ARMA 3 server How to force it to use all cores equally.

[chrispottsov1987]

I am running an Arma 3 server, unmanaged, and set up using the exact settings suggested on the BI website.

When the game is running, it will start to lag a little, when I look at the task manager in the server, it shows that one core is maxed out almost constantly, 95-100% Second core is at 50-70% and the remaining two cores are barely touched. 10-20% each. 40-50% total (all cores)

I have already started the server with cpuCount=4 to make it use all 4 cores, and as far as I can tell it is. Just not very efficiently. Is there a way to force it to use all 4 cores equally? Or at least more efficiently!

After a long discussion with the support team, it became apparent that the server hardware I am using now is the best they can offer, and no more powerful system is available. So that leaves my only option to try and force the game to use all 4 cores better.

Will setThreads=7 force multithreading in the game, and force it to use all 4 cores better?

After all the only real upgrade option available right now would be to go for a 6 core to get the extra processing power, but I'm not going to think about paying extra for cores when I cant get the game to utilise the ones its got.

Before any one points out, I am aware it's still an Alpha, so its not optimized yet.

I ask this on here instead of the BI website, because here I can get an answer from others who use these servers and possibly host other Arma servers.

At the very least, I know NFO offers to host older versions of Arma, and has them running smooth, so with luck they can give some tips on how to optimise the game. Sadly I wont be able to get them to spill the beans on everything they do to get their level of performance on their managed machines, or else everyone would do it, and they'd loose money. But if you could give me some advice, tweaks that I can make that will help to get my server somewhere between your fully managed servers performance and that I am getting form the basic setup, I have now.

Any help would be much obliged.

[kraze]

With the game being in Alpha has you mentioned it isn't optimized. The Arma series has been one of the better ones when it comes to using multiple cores. Unfortunately, there really isn't a way to force it to use more cores.

The commands you mentioned above, specifically "cpuCount=4" just tells the server how many processors there are. However, the game auto detects CPU. IMO that should be used to limit a server to a specific number of cores.

setThreads tells the server to run commands/process information in parallel with other information. In some cases this value can be tweaked but in other cases leaving it at 2 should be fine.

You may be able to tweak some server properties which should lower usage but it wouldn't be by much. Your best bet would be to lower the slot count or wait until the game is better optimized.

[Edge100x]

If you're running on a VDS, you could also consider a full dedicated machine, to eke out every last bit of performance. VDSes have a little bit of virtualization overhead -- the amount of overhead varies depending on the application and how it behaves, and I don't think that ArmA* is very bad, but this could still net maybe a 5-20% improvement.

[chrispottsov1987]

I had thought about going for a full dedicated machine, but was convinced to try a virtual machine first, by most of the posts in this forum.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but your claim when I bought the VDS was that although not a full machine in its self it is managed in a way that can provide similar performance, as well as the benefit of being managed by your company. So there performance should be almost identical.

I have checked out the chipsets for both the E3-1270v2: Dedicated machine you offer, and what I am getting at the moment. As far as I can tell there is very little in performance between the two.

So what kind of difference would there be between the E3-1270v2: Dedicated machine, and upping my current VDS to use 12cores instead of 4, in essence giving me full control over that machine? While also having the benefit of remaining under your control to sort out any problems quickly.

As the price of the two are almost identical, I can only assume that the results will also be the same.

This my not help my situation now, as I am unable to get the program to utilise 4 cores, having 12 may do little to help. However I may wish to upgrade in the future, so knowing if I would be getting better results from renting all the cores from a VDS would be the same as having a dedicated system could be helpful.

[kraze]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but your claim when I bought the VDS was that although not a full machine in its self it is managed in a way that can provide similar performance, as well as the benefit of being managed by your company. So there performance should be almost identical.

Our VDS's are very fast and probably some of the fastest you can get in the market. However, when it comes to piggier games like Arma, NS2, BF3 they need to squeeze every last bit of performance out of the CPU.

Being in a virtual environment there is some overhead. While the overhead is minimized in some cases it is just enough to allow for smoother gameplay.

I have checked out the chipsets for both the E3-1270v2: Dedicated machine you offer, and what I am getting at the moment. As far as I can tell there is very little in performance between the two.

The performance is probably very similar but with a dedicated machine you are taking away the overhead.

So what kind of difference would there be between the E3-1270v2: Dedicated machine, and upping my current VDS to use 12cores instead of 4, in essence giving me full control over that machine? While also having the benefit of remaining under your control to sort out any problems quickly.

As the price of the two are almost identical, I can only assume that the results will also be the same.

I wouldn't recommend you do that as when it comes to hosting game servers it is not how many cores but individual core speed. Having more cores would allow you to run more game servers at once, though.

