For some time now, hundreds of video games offer the possibility of playing online on the Internet. Regardless of the console you have at home - PC, PlayStation, and Xbox, among others - this modality has become very popular among gamers from all over the planet, and in recent years it has gained special prominence thanks to the e-sports championships they distribute millions of dollars in prizes.
But there is an essential issue: to enjoy a smooth online gaming experience it is essential to have a connection that offers a high data transfer speed - upload and download - and a very low latency (ping) to avoid slowdowns or lags. For this ideal scenario to be possible, it is important to have some concepts clear and know how to configure the router for gaming purposes. Here some key aspects.
LATENCY: CRITICAL ENEMY
The different 파워볼사이트 consoles and computers can connect to the Internet via network cable or Wifi. However, for the purpose of playing online, there are decisive differences between one type of connection and another. Which one is better? “It is advisable to be connected by cable to the router. Wireless connections tend to have a higher latency than cable, are more unstable and may be affected by interference or saturation, ”says Gian Kim , general manager of Softnyx Peru, an online video game platform that operates under the free to play model .
What does the term latency refer to? At the exact time it takes to go and return a package within the network. The Xataka portal , one of the most acclaimed technology blogs in the Spanish-speaking world, explains it this way: “Latency measures the immediacy of the connection. For example, if we have a latency of 50 milliseconds, it means that this is the time it takes for a data packet to arrive from a remote server to our computer. ”
A useful illustration to understand how latency affects the online game would be the following: imagine that you are playing Call of Duty in multiplayer mode. You shoot an enemy several times, but your bullets do not reach him. On the contrary, only one shot is enough to kill your character. What happened? Your signal took longer to reach the game's servers than your rival's.
"The relationship is simple: the lower the latency, the better the gaming experience," says Kim. And it adds an important detail: latency influences factors such as the distance between the two points that want to establish communication and the networks or intermediate jumps through which the packets have to go.
IMPROVEMENT OPTIONS
In general, the home router is configured by the Internet provider to allow optimal browsing, downloading files and using services such as Skype, YouTube or Netflix. But to play online there are some options that can be adjusted to prioritize the traffic of the games over other applications.
Luis Salazar, a Peruvian gamer who was South American champion of Pro Evolution Soccer (PES), suggests that an essential task is to configure the router to ensure that no one connects to it without permission, so that it consumes or saturates bandwidth.
To do this you must enter the router configuration. How? Entering the IP address of the device in the browser and logging in with the username and password that are usually in the device box. “This is useful to ensure that the Wifi is configured with a secure key and with WPA2-AES encryption. In addition, we must verify that the UPnP is deactivated - for security purposes - and that the firewall is enabled, although in a little restrictive way, ”says Luis.
Another essential configuration is the Quality of Service (QoS). This is a mechanism used to ensure traffic prioritization and free up bandwidth for certain services. Once inside the router settings interface, the QoS menu must be located and the “gaming ” option activated . This step is essential to avoid excessive data increase in the memory (buffer) of the router, reduce latency and help optimize the speed and performance of online games.