Server on a different machine, will it improve performance?

[TyyGUy91]

I would love some advice from you guys who have some experience with dedicated servers

I run arma 3 on a very good PC right now. I like to start a lan MP server and just play DUWS by meself. problem is over time I lose performance either due to a memory leak or something, or just as assets being piling up over time (AI, vehicles, etc)

I go from 60+ fps at the start to about 20 by the time I am getting to the end of the mission (around 3-4 hours)

This is, of course, normal and to be expected. Arma 3 is very CPU hungry. it makes sense that as things pile up, performance will go down. Add on to that the CPU load just running the clientside aspects of the game and I can see where the frames are bleeding off.

here is the thing though.
I have a few extra parts. enough to build a decent PC (an i7-2600k and mobo to match, a spare SSD, etc.)
only thing I am missing is RAM.
These parts were capable of running the game fine before I upgraded, so I assume they would make a pretty good server machine.

So if I were to build this PC, throw 16gb of ram into it or something, and then run the LAN server from that and use my primary PC to play the game on, would that improve my long term performance? or would it bog down just as quick?

I am looking at dropping around $100 for the ram, but I don't want to spend it if I am not going to get anything out of it, but if it means I can maintain a steady performance for an entire round I will totally spend it

[Nutlink]

16GB would be overkill, and a 2600k would be insane as a dedicated server for just yourself. I'm not sure about the mission itself since I never played DUWS, but a 2600k with 4GB or so of RAM would be pretty slick for it. Also, for your new machine dont' forget you'll need an OS. Fortunately, if you really wanted to, you could run the server on Ubuntu (or another distro of Linux of your choosing).

Hell, I "test" my missions that are fairly hefty (meant for 6-12 players) on a machine with a G3220 and 8GB of RAM. It works wonders for performance.

[TyyGUy91]

Originally posted by Nutlink:

Hell, I "test" my missions that are fairly hefty (meant for 6-12 players) on a machine with a G3220 and 8GB of RAM. It works wonders for performance.

wow. good to know!
thanks for the info. I think I can scrounge up 8gb of ram without buying new. I will try that.
Im glad my 2600k will not go to waste. it was a nice little chip and served me very well...

[Azrad Al'Azif]

Originally posted by Tyguy:

I go from 60+ fps at the start to about 20 by the time I am getting to the end of the mission (around 3-4 hours)

There is an option to limit AI spawn. This improves your FPS. Have you already tried it?

[Dj Otacon]

Yes.

[NZPorterDJ]

I run a dedi server for testing purposes and find it invaluable. I'm currently using an old moterboard slotted with an Intel Core 2 Quad CPU @ 2.4 GHz / 4 GB Ram running a manually slimmed down version of Win7Pro x64.

This allows me to run missions and host 4~6 players quite comfortably. For a single player in a MP mission you don't have to go all out for the latest hardware to get a decent performance boost. It also opens up a lot of missions that just won't work right being run from the client.

I say build it and see. If nothing else, it will give you a versitile little local server box to play with.

[TyyGUy91]

Originally posted by DJPorterdNZ:

I say build it and see. If nothing else, it will give you a versitile little local server box to play with.

that is my reasoning as well.
it's not like I am going out and buying all this just for an arma server box. I have almost all of it lying around collecting dust.
I just wanted to know if it would make a difference before i went out and picked up the ram and went through all the trouble of setting up the server

thanks for the help everyone!

[[40-1]King_Kosher]

separating client from server in terms of hosting is always a good idea performance-wise in ArmA,so i`d say go for it (might be wrong on that but i think 8gb is enough for that box).

just imagine the possibilities if you use headless client on that server...wish i had those spare parts around here too

[TyyGUy91]

so now comes the other questions.

I just tried setting up a basic server on my laptop, just to try it out, and it works great with vanilla.
But I play with a pile of addons...

is there an easy way to enable my addons on the server?
I mostly just want MCC, and a handful of other misc addons like vehicles and blastcore.

Everything I have read so far is like rocket science just to configure the server, let alone enable addons the way I have them set up locally

[[40-1]King_Kosher]

Originally posted by Tyguy:

is there an easy way to enable my addons on the server?
I mostly just want MCC, and a handful of other misc addons like vehicles and blastcore.

Everything I have read so far is like rocket science just to configure the server, let alone enable addons the way I have them set up locally

look for TADST on Armaholic/the official site.It is short for "Tophe`s Arma dedicated Server Tool" and my cat could set up a server with that (easy mod enabling,preference saving,whatever you wish for)

No need to set it up yourself with server.cfg,profiles and other things.

[TyyGUy91]

Originally posted by King_Kosher:

look for TADST on Armaholic/the official site

are you god? because you just answered my prayers.
this tool is exactly what I am looking for. I had a server up and running with all addons within 2 minutes!

here is the kicker though... I still can't use DUWS with it... because DUWS does not work on dedicated servers.
once the game starts it asks the host machine to pick a base location, set options, etc.
no host client=no menus to set all this...
waste of time.

oh well, at least now I can play most of the other missions I like!

thank you for your help

[[40-1]King_Kosher]

Originally posted by Tyguy:

this tool is exactly what I am looking for. I had a server up and running with all addons within 2 minutes!

here is the kicker though... I still can't use DUWS with it... because DUWS does not work on dedicated servers.

Glad to be of help,can`t do much about DUWS since as you said,it only works on listen servers.

However,if you plan on creating missions yourself the ALive mod could be a great help to set one up without knowing too much of .sqf scripting

[Cyka Pingu]

Depending on mods and game mode, absolutely. Running a separate server with 3 HCs on the same machine, all three bound to separate cores for Antistasi with quite a few mods (from units and maps to other simulation based scripts that chonk it normally).

[Valen]

Dude(tte)! That is a 10-year necrothreading.

[Niall]

Profiling branch = extra frames