Getting Poor Routing to West Coast USA

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Getting Poor Routing to West Coast USA

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2 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2141826 9-Dec-2018 00:29

It's only some connections (typically to game servers it seems) that seem to route via sydney.

For people ( @KiwiTT ? ) wanting to reduce gaming ping with a VPN I've switched to mudfish which is cheaper (pay by bandwidth), more flexible (more exit points to choose from), and no packet loss compared to my previous (wtfast). It's a little more technical to set up but I prefer the flexibility.

Regarding all connections routing via syd...

When I traceroute to overwatch servers (e.g. 24.105.30.129) I can see the syd hops...

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 10.0.0.1

2 4 ms 3 ms 3 ms 125-239-10-1-adsl.sparkbb.co.nz [125.239.10.1]

3 * 12 ms 11 ms mdr-ip24-int.msc.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.116.6]

4 11 ms 11 ms 11 ms ae8-10.akbr6.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.116.5]

5 11 ms 11 ms 11 ms ae7-2.akbr7.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.119.53]

6 36 ms 35 ms 35 ms xe7-0-4.sgbr3.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.127.2]

7 36 ms 35 ms 35 ms ae2-10.sgbr4.global-gateway.net.nz [202.50.232.246]

8 37 ms 62 ms 61 ms ae-13.r21.sydnau03.au.bb.gin.ntt.net [103.13.80.125]

9 150 ms 147 ms 151 ms ae-11.r31.tokyjp05.jp.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.5.34]

10 153 ms 151 ms 151 ms ae-3.r00.tokyjp08.jp.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.6.129]

11 151 ms 158 ms 160 ms ae-1.a00.tokyjp03.jp.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.5.51]

12 151 ms 151 ms 151 ms 61.213.179.114

13 223 ms 223 ms 253 ms et-0-0-48-br01-eqty2.blizzardonline.net [137.221.81.33]

...

16 222 ms 223 ms 223 ms 24.105.30.129

Then if I enable mudfish for overwatch it adds entries to the routing tables for the ranges that overwatch gameservers sit on to make windows use it's TAP adapter for those IPs and tunnels everything going through that adapter to, say, a ColoCrossing exit node that drops my ICMP RTT to 180. The route to ColoCrossing (i.e. the route that the VPN is tunneling connections to overwatch through) doesn't seem to be going via sydney at least as far as I can see from the hostnames, IP location lookups, and timing (syd is normally 35-45ms as seen in above traceroute):

Tracing route to node-us-00188.mudfish.net [104.168.154.66]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms * <1 ms 10.0.0.1

2 4 ms 3 ms 3 ms 125-239-10-1-adsl.sparkbb.co.nz [125.239.10.1]

3 * * 12 ms mdr-ip24-int.msc.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.116.6]

4 12 ms 11 ms 11 ms ae8-10.akbr6.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.116.5]

5 13 ms 11 ms 10 ms ae7-2.akbr7.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.119.53]

6 12 ms 11 ms 15 ms ae10-10.tkbr12.global-gateway.net.nz [202.50.232.29]

7 135 ms 135 ms 135 ms xe7-0-1-10.lebr7.global-gateway.net.nz [202.50.232.162]

8 143 ms 143 ms 139 ms ae3-10.sjbr3.global-gateway.net.nz [122.56.127.25]

9 169 ms 167 ms 167 ms ae0.pabr5.global-gateway.net.nz [203.96.120.74]

10 146 ms 147 ms 147 ms ae-8.r06.plalca01.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.203.41]

11 192 ms 195 ms 195 ms ae-15.r02.snjsca04.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.4.119]

12 170 ms 171 ms 171 ms ae-11.r23.snjsca04.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.6.118]

13 163 ms * 164 ms ae-3.r23.sttlwa01.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.3.125]

14 164 ms 163 ms 163 ms ae-29.r05.sttlwa01.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.2.89]

15 163 ms 167 ms 162 ms ae-1.a00.sttlwa01.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.5.134]

16 160 ms 159 ms 159 ms xe-0-0-25-2.a00.sttlwa01.us.ce.gin.ntt.net [157.238.64.158]

17 164 ms 163 ms 163 ms client-104-168-131-13.hostwindsdns.com [104.168.131.13]

18 161 ms 159 ms 159 ms client-104-168-154-66.hostwindsdns.com [104.168.154.66]

Trace complete.

I can then do a traceroute to the overwatch servers with the VPN enabled (using that ColoCrossing exit node) and see how the first hop has 160MS consistent with being tunneled through the route above and then the remaining hops take it up to 180.

@hio77 are you saying that the route to ColoCrossing is actually routing via sydney as well?

KiwiTT

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Master Geek

#2141828 9-Dec-2018 05:35

We really should not have to use a VPN to choose our routes. The ISP should use the shortest route to a destination by default. That is how I configured our routers at an ISP I worked at in the 1990s.

Incidently, I have now tried my connection today, and it has now reverted to the optimum route via my VPN provider.

NOTE: by default, it still routes via AUS. However, when I force it to go via the USA, there is a significant drop in my ping to Amsterdam. If I subsequently connect directly to Amsterdam via my VPN it again diverts via AUS.

sbiddle

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#2141848 9-Dec-2018 08:11

KiwiTT:

The ISP should use the shortest route to a destination by default.

No they shouldn't. There a myriad of reasons why this should never be the case.

KiwiTT

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Master Geek

#2141872 9-Dec-2018 09:17

Explain?

That is not how I set up routing when I was configuring routers in the 1990s. I believe even router algorithms, almost always picked the optimum route, when they created their routing tables.

Adding 70ms to the route by going via AUS, just does not make sense to me. It just slows everything down especially if it adds ~50% to the path (130ms to 200ms) … does it not?