This my not help my situation now, as I am unable to get the program to utilise 4 cores, having 12 may do little to help. However I may wish to upgrade in the future, so knowing if I would be getting better results from renting all the cores from a VDS would be the same as having a dedicated system could be helpful.

This has nothing to do with your ability. This is all on the developers. You can't force a game to use multiple cores. I imagine as the game gets further in its development process it will be better optimized.

[chrispottsov1987]

So what kind of difference would there be between the E3-1270v2: Dedicated machine, and upping my current VDS to use 12cores instead of 4, in essence giving me full control over that machine? While also having the benefit of remaining under your control to sort out any problems quickly.

As the price of the two are almost identical, I can only assume that the results will also be the same.

I wouldn't recommend you do that as when it comes to hosting game servers it is not how many cores but individual core speed. Having more cores would allow you to run more game servers at once, though.

I might not have worded that the correct way.

I meant to say, If I take the 12-core VDS that I can only assume from its similar price to a dedicated system. I would be getting sole control over all the processors on the VDS? Will that allow me to reduce the overhead and give me similar results as having a dedicated machine? As I would be getting sole control over all the processors on the VDS?

just to try and clarify things, Here a rough example of what I am on about.

E3-1270v2: The latest technology from Intel: Ivy Bridge •Intel Xeon E3-1270v2 processor (four physical 3.5ghz cores on QPI + hyperthreading + turbo->3.9ghz)
•32 GB DDR3-1333 ECC memory
•2000 GB, 7200 RPM SATA hard drive

Is this the same as:

•Twelve full, dedicated HT CPU cores (Nehalem or better)
•12288 MB of RAM
•1000 GB of RAID-protected storage

Do I get full control over the server the VDS is held on, therefore reducing overhead?

In short, what is the server specs you host on? 12core with 12288Ram so that plan gives 100% of control over server. Or is a server 24core 24576Ram so I would get 50% control as apposed to 25% and 12.5% respectively I get on the 4 core plan I am on now. As I assume a server that is split between 2 is going to have less overhead than one split between 4+.

Because although the dedicated machine may be a little better, 5-20% I believe was the estimated as the possible improvement, I can not justify that slight of an increase by the 400% increase in price.

[kraze]

I might not have worded that the correct way.

I meant to say, If I take the 12-core VDS that I can only assume from its similar price to a dedicated system. I would be getting sole control over all the processors on the VDS? Will that allow me to reduce the overhead and give me similar results as having a dedicated machine? As I would be getting sole control over all the processors on the VDS?

just to try and clarify things, Here a rough example of what I am on about.

E3-1270v2: The latest technology from Intel: Ivy Bridge •Intel Xeon E3-1270v2 processor (four physical 3.5ghz cores on QPI + hyperthreading + turbo->3.9ghz)
•32 GB DDR3-1333 ECC memory
•2000 GB, 7200 RPM SATA hard drive

Is this the same as:

•Twelve full, dedicated HT CPU cores (Nehalem or better)
•12288 MB of RAM
•1000 GB of RAID-protected storage

As I mentioned above the performance is similar but your issue is with the overhead and adding more cores won't make the overhead any less or more. We also are selling you a VDS, not VPS so having more cores on a machine won't make for better performance.

As with our higher end VDS's we use bigger machines, most with up to 32 cores so it is not possible to completely isolate yourself on a single machine without going dedicated.

Reading the rest of your post it seems you are slightly confused on the overhead. The overhead here is strictly from being in a virtual environment and not dependant on other customers on the machine since we are dedicating resources to you all the time.

[chrispottsov1987]

It seems I may have been thinking overhead was caused by the number of VDS the system had to monitor at a single time, that if you reduced the number by half the resources required would be reduced and thus overhead cut.

Well, I cant justify going for a dedicated machine at this point, the price range is just a little too high. Plus I really don't want to give up the extra support and security I get from running on a VDS.

My only hope is that Arma gets better as it goes into beta, but I doubt it. Any slight increase they can give in terms of performance will be offset by the extra amount of scripts and units they will be putting into the game.

[kraze]

Well, I cant justify going for a dedicated machine at this point, the price range is just a little too high. Plus I really don't want to give up the extra support and security I get from running on a VDS.

What do you mean by extra support and security? In those terms a VDS/dedi should be pretty much exactly the same.

[Edge100x]

What I said before is accurate and I tried to be clear with it.

VDSes are very high performance. However, if your server is (for instance) running on a VDS that is in turn hosted on an E3-1270-based system, it will strictly not perform as well as it would full dedicated E3-1270 machine, all else being equal. This is because any virtualization fundamentally adds some bit of overhead -- it's an extra layer in between you and the hardware, after all. On a well-optimized system, and with no other customers sharing your machine, that overhead is usually small (something like 5%), but for some applications (such as UE3-based games), the overhead can be higher, due to the way that they operate.

