I used to get lots of disconnects, especially when strafing with US machine guns. It turned out I had several problems, all of which you might consider.
First: You really should get a router. It blocks lots of nasty hack attempts on your pc. I used to run ZoneAlarm plus my router, but noticed that once I had installed the router, ZA logged zero attempts to get into my PC. So I quit using ZA. ZA is still useful for monitoring your PC trying to go out to the internet w/o your permission, but all in all IMHO it's more trouble than it's worth if you have a good NAT router.
Second: I concur you should get a NIC. I have extra ones since the new mobos all have built in ethernet connections. Send me a email and I'll ship you one of my old ones.
Third: My cable modem was going bad. It was two years old. Replaced it with a new Motorola Surfboard, cured 75% of my problems.
Fourth: My router was going bad. It was the original Linksys Jurassic period router. Replaced it with a NetGear that has much lower latency. If you're shopping for routers, get one with the lowest possible latency. A year ago it was the Netgear.
The new cable modem and router cured my ills. I very rarely have a lost connection now. I've had a few CTDs lately but that was due to OCing my vid card, not internet connection.
A couple of more things to check:
Make sure your cable connection outside your house is good. Once a year I take some super fine sandpapaer and polish up the copper cable cable wire and reinsert it in the outside splitter.
Check how many splitters you have on your cable. if you have several TVs plus your PC, it could be losing out. You want as few splits as possible between the cable company's drop at your house and your PC. Those splitters also are of various quality. I replaced all mine with high quality splitters.
I strongly reccommentd you reviewing this web site to make sure your cable, modem, and splitters, are set up to their optimum:
http://www.dslreports.com/faq/cabletech#10 Here's an example of the info at this website:
Q: What kind of signal levels do I want on my cable modem? (#3412)
A: Downstream Power:
You generally want between -12db and +12db. Most modems are rated from -15 to +15. Anything less or more than that and you
may have quality issues .
I personally prefer to not have less than -7db. If you want to raise your signal level a bit, check my troubleshooting and splitter section.
Downstream SNR:
This number is best over 30, but you may not have any problems with down to 25. Anything less and you will probably have slow transfers,
dropped connections, etc.
See my "Downstream SNR" definition for more information on this.
Upstream Power:
The lower this number is, the better. If it is above 55, you may want to see if you can reconfigure your splitters. Anything above 57 is not good and should be fixed ASAP. (This is getting pretty close to
not being able to connect.)
Upstream SNR:
Anything above 29 is considered good. The higher this number is, the better. If this number is below 25 and 29, you have a minute amount of noise leaking in somewhere. If it's anything less than 25, you want to get it fixed as you may have a lot of packet loss or slow transfer rates.
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Most cable modems have a way to login to the modem and get the above info right out of it.
Hope we can get you fixed.
Mosq
