2Degrees and Southern Cross NEXT

Forums › 2degrees (including Slingshot, Orcon, Flip, Stuff Fibre, MyRepublic, 2talk and Vocus) › 2Degrees and Southern Cross NEXT

jd87

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#298704 8-Jul-2022 16:52

Is 2Degrees planning on using Southern Cross NEXT? I switched over a few weeks ago and regret it but I'm locked in a 12 Month contract. Since switching over my latency to US gaming servers has jumped significantly, it's seems to be a routing issue as it seems 25% of the time it drops back down to my old latency but I given this has been going on for a while now, I don't have hopes it will be resolved. I am hoping the SCN cable will drop this back down, as it seems to be both a more direct route and might offer new routing altogether?

Linux

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#2939835 8-Jul-2022 16:58

You are aware 5ms difference only between the cables?

jd87

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2939853 8-Jul-2022 18:51

Oh right, I had read between 5-10% so I was hoping for closer to 20ms, feelsbadman.

xpd

Geek @ Coastguard NZ
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#2939870 8-Jul-2022 19:58

What game servers are you having issues with ?

Can you provide any traceroutes etc ?

More info the better for 2D to take a look at.

Gavin / xpd / FastRaccoon / Geek of Coastguard New Zealand

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jd87

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2940171 9-Jul-2022 18:10

The game is Albion Online. The server works like Eve Online if you're familiar with that, where there is a single global server and lots of clusters/zones.

I think it's a routing issue as I can leave and re-enter a zone and get a completely different ping:

For example leaving and entering here the ping drops from 235 to197 seen in bottom right:

Down to 197:

It's the same server with the same people but the route is different it seems.

It seems like a superficial amount, but for whatever reason the artifacts like rubberbanding are significantly higher when connecting to a zone via the high 230-240ms route. It the game has a fair amount of lag compensation up to 200ms after which things begin to get janky, it seems completely random which route will be selected.

Tracing route to live01-win-29.dc02.albion.zone [5.188.125.42]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms RT-AX88U-7708 [192.168.50.1]
2 4 ms 9 ms 5 ms 41.7.69.111.static.snap.net.nz [111.69.7.41]
3 3 ms 4 ms 4 ms 198.18.10.193
4 3 ms 3 ms 3 ms 161.10.69.111.static.snap.net.nz [111.69.10.161]
5 * * * Request timed out.
6 128 ms 126 ms 128 ms TWODEGREES-svc063403-ic344202.ip.twelve99-cust.net [62.115.175.227]
7 131 ms 131 ms 131 ms las-b24-link.ip.twelve99.net [62.115.175.226]
8 185 ms 187 ms 187 ms rest-bb1-link.ip.twelve99.net [62.115.114.87]
9 184 ms 184 ms 183 ms ash-b2-link.ip.twelve99.net [62.115.123.123]
10 * * * Request timed out.
11 214 ms 215 ms 215 ms 192.168.0.164
12 * * * Request timed out.
13 217 ms 215 ms 215 ms 10.255.103.182
14 185 ms 183 ms 184 ms gw.gcore.lu [5.188.123.129]
15 * * * Request timed out.
16 * * * Request timed out.
17 * * * Request timed out.
18 * * * Request timed out.
19 * * * Request timed out.
20 * * * Request timed out.
21 * * * Request timed out.
22 * * * Request timed out.
23 * * * Request timed out.
24 * * * Request timed out.
25 * * * Request timed out.
26 * * * Request timed out.
27 * * * Request timed out.
28 * * * Request timed out.
29 * * * Request timed out.
30 * * * Request timed out.

Trace complete.

Using a VPN like ExitLag seems to maintain the 195 route, but requires a subscription. The server looks to be in Virginia:

yitz

2075 posts

Uber Geek

#2940186 9-Jul-2022 19:34

It is one of the quirks of 2degrees routing, I have seen it too on Vodafone NZ in the early days of the Hawaiiki cable but they use a more direct and lower latency path nowadays.

If you check the return path from the server provider https://lg.gcore.lu/ from the Ashburn, VA node then you can see they load balance traffic across 2degrees' multiple North American upstream providers Twelve99, GTT and Cogent with the Cogent path being longer as it goes up to Seattle, then onto Sydney before ending up in Auckland while the others take a more direct path onto LA to Auckland.

With the Vocus merger however there may be some changes but it might take time. I noticed they did some testing this Tuesday morning where they switched temporarily to Vocus for 8-9 hours and a lot of the routing quirks that people have been complaining about here were gone during that time.

jd87

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#2940485 10-Jul-2022 18:53

Noted, thank you, it gives me a little home the merger will fix the strange routing!