Tick Rate Setting/Pricing

[Edge100x]

Nod, that's why we limit 60hz for the standalone servers. We know from experience that large servers will generally have problems with such high tickrates, even with low overall machine CPU usage. (Our standalone servers have low overall CPU usage.)

With a dedicated server or VDS, customers have unfettered access to set whatever they want -- just as they can add as many servers to the machine as they want, limited only by its overall CPU and memory resources. This means that, as always, they need to be aware of the resource usage of the servers and reconfigure them as necessary. Setting a tickrate that does not run well will result in unhappy players. Dedicated server customers are good about understanding this, because they typically have communities that provide quick feedback.

Rogue Warrior, that's the EA explanation information from their documentation. The actual symbols will occur in-game.

[onemoar]

Nod, that's why we limit 60hz for the standalone servers. We know from experience that large servers will generally have problems with such high tickrates, even with low overall machine CPU usage. (Our standalone servers have low overall CPU usage.)

With a dedicated server or VDS, customers have unfettered access to set whatever they want -- just as they can add as many servers to the machine as they want, limited only by its overall CPU and memory resources. This means that, as always, they need to be aware of the resource usage of the servers and reconfigure them as necessary. Setting a tickrate that does not run well will result in unhappy players. Dedicated server customers are good about understanding this, because they typically have communities that provide quick feedback.

Rogue Warrior, that's the EA explanation information from their documentation. The actual symbols will occur in-game.

the threshold for the warnings is set a bit low atm
the actual lag people experiencing is usually related to there client not being able to maintain the required frame rate and or bandwidth
the new system has very little tolerance for packet loss or high latvar
pure dedicated is the only way to fly for 64@60hz
and contrary to opinion having a server full of high-pingers/people with low fps/bad connections does cause a issue in that it can give the appearance that the server is lagging because you are constantly querying the lookback buffer to see what the hell really happened this also eats a fair chunk of cpu

[Frogtooth]

Don't suppose you guys have access to 4790K-based hosts? The single-threaded performance of the 4790K is like 10% faster than any Xeon. Might that make for a better BF4 server host for 60Hz, 64p servers?

[kraze]

Don't suppose you guys have access to 4790K-based hosts? The single-threaded performance of the 4790K is like 10% faster than any Xeon. Might that make for a better BF4 server host for 60Hz, 64p servers?

We don't use any consumer grade CPUs here, so that would not be possible. Also, the Xeon range covers all of the Intel server CPUs. I would not expect the 4790K to beat out any Xeon on the market by 10%.

[Edge100x]

The i7-4790K may be slightly faster than an E3-1271v3, but even if it is 10% faster, that wouldn't be enough to guarantee the performance of 60hz 64-slot servers, if that's what you're thinking -- plus, we'd have to replace our fleet of BF4-running machines to do it, and that's not practical in the short term. (As Kraze mentioned, we also really don't like consumer-grade processors due to the lack of ECC support and lower reliability.)

The Xeon E3-1270v5 was recently released and we're waiting for support for it in a multi-node configuration. It should comparable to an i7-4790K or a bit faster, and supports more and faster memory (64 GB of DDR4). Once we can roll those out, they will be made available as dedicated servers first.

[TacTicToe]

Xeon E3-1280 V5???

So umm curious. Is it possible then to upgrade our box to the E3-1270v5 when you have them available? Or are we stuck with what we have? Not sure how something like that would work.

[kraze]

Xeon E3-1280 V5???

So umm curious. Is it possible then to upgrade our box to the E3-1270v5 when you have them available? Or are we stuck with what we have? Not sure how something like that would work.

Dedicated machines don't really have an upgrade option like normal services. You would just need to order the new machine with enough time remaining in your current cycle to allow it to be setup and for you to transfer your servers. Once completed you'd cancel the old machine.

[floold]

Any news yet?

Would love it if you guys could update this topic a bit more with news regarding your progress...

I see 60hz servers popping up left and right now... The question is though: will we ever see 60hz on the 64p standalone servers here?
Or even better, 60hz on 66-68 slot (standalone)servers so that it works when having spectator slots.
In all honesty, i'm starting to think that it will never come... Maybe that's not correct, but reading the posts that have been made points me towards this conclusion. (please prove me wrong )

Ordering a dedicated server just to run a 60hz server is also pretty much the least financially acceptable option...

[kraze]

It's actually been discussed a few times in this thread. Overall, even the latest hardware is going to have problems running a steady 64 slot server at 60Hz 100% of the time. There just isn't hardware available that can do it. As new hardware releases and Dice tweak the game itself we'll reevaluate our numbers.