Messages

I reckon your postman is too busy playing GPB with his shiny new GPX controller 

Thanks, that in line with dibu's figures, the problem is scaling 0.6Mbit with 8 could be 2.4Mbit with 16 players from my guesstimates earlier (no idea of fixed overheads or data packing).

Dibu's figures suggest that for 16 players its 2.0 Mbit  so it's probably not quite so severe but it is very non-linear. Twice the players = 3.33 times the upload bandwidth 

Figures seem to work out so 'simple' hosting seems possible for 12 to 16 players on a standard domestic broadband connection (fiber).

Hi Toomes,

You grabbed the GPX then. 

Interested in how these compare to other controllers, any chance of a quick summary/comparison with your old controller?

Thanks for the info on core usage. I was wary GPB might not like 'modern' processor architecture.

Why would that be !? It runs fine on your main PC so ... at worst it can't really leverage on multiple cores/threads. But that just means you can probably run multiple servers on the same machine

MaX.

Nice idea i have a Q6600 system in bit in a drawer which would be quite quick/core, but triple host would hit the upstream bandwidth problem pretty quickly lol

I was mainly curious if a modern low power micro PC would handle simple server duty. I might set up my old dual core celeron laptop as a test platform, i do not use it for anything else these days as i have a fancy works laptop instead.

Need to get up to speed with firewalls suitable for a host - any suggested reading? I guess my routers built in firewall would be considered insufficient 

Thanks for the info on core usage. I was wary GPB might not like 'modern' processor architecture.

Try shift period on minimum period feels a lot 'sharper', then lower the amplitude to taste.

Kerbs are hit and miss, some have a bit of rumble other do not even on the same track, try mallory, exit from gerrards seems to generate a bit of kerb rumble. From my recent testing i suspect even a very small (tiny) ripple on the kerbs would be enough for a noticeable rumble.

As the kerbs can already generate a sound prompt it would be nice if this could be flagged to the plug in interface.

Its a shame they do not let you choose how to balance your bandwidth up/down within the total bandwidth available, I probably only use a fraction of my downstream bandwidth.

Still, a small session with 10 or 12  bikes seems perfectly feasible on domestic fibre broadband .

Curious if something like a Gigabyte Brix with a Celeron dual core could be a low power host, quite cheap especially if you have some old memory and small SSD available.

That's more how i expected it to be arranged.

Thinking about it i think i finally understand see where the bandwidth imbalance comes from 

So 16 bikes feed data to the 1 server but the server repeats (uploads) 15(or 16 for integrity) bikes data to 16 different clients.

So..

16 players:
So for each 16 incoming data blocks (downstream)  256 have to be sent out (upsteam) 

Scaling is harsh on the upsteam side but seems to be in line with dibu's numbers;

32 players:
So for each 32 incoming data blocks (downstream)  1024 have to be sent out (upsteam) 

Twice the number of players, 2 times the download but 4 times the data to upload.

..The above is probably gibberish but it makes me feel like i am less confused 

Had a read and apparently the reason given for poor upload bandwidth on UK cable is that they have decided that for a given copper link between user and the fibre box (docsis RF bit) most of the bandwidth will be dedicated to TV channel and media (down) streaming.

Thanks dibu,

The host certainly does put quite a strain on upload speed then but with a basic UK fibre broadband package hosting 10 players does seem quite realistic. Anyone with a decent 100/10 MBit package could attempt host a full session.
The high download speeds available with most packages packages do not seem very useful in this instance.

The high upload and low download does seem to suggest the server is doing most of the game data processing. I was hoping that the heavy data processing for each bike would be on its client end and the server just passed each bikes 'pose' and position data between clients with only race management and collision detection as overheads.

@LOOPATELI, could you post the processor spec. of the 'old' PC you have been using just as a base level guide.

Thanks. 

Seems to more to the rumble than it seems at first;

Been using it all weekend, mainly with the 990 on default garage settings and really enjoyed using the rumble with a very low filter value and high acceleration sensitivity.
Very rumbly  but i developed a suspicion that some of it was drive and suspension generated vibration.

So having tried a few laps with softest spring setting (near default value) and then max spring rate and then fiddling with the rebound/damping a bit (no expert, just twiddling) quite surprised how much the rumble levels reduced and the bike behaved better under hard acceleration and cornering. Tried on all the tracks i had used over the weekend.

So it does seem that set up changes do reflect in the rumble output Quite surprised at the effect of the spring rate, it seems a lot of the vibrations were due to overly soft suspension and chatter and not so much track surface. Surprised (pleasantly) by the effect of the high rate spring with the 990 

Really needs someone more experienced with garage settings and more consistent lapping but definitely the rumble is adding bike handling information just need to get used to the interpretation.

Cheers, much needed info 

I would really appreciate if one of the current hosts could run the network traffic monitor for a while whilst hosting a few riders and post the result. I am really curious as to what level of traffic the game actually generates.

Great that hosting is license free 

Wonderfully mad, i was watching the sidecars last night - very entertaining and the passengers all deserve a bravery award, they always seem to come of worse in a spill.

Lovely model, how will you handle the dynamics without a passenger though?

Always wanted to start a poll    so i did.

Set one up to get a feel for rumble availability especially with regard to whether it could be a racing advantage. If most have available rumble already then it is just a matter of personal preferences.

Your vote counts! ......... well its quite interesting anyway  - please add to the poll

Some discussion as to the pros/cons of rumble support and whether it could give an advantage, just wondering the ownership status of rumble capable supported controllers within the GPB community.

For discussion please use MaX's postings