System Requirements for CS 1.6 Server on basis of Slots and FPS

RaHBeR · **Author**

Hi Guys,
I want to know the Minimum System Requirements for a CS 1.6 server with respect to the number of slots the the server FPS.

That is if I want to run a 32 slot server with 500 FPS what will be the requirements and if I want 32 slots with 1000 FPS then, and so on.
If you guys have a formula or equation for it then tell me, I'll then calculate on my own. Or you can tell me a small configuration that for 4 slots with 500 FPS and then with 1000.

Any help will be appriciated.
Regards,
RaHBeR

ancient1

You may be confusing ticrate with fps. The servers ticrate equates to how many times per second the server updates the game world.

To make things even more confusing for you, lets say your playing on a LCD monitor, this monitor probably has a refresh rate of 60 hz. That means your GFX card can only render a maximum of 60 frames per second.

So if you wanted a server that was optimised for your personal LCD monitor, you would want that server to be running at a tic rate of 60, but due to loss internally in the server engine, you would set the server ticrate to 66, this would give a stable server running at around 59-61 FPS.

You can check this by doing a stats command in the server console.

Thats not where the story ends, you now need to configure the 66 ticrate server to get the most out of the available bandwidth the server has. So rates are now set up to match the servers ticrate.

For 66 ticrate servers the following rates should be used:

sv_maxrate 20000
sv_minrate 10000
sv_maxupdaterrate 60
sv_minupdaterate 30

For 100 ticrate servers use these (only worth while if your LCD monitor has a 100hz refresh rate):

sv_maxrate 60000
sv_minrate 10000
sv_maxupdaterate 101
sv_minupdaterate 30

Now for the server cpu requirements, this depends on the slots and the ticrate of the server, not to mention the addons you may install in amxx.

CPU usage is not linear for player numbers, and cpu usage grows exponentially the more player slots you want to have available.

Generally speaking a 1.5gz cpu would run a 32 slot server at 66 ticrate quite comfortably, however you would probably need a 2.6gz cpu to run the exact same server at 100 ticrate. These figures are from my many years experience of running high quality servers.

Hope that helps.

RaHBeR

Hi,
I understood quite a bit.
What is the server FPS then? I tried a server on a i3 (don't remember the speed) with 4GB RAM and 24 Slots (i tested with only 1 player i.e me). I set sys_ticrate to 200 and got around 170 fps being shown in the server console, in-game over LAN I got 15 to 25 ping. Then I set the sys_ticrate to 10000 (i put much a large value to reach max), server fps was fluctuating around 800 to 950 and in-game I got 3 to 6 ping.
Care to explain?
Regards,
RaHBeR

ancient1

Its a common mis-understood thing.

FPS on your computer is how many frames your grafix card is rendering, this cant be more than your screen is capable of (Most LCD screens these days are either 60/80/100 or 120). If you set your fps_max to 1000, you still wont get more than your screen is capable of, even if it says you are! Its simply not possible!

The server FPS, is in fact a confusing term, as its not actually FPS, it should really be renamed to something like response, as that is what it really means.

So for example a 66 tic server will respond 66 times per second to updated game information from the players, it will ALSO issue 66 game updates to the connected players per second. A 100 tic server would do this at 100 times per second and so on.

The problem is the higher you set the ticrate, the more information the server has to compute and then send and receive this information back to the players.

So if you had a 500 tic server it would be sending so much information that it would be using masses of bandwidth, and since your computer cant possibly respond fast enough or render the updated information, its quite useless in reality.

The trick to good servers and good hit registry is to set both the players and the servers rates to match the ticrate.

Hope you understood

Ancient

ancient1

Quote:

Originally Posted by RaHBeR

Hi,
I understood quite a bit.
What is the server FPS then? I tried a server on a i3 (don't remember the speed) with 4GB RAM and 24 Slots (i tested with only 1 player i.e me). I set sys_ticrate to 200 and got around 170 fps being shown in the server console, in-game over LAN I got 15 to 25 ping. Then I set the sys_ticrate to 10000 (i put much a large value to reach max), server fps was fluctuating around 800 to 950 and in-game I got 3 to 6 ping.
Care to explain?
Regards,
RaHBeR

On a lan you should be getting latency of around 2-5 with correct personal settings.

You should have this is your config.cfg or autoexec.cfg, take your pick:

cl_cmdrate "101"
cl_updaterate "60"

You can adjust these settings when playing online to get best hit registry and best latency for your connection.

A High cl_cmdrate = high latency. The lower you set it, the lower your latency, but downside is the worse your hit registry will be. Try to fine tune it for best results online.

Ancient

RaHBeR

Hi Again,
Thanks a lot! You made the concepts crystal clear!

So the Server hosting companies that brag about boosted servers of 500 and 1000 server fps are in reality not much of better use than normal ones?
Regards,
RaHBeR

ancient1

You got it!