Variance in delay graph.

[CZCH64]

What does this show? As I posted in another thread I was having issues with a new PC  getting frame stutters in the game, but not losing fps. So I went ahead and formatted the disc and packed it up to bring it back to Bestbuy. Now I plugged my old system back in and I'm getting the same damn problem. So I bought up the "NET Graph" just for the hell of it. And sure enough I get spikes when I get the frame stutters. Any ideas?

[100Coogn]

The variance in delay should be flat-lined.  Even if it's slightly over '0', it should be a nice steady flat line.  If it's spiking consistently, you either have a bad connection, or something else is trying to use your connection. 
Take a look at your ping numbers when you go to log into an arena.  Low numbers are good, but consistent numbers are equally important.

Coogan 

[CZCH64]

Thx....My ping is around 60-70...but getting spikes up to around 100-114. I'm hard wired so don't know how something else could use my connection.

[100Coogn]

Those are pretty good numbers.  I'm concerned about your spikes.  Just using the low side, you're jumping from a 60 to 100.  That's a bit unsteady.
When I was using dial-up, I had about 250, before I'd log in.  I know that sounds high, but it was a steady 250.
When those numbers are jumping too tuff, you'll either notice screen freeze, or others will start saying that you are warping.

Coogan

[The Fugitive]

Another program on your computer might be using it with out you knowing it. Some programs try to update data every 5 minutes. If your spikes are happening at regular intervals that might be the issue.

Get pingplotter ftp://www.pingplotter.com/pub/pingplotter/pngplt_1.exe Its a free program that you can test your route to the LW servers. DL, install, type in this address 206.16.60.41 and let it run for 10 minutes. Any red shows up it's bad. Take a screen shot and post the picture for more help in looking at it.

[CZCH64]

Thx...I keep getting a %50 percent packet loss from an IP in VA. Is there a way to correct that?

[The Fugitive]

It might "fix it self" if the ISP is aware of the issue they may be working on it already. It could also be something to do with heavy traffic, maybe the election crap. You could call your ISP and show them what you found, but their first response will be "is the unit plugged in blah blah blah". If you can get past the "general" help desk and escalate it up a tier or two you might get someone that can and will look at it.

[Skuzzy]

Everyone has given pretty good responses here.

The "Variance" is a measure of how well your CPU is responding to game requests.  If it is not flat, then it normally means something else is interrupting the CPU and stopping game requests from being satisfied.

Anything can cause it.  Errant network requests (some games install a bittorrent client which can eat up the CPU if not properly configured, iTunes is also bad about this, along with any other P2P progam).  Malware, spyware, anti-virus software, anti-xxx software of any kind (Norton and McAfee are not friendly at all about this).  That is just a couple of things of the hundreds of things that can cause it.

Onboard video chips can cause it as well as they have no dedicated video RAM, which causes the CPU to have to stop every time something has to be drawn.

[CZCH64]

Thx for the tips......Got my new system up and running. Looks great, was still getting a few hitches here and there but nothing like before though. Though I found this eliminated them....If I use detailed terrain and water they stop. Runs smooth as silk with those checked. I would think the opposite. Any ideas on that?

[ebfd11]

I noticed that i was getting spikes, and here was the problem.

JAVA updates and regular updates.. they would come up in the background and I would not notice them, while I was in gane, but I would see temporary stutters and then get the infamous boot.

So make sure you dont have the updates enabled except by your choosing and disable the java updates also.

LawnDart

[Bizman]

Here's another reason I noticed last weekend: Variance and HostQueTime will make funny curves if you're using a cat5 Ethernet cable when both your router and network card are gigabyte rated. You know, a cable is a cable is a cable and they all look alike... So I just ordered a bunch of shielded cat6 cables after finding out I had a cat5 also at home in my modem/router.

[Noir]

Is you computer a portable core2duo? I had one and it produced saw type variance because of how the cpu speed fluctuates over time with speedstep technology

[Skuzzy]

Any laptop needs any and all power management disabled.