Anti-Trend I would be really thankful to you if you help me with respect to a few of my problems
I moved this to a new thread, since it doesn't have much to do with the HWF kernel thread.
1) This is a post i made in srcds forums could you please advise me over it :-
Kernel Settings Help. - srcds.com forums
Ahh, building a CS server. I've hosted game servers over the years, but none recently and not CS in any case. So, I can't really help with the specifics of that particular game. However, the suggestions below should apply to any latency-sensitive server.
2)Are there any options in kernel settings (networking options maybe?) which may help reduce the internet latency.
A good network card, first and foremost. I recommend disabling the onboard NIC and replacing it with a PCIE Intel Pro 1000 or similar. 3Com also makes some good stuff, but for the money you're better off with Intel.
Then you'll want to extend the buffer space of the kernel for small network operations. Add the following to your /etc/sysctl.conf:
Code:
net.core.rmem_default = 524288
net.core.rmem_max = 524288
net.core.wmem_default = 524288
net.core.wmem_max = 524288
...then force it to take effect with:
One other thing that will help a lot is a fast and reliable clock source. The AMD-recommended source is
hpet, and I have had good experience with it myself. You can apply it immediately like so:
Code:
echo hpet > /sys/devices/system/clocksource/clocksource0/current_clocksource
...and make it permanent by adding the following option to your boot arguments in your bootloader:
Other things that can help are a 1000Hz kernel timer, low-latency voluntary preemption, and perhaps RT/MM if you want to roll your own. However, I have had problems with both patch sets in the past. Some versions work great, others not so well. Personally I think the HWF kernel should be a good balance of performance, stability, and responsiveness, but RT or MM
may give you an edge that the stock kernel tuning parameters wouldn't otherwise. It might be worth experimenting with a few kernel variations to find your sweet spot.
3) I got AMD Athlon 64 x2 6000+ , is x2 the right choice or any other ?
An X2 6000+ is a good CPU, but it doesn't have an overabundance of L2/L3 cache or memory bandwidth. It does have an integrated memory controller though, which is good for latency. All in all it should be fine, though something with more onboard cache would be better for running multiple simultaneous servers.
For instance, you could get a Phenom II and run it with 4 sticks of RAM in unganged mode. In that way, each CPU core has access to a 64-bit stick of RAM independently of the others, which is pretty great for tasks like multi-game servers. Plus, the Phenom II is a lot cheaper than similar CPUs from Intel.
4) With respect to param.h what is the difference between hz and user_hz and which of these is equal to timer frequency we see in make menuconfig, because i wanted to set timer frequency 500hz manually because 500 is not a choice in make menuconfig.
Essentially, the kernel timer sets the frequency of which the kernel checks for new work to be done. The lowest pre-defined value is 100Hz, meaning a resolution of 10ms, which is the same as in Windows. The highest value is 1000ms, giving a resolution of 1ms. This means it will be much more responsive if there is a lot of load or many different competing processes on the system, but will be able to give less overall CPU power since some clock cycles are wasted on the higher clock resolution.
The kernel is tuned for 4 timer settings. In Hz: 100, 250, 300, and 1000. For example, 100Hz is good for NUMA systems with lots of CPUs and RAW CPU power is king, 250 is good for things like web servers, 300 is good for video engineering, and 1000 is good for very low-latency tasks like gaming.
If you define your own timer 500 is an option, but then you'd be running at a timer setting that hadn't been tested by any other Linux users and you could run into some sticky situations. Really, 1000Hz is probably preferable anyway.
