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OnLive Latency Tested
The Digital Foundry blog has done an analysis of recently launched cloud gaming service OnLive, measuring latency across several different games. Quoting:
"In a best-case scenario, we counted 10 frames delay between button and response on-screen, giving a 150ms latency once the display's contribution to the measurement was removed. Unreal Tournament III worked pretty well in sustaining that response during gameplay. However, other tests were not so consistent, with DiRT 2 weighing in at 167ms-200ms while Assassin's Creed II operated at a wide range of between 150ms-216ms. ... OnLive says that the system works within 1000 miles of its datacenters on any broadband connection and recommends 5mbps or better. We gave OnLive the best possible ISP service we could find: Verizon FiOS, offering a direct fiber optic connection to the home. Latency was also reduced still further simply due to the masses of bandwidth FiOS offers compared to bog standard ADSL: in our case, 25mbps."
And with the bandwidth this service uses, you'll hit your ISPs "unlimited" cap in what, 6 hours? A day?
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
The statement is silly because latency isn't directly related to bandwidth. Switches, bridges, repeaters, modems, routers and other such devices all add latency. If FiOS reduces the number of these in the chain, the latency will be reduced. I'm not saying it necessarily does - just that it could provide better latency without having more bandwidth because of other factors.
As an early adopter (read: 1-year free trial ;) the service works fine (6Mb cable conneciton). For twich games you will notice a little sluggishness, but overall, its not difficult to adjust. Essentially, all the games play like a good latency online game. The only thing i'm not sure I like at the moment is the some of the minor artifacting you'll see due to the video compression. Again, this only really comes into play if you stop and look for it, during action you'll not notice it too much as you'll be busy paying attention to other things ;). Though right now, I cant say for sure how this service will perform in the future, as you apply for entrance into the service currently. Once anyone can join whenever they want, its hard to say how quickly OnLive will adjust to increased congestion.
I love to slaughter the english language.
150-200 ms latency in a modern FPS is nearly unforgivable. I played TF2 a lot for a while and if I ever had more than 40-70 ms latency the hit detection would start to suffer and you'd get shot through walls or just not hit.
I expect a system like OnLive might work better with strategy games and other types of games that are not nearly as fast paced as most modern shooters are.
Admit nothing. Deny Everything. Make Counter-accusations.
Yep, you're absolutely right in that bandwidth and latency aren't the same. However, when used by TCP in latency sensitive environments, common asymmetric connections can quickly saturate their available upstream bandwidth. This means that they're not able to ACK incoming packets, effectively increasing their link latency and reducing its throughput. So, in reality, total throughput is a combination of link latency and the ability to quickly respond to the protocol stream to keep the bits flowing. This is why QoS for TCP is so important on heavily utilised asymmetric connections.