Europe / German Server Ping Rates

[Roland]

This being your second post spouting the same general information, I have to query: where exactly is anyone in this thread confusing server performance with latency? I have yet to see it, but you seem absolutely convinced of it, so I'm honestly curious.

And you may be missing the point that Hedon raised: latency issues can be caused (and found) both within an ISP and within Blizzard and their servers. Do not forget that, as this (and I don't think you need any convincing on this) seems to be primarily a latency issue. The question is: WHERE is the latency bottleneck? It could be directly from the ISP and their connected networks, it could be directly from Blizzards internal servers and gateways, or it could be as simple as their ISP(s) not being able to provide enough (upload) bandwith to handle all the clients, which would cause the problem to ONLY be present within WoW (and not, for example, while trying to download game demos, music, etc.). This would also explain the problem being constant, while at the same time exacerbated by peak-time traffic.

[Kevin]

It is interesting that the worst examples of poor performance - the AH and mailboxes - are ones which involve database access.  It is good architectural practice to host your database and applications on different servers, but I would guess Blizzard haven't done this (because character transfers are such a big deal.  If the database were separate from the servers it would not be necessary to transfer any data, just update the field containing the server name on the database record).
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Each "server" is a cluster. Each continent has it's own server, the items and characters are on another server, instances are on another server, etc (though it's very likely that each server is a virtual machine on the same hardware set, I was very used to one physical box being 15 servers and where you could lose just one of those 15 servers or networking for just one of those 15, etc). The clusters don't really talk to each other. That is why the character transfers are a big deal. When you already have a cluster that is a single server to the client inter connecting that to another cluster and keeping info synched becomes more difficult.

But yeah a character for Tichondrius is not on the same server as a character for Stormrage, heck in that case those phsyical machines are probably several thousand miles apart. With how much data is associated with each character and how many characters a person can have, yeah there is no single massive character database. Each server has it's own. This is also one of the technical hurdles for cross server battle grounds. Physical server host in Virginia and another in California, clients in Wisconsin and Arizona. You have to make sure that all that battleground stuff is synched up now between physical servers thousands of miles away. Of course the answer is to portal you all to another physical box but of course you still need to route that to the clients and the you have to verify item integrity two two or more physical clusters that the new battleground isn't a part of.

So depending on what the core network architecture is it really isn't simple to just hook this and this together, keep it secure, and have it perform well. Networks are not infinitely expandable, some things require reforming the network entirely. Though much of that is security concerns.

[Flymo]

This being your second post spouting the same general information, I have to query: where exactly is anyone in this thread confusing server performance with latency? I have yet to see it, but you seem absolutely convinced of it, so I'm honestly curious.

And you may be missing the point that Hedon raised: latency issues can be caused (and found) both within an ISP and within Blizzard and their servers. Do not forget that, as this (and I don't think you need any convincing on this) seems to be primarily a latency issue. The question is: WHERE is the latency bottleneck? It could be directly from the ISP and their connected networks, it could be directly from Blizzards internal servers and gateways, or it could be as simple as their ISP(s) not being able to provide enough (upload) bandwith to handle all the clients, which would cause the problem to ONLY be present within WoW (and not, for example, while trying to download game demos, music, etc.). This would also explain the problem being constant, while at the same time exacerbated by peak-time traffic.
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To give just one example:

as for my ping rates, I'm none too sure, since it usually feels higher than what the indicator tells me.

It is quite unlikely that there is any undue latency within Blizzard's domain because then we'd all experience it (unless perhaps there was a single faulty router, but it would be very easy for them to pinpoint and fix it). If anyone has a tracert that proves otherwise then please post it.

[Roland]

To give just one example:
It is quite unlikely that there is any undue latency within Blizzard's domain because then we'd all experience it (unless perhaps there was a single faulty router, but it would be very easy for them to pinpoint and fix it).  If anyone has a tracert that proves otherwise then please post it.
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You know, I had read that same statement, and it didn't even register that way. Thanks. I was hoping you'd have an actual example (and not just puffing hot air, like some people around here). Always good to learn more. :) I'm almost surprised I missed that connotation - but not quite. ;) Sleep has not been kind to me these past few weeks.

As to how easy it is to pinpoint what the problem is and where it is, I'm sure it's not that simple. If it were, tech guys like me wouldn't have a job. ;) Having said that, there is some truth to your statements, in that if it was completely on Blizzard's side it would be prevalent much more staticly, and for all connected users (unless I'm missing something). Although, I wouldn't be surprised if there were some issues with Blizzard's hardware / software. Still, I'm still placing my bet on it being primarily an ISP issue. Time will tell.

Thanks again for the example. Somehow it had completely gone in one ear (eye?) and out the other. Illumination is such a wonderful thing, no? :)

[Hedon]

Ok, in an effort to clear things up: here is how the situation presents itself in Europe:


1. Some realms are more prone to lag then others, though at this point all realms are subject to some kind of latency issues.

2. The severe latency issues don't seem to scale with server population. Some of the most affected realms are in fact low pop realms.

3. The severe latency issues occur almost exclusively during prime time hours. This means weekdays 18:00 to 22:00 and on "raid sunday" 15:00 to 22:00.

4. People are seemingly randomly affected by the latency issues. This means for some the ping is fine, for others it is unplayable. Wether someone is affected or not can change daily or even hourly (tuesday in ZG my ping suddenly improved significantly, while for others that were fine so far, it has turned into red).

5. The latency issues seem to be more prevalent in instances then out in the world, and also scale somewhat with raid size (i.e 20 man ZG performs better then 40 man MC or BWL).

6. "Database lag", i.e. the delay experienced when trying to sell something to a vendor or put into the AH is what it always has been.



Some additional information:

Even long before the current lag crisis (I demand special coverage on CNN ;) ) login servers were prone to instabilities, meaning they sometimes completely crashed or had very poor performance.



I'm of course aware that lag is as much a part of the MMO world as is grinding for lvls, it is annoying but one learns to live with the occasional lag spikes. The problem with WoW EU just is, that the situation never was really optimal in the first place (recurring login server problems) and has slowly worsend over the course of the last weeks. At the beginning there were just the login server issues, then came the occasional lag spikes in MC and BWL, annoying but not really gamebreaking, up to the point of the last two weeks, where lag has become so severe that it raids during prime time hours are not possible atm, and it generally has become somewhat of a lottery, wether you'll be able to play WoW at all during prime time hours.

[Yurup]

I've only been playing a day but so far my latency on the Earthen thingie server hasn't reached over 206 yet. Pretty good to me.

[nobbie]

I've only been playing a day but so far my latency on the Earthen thingie server hasn't reached over 206 yet. Pretty good to me.
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It seems the problems have settled so far this weekend. Mail and vendor lag is very often still huge, though. Also, the char list after the login seems to be slower.