Additionally, the fastest type of machine that we use for VDSes is an E5-2690, which is about as fast as an E3-1270 on a per-core basis. With a standalone dedicated machine, we offer an E3-1270v2 configuration, which is 5-15% faster from a hardware standpoint.

If you purchase a 12-HT-core VDS, it is not true that you will be alone on a machine. We do not use any machines for VDSes that have 6 physical cores (12 hyperthreads). Most of our machines have 16 physical cores (32 hyperthreads). An E3-1270 has 4 physical cores (8 hyperthreads).

I don't want you to get the impression that there's a big difference here between a VDS and a dedicated machine, in terms of single-core performance, because there usually isn't. I am just saying that if you absolutely need every last drop of performance, a dedicated machine with us will technically be best. (I can't say the same for machines at other hosts, as bandwidth and hardware quality are also important factors.)

You might also see a performance increase by bumping up the number of cores. I wouldn't recommend going straight to 12, but you might try 6, for instance. I don't know enough about ArmA3 to be able to say how big of a difference this would make.

[chrispottsov1987]

Well, I cant justify going for a dedicated machine at this point, the price range is just a little too high. Plus I really don't want to give up the extra support and security I get from running on a VDS.

What do you mean by extra support and security? In those terms a VDS/dedi should be pretty much exactly the same.

Again I may not have chosen the correct wording, by secure I simply meant, if for what ever reason my VDS breaks or stops working, you can transfer my system to a working one fairly quickly. While a dedicated machine, if broken is unable to be transferred and is going to remain offline, until you can order up a technician to fix/rebuild it.

The same for support, I know you would not build a machine and then turn your backs on me, but if something does go wrong with the software, and it needs to be fixed for any reason. You do not have direct access to do this that you do with the VDS. You have to arrange an engineer to go and see what the problem is. Sure I read that in one of these forum posts, not sure which one.

That's why I prefer to stay on a VDS rather than a dedicated machine.

And as for what Edge100x put. You made clear that a dedicated machine may provide a slight boost over the equivalent of what I am running right now, however given the price difference between that and a VDS, it seems like I am able to get much more for the same price, from a VDS.

[Edge100x]

Yes, this is true.

I love the flexibility of VDSes myself. It's great being able to re-image the machine at the click of a button and to log in through VNC to fix potential firewall or system problems. Upgrading and downgrading is also easy, all VDSes come with built-in RAID, the control panel's Firewall page is useful, and the price point is certainly lower.

[.=QUACK=.Major.Pain]

Not sure what parameters can be used in the command line while still in Alpha, but have you tested it using these parameters like are used for DayZ?

Code: Select all

-cpuCount=2 -exThreads=1 -maxMem=2048

Adjust for Arma 3.


Also, if you know what your doing and want to all do some testing, you could also add a basic.cfg file with the following:

Code: Select all

MinBandwidth=104857600;
MaxBandwidth=1073741824;
MaxMsgSend=256;
MaxSizeNonguaranteed=256;
MinErrorToSendNear=0.029999999;
MinErrorToSend=0.003;
MaxCustomFileSize=0;
Windowed=0;
adapter=-1;
3D_Performance=1;
Resolution_Bpp=32;
class sockets
{
	maxPacketSize=1400;
};
serverLongitude=-122;
serverLatitude=47;
serverLongitudeAuto=-122;
serverLatitudeAuto=47;

Just play with the values and see if it improves anything.
You would also have to add the basic.cfg parameter in your command line to call for the file.


We found too many slots caused lag and constant crashing. We have been running at 25 slots and found things ran far better and no more crashing. There is probably a slot size that is a safe number just before issues start to happen.

We never took the time to run any tests on the above.

[chrispottsov1987]

Was wondering if anyone had found a better value for the server config than that listed above. Have been using it for a while now, but I still notice the occasional slow performance from the server when player count get to 15/20 mark. As its been a few months, and I'm sure a few have played around with this setting trying to get the best out of it, was wondering if any one had new settings to share that work better.

Quick search on Google, or BI's website, reveal hundreds of different people promising No-lag ultimate performance settings. Though I doubt half even own a server let alone know what they are talking about. I'd sooner trust that Nigerian general who keeps offering me $100 million then those lot. However given that this site is hosted by a server company, and anyone on here who posts a reply, prob runs an Arma 3 server, on similar specs to what I have, It may be worth getting some feedback from proper server managers.

Any advice would be appreciated.

[kraze]

You could look into a standard server from us or you could contact us and see if there is a faster VDS machine available. There might be a 2690V2 available which could yield 5-15% increase in performance which may be enough to smooth things out a bit but it's hard to say.