Quakecon: Network Operations Center tour

Sun Aug 2 12:08:11 UTC 2015

On Sun, 2 Aug 2015, Niels Bakker wrote:
> Also, 2 Gbps for 4,400 people?  Pretty lackluster compared to European 
> events.  30C3 had 100 Gbps to the conference building.  And no NAT: every 
> host got real IP addresses (IPv4 + IPv6).

Quakecon is essentially a giant LAN party.  Bring Your Own Computer 
(BYOC), and there are big gaming rigs at Quakecon, and compete on the LAN. 
There isn't that much Internet traffic.  There is only 100Mbps wired to
each gaming station.

I'm not a quake fanatic, I don't know what are the important network 
metrics for a good gaming experience.  But I assume the important metrics
are local, and they install a big central server complex in the center
of the room.  I'm assuming the critical lag is between the central
server and the competitors; not the Internet.   Otherwise they could
have all stayed home and played in their basements across the
Internet.  Latency is probably more important than bulk bandwidth.