Linux

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#2141882 9-Dec-2018 09:48

@KiwiTT well cost for a start

And comparing you setting up routers in the 1990's has zero to do with how a big ISP routes traffic around the globe

John

KiwiTT

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Master Geek

#2141889 9-Dec-2018 09:54

So nerf the performance of your customers, to save a few pennies. Typical. Why not provide the fastest service to customers and let word-of-mouth spread and gain more customers because you have the best network.

Sounds like a network built by accountants and not engineers :(

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#2141891 9-Dec-2018 09:58

KiwiTT:

So nerf the performance of your customers, to save a few pennies. Typical. Why not provide the fastest service to customers and let word-of-mouth spread and gain more customers because you have the best network.

Sounds like a network built by accountants and not engineers :(

Well it's the accountants that manage the $$$ remember that pay the Engineers! Last time I checked the Engineers did not manage payroll and dividing up OPEX / CAPEX around the business

John

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Free setup code: R587125ERQ6VE. Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

sbiddle

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#2141893 9-Dec-2018 10:09

KiwiTT:

So nerf the performance of your customers, to save a few pennies. Typical. Why not provide the fastest service to customers and let word-of-mouth spread and gain more customers because you have the best network.

Sounds like a network built by accountants and not engineers :(

Exactly the opposite. It's potentially a network build by engineers and not accountants.

You're clearly unware a) the commercial realities of interconnects and more importantly b) not all bandwidth is created equal.

I assume by "fastest" you're simply focused on one measure - ping times. That does not determine the quality of a route, and is really only part of factoring in consideration how traffic should route.

There are plenty of cases where the most direct route (which very well could be the cheapest) could mean a poor route that delivers a poor QoE and end user experience. The "fastest" route speed wise could easily be an indirect route that uses higher quality bandwidth.

Yes finances does play an issue in some routing decisions (or lack of decisions) - and it has to because some aspects of routing and interconnects simply aren't cost effective in a market where the race to the bottom has meant incredibly low margins.

hio77

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Lizard Networks

#2141896 9-Dec-2018 10:24

Probably worth pointing out... There is only one provider who promises best gaming latency etc in the market.

Last I checked they also fail at delivering and sometimes even have contention issues at peak time.

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Any comments made are personal opinion and do not reflect directly on the position my current or past employers may have.

KiwiTT

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Master Geek

#2141911 9-Dec-2018 10:40

hio77: Probably worth pointing out... There is only one provider who promises best gaming latency etc in the market.

Last I checked they also fail at delivering and sometimes even have contention issues at peak time.

Great! … However what makes this routing decision strange, is that SPARK is the majority owner of the direct link to LA and even they route their SPARK customers over the longest route.

I also doubt that the link from NZ to Hawaii is ever a poor route.

hio77

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Lizard Networks

#2141913 9-Dec-2018 10:44

See Steve's comments. That's provider agnostic but relevant to your question.

As mentioned earlier I will not comment on spark directly. Others are more experienced to do so.

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BarTender

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#2142337 10-Dec-2018 09:45

My personal view is if low latency to a particular site is so important then I highly recommend you purchase a dedicated service that will provide you with that.

Broadband is a mass-market product that is built and marketed for the mass-market.

Spend less than 5 mins on Geekzone and read the number of complaints about Spark routing and broadband performance in comparison to ALL the other providers in all the other sub-forums taking into account that Spark has half of the Broadband market in NZ (give or take). You will notice that the number of complaints about performance and experience on everyone else far outweigh the number of complaints on Spark even though Spark have a far higher customer base. Why would that be?

It's an incredibly complex beast international routing and peering arrangements so I think Spark do an excellent job considering the non-trivial number of customers they need to support. It's just the lack of peering with domestic IX's that is a bit of a pain but I understand for commercial reasons their decision to not free and openly peer with the IXs. As a business would you happily give away many hundreds of thousands of dollars annually just because a few geeks were complaining about the response time with a few sites, I think not. And if you do think that way I will happily take a mortgage free house in Auckland off your hands since you are so comfortable with charity.

sbiddle

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#2142412 10-Dec-2018 12:13

KiwiTT:

hio77: Probably worth pointing out... There is only one provider who promises best gaming latency etc in the market.

Last I checked they also fail at delivering and sometimes even have contention issues at peak time.
Great! … However what makes this routing decision strange, is that SPARK is the majority owner of the direct link to LA and even they route their SPARK customers over the longest route.

I also doubt that the link from NZ to Hawaii is ever a poor route.

The fact Spark own 50% of SXC means absolutely nothing in the context of your issue. I'm not sure why you think it does. Are you suggesting Spark receive preferential wholesale access compared to other providers on the cable?

I'm not defending Spark in any way (and since I don't work for them I couldn't really care if they did) but I would also love you to post an example of Spark peak time contention on because there would be people at Spark who would be very keen to solve such an issue if it does actually occur. The stats and performance of Spark pretty much speak for themselves - you could look at the number of complaints about Spark on here in recent years and network quality is not something people complain about.

There are 80+ RSPs in the retail market here in NZ. If you don't like Spark then move - there are no shortage of people willing to take your money.

hio77

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Lizard Networks

#2142564 10-Dec-2018 14:30

BarTender:

I will happily take a mortgage free house in Auckland off your hands since you are so comfortable with charity.

Wellington must not be that great afterall ;)

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BarTender

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#2142572 10-Dec-2018 14:38

hio77:

BarTender:

I will happily take a mortgage free house in Auckland off your hands since you are so comfortable with charity.

Wellington must not be that great afterall ;)

I'll just keep it as a rental and sit on those fat capital gains. ;)

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