, which wouldn't require as much real-time as a game server does. I've seen it firsthand, where you configure a game server to run at a certain tickrate, then find out that the actual game server is only running at 50-80% of it, then after, changing the HZ and other values in the kernel and recompiling, it operates at 93-100% of the tickrate. Sure you can configure a game server at the lowest tickrate and cram as many servers as you want to fit on the machine, but is that going to be best?

  25. #25
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    Re: Game Server Experts..

    Originally posted by ALee
    I'm planning to order a sempron 2600 server from resellerworkz with their current special. Here are the specs:

    1.8 GHz Sempron 2600 CPU
    512 MB DDR RAM
    10 MB uplink (may want to upgrade that?)

    Or

    Athlon xp 2400+ (I know this is a better CPU)
    512 MB DDR RAM
    10 MB uplink

    How much counter-strike or half-life servers do you think this server can handle? And I'm talking about pub servers, not private. Thanks
    2X12 CS servers.
    I hope your joking!?
    Counter strike is not that resource intensive at all, for a game server.
    You could push it with 64 players on that, you may get the occasional lag, so 48 players would OK on that.
    1X16 player server will push around 512Kbit (60kb/s) bandwidth.
    1X16 player server takes about 100Mb memory.
    CPU obviously varies, but it rarely goes above 10% for one 16 player CS server.
    Andrew Thomas

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