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Inside the World's Largest LAN Party
MrSeb writes "Last weekend, over 12,000 LAN party goers turned up at DreamHack Winter 2011 in Jonkoping, Sweden with a PC under the arm, on their back, or packed carefully in the trunk of their car. Every single attendee is squeezed into just three massive halls — the largest holding 5,000 computers — or four days, only taking brief breaks to sleep or check out one of the many stages (including some of the largest e-sport tournaments of the year). Being the largest LAN party in the world, DreamHack's infrastructure is suitably monumental: it takes days to lay the thousands of cables, and at the heart of the network is tower of Cisco routers that interface with a 120Gbps internet connection provided by Telia."
Think of the smell.
"No matter where you go, there you are." -- Buckaroo Banzai
With all the things that usually go wrong at my LAN parties of 4-8 people, I can only imagine the potential frustration at a gig like this!
'or' should be 'for', before 'four days'
where can i get that kind of connection speed, and how much does it cost
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But it helps grow bacteria. By not bathing, you're creating millions of lives.
To offset political mods, replace Flamebait with Insightful.
FWIW, I'm a long-time LANner, and yeah... the smell can sometimes be pretty pungent.
Often the main problem is trying to provide enough showers for 1,000 people or more. Most of these venues are set up to provide showers for just a few people (usually sports athletes or similar). Some LAN parties try to get around this by bringing in a hoard of portable showers (and toilets!), but it's still impossible for everyone to shower in the morning (or evening).
When I was in high school and did the LAN party scene we never connected our LANs to the internet. Usually the upper-middle class kids hosted, and they had the expensive "high-speed" internet. Which at that time (2000-2002) was ~2Mbps on cable. Most of the attendees still had dial-up. So connecting the network to the internet was a bad idea, since people quickly forgot the point of a LAN party...
sig?
Even with all of that internet facing bandwidth, I've got to imagine that the sneakernet trading of all things digital must be quite prevalent. Or perhaps I'm just remember what happened at all the LAN parties I went to during my high school years (in the 90's). I wonder if they take any precautions on such things or if they turn a blind eye?
Plenty. There's still LAN bandwidth too, don't forget (I assume it's 1Gbps locally, but could be 100Mbps... but either way...)
Plus, I'm sure a network bod will chime in and discuss the chances of all 12,000 people using their 10Mbps internet bandwidth allowance at one time...
Check out picture 2, and compare to picture 3.
The air in My Mom's basement never looks that bad.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Short answer: yes.
Long answer: 99.99% of the time, yes.
Answer so long it takes an extra long title to even begin it: with the RARE exception, gaming is more about latency then speed. with the exception of some First Person Shooters, a 56K modem is more then sufficient bandwidth to provide an optimal experience. A 128K leased line or a T1 is Ideal, simply because of the technology moving frames of data in guaranteed order TO the ISP, (contrasted to cable/DSL, where your traffic may be buffered if your DSLAM or ADM is oversubscribed and busy) There are a FEW games that bandwidth can make a difference, but anything over 1Mbit is overkill. (clearly excluding the DOWNLOADING of game content, patching, updates, etc. GAMEPLAY consumes very little bandwidth)
Worlds Largest Congregation of Male Virgins
Curious stuff, breakthroughs, firsts, innovation much more in percentage compared to their size and resources.
america on the other hand is still busy with giving 72% of every economic value to 1% of its society, whereas 85% gets to eat dirt with getting only 15%. glorious system. makes one want to 'innovate'.
http://www2.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/power/wealth.html
Read radical news here
On the positive side, a LAN would be a fairly 'round the clock thing, wouldn't it? Much less so than a sporting event, or even a music festival. Mind you I'd imagine you still have queues - and more than the odd stinker. But then I guess some would say that's part of the atmosphere.
But I'd rather have seen pictures (and diagrams and configs) of how they laid out the power and switches. And what problems they ran into and how they plan to solve them for the next time they run this.
No matter how much thought and planning you put into the infrastructure, the users will always surprise you with some new problem.
But that setup must have rocked for torrents.
I suspect the chances of all 12,000 people using their internet bandwidth at the same time was pretty likely. Especially since they asked people to try and max it out at a specific time to set a utilization record.
http://www.dreamhack.se/dhw11/2011/11/22/120-gigabit-at-dhw11/
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/107245-inside-the-worlds-largest-lan-party/16
check out the eyes of the guys laughing. thats a real laugh, and their eyes are shining with real happiness. been a while since i saw such people in media images.
Read radical news here
Think of the snus.
Not a problem at all, very few use their bandwith at the full rate. All the participants had 100Mbit accessports, except a few at a Telia VIP table. Still the max bandwith peaked at about 24Gbit/s when highest.
they use that to feed in channels and to link to the VOD super hubs.
Yep, the best way is to go for a shower in the middle of the day, or very late at night.
The main thing is that it's completely pot luck. The showers are usually quite far away from the hall/sleeping area. You can trudge all the way over there to find all of the showers occupied.
It needs a proper, web-based queuing system...
with that many people and with stuff that is easy to take and sneak out as well people failing a sleep at the systems is't bond to happen or at least have people try to do it.
If they are are true gamers their rigs will provide enough venting.
Those aren't your sub-100W corporate boxes. Rough calculations for gaming PSUs on 230V would be tens of thousands of amps. And good thing it's winter in Sweden!
LAN - Laxatives And Nudity
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
My guess is picture 3 is the aftermath of the smoke generator you can see is running in picture 1.
One of the photos shows a Cisco 2950T-48 that provides 48 10/100 ethernet ports with 2 GigE uplink ports. This seems like a simple setup for lots of tables. Drop a switch at each table and feed run one cable back to the core switch for the area. If Cisco provided 300 of these switches that gives you 14400 100meg ports for users. Then a few core switches with a stack of non-blocking GigE ports and some 10GB or 40GB uplink ports to the core routers. Easy... I'm sure several companies (or universities) had similar setups. The amazing thing is the built it as a temporary setup. The real job is providing safe power and cooling for all users.... maybe next time they can provide PoE for everyone and require "green" computers! http://www.dreamhack.se/dhw11/files/2011/11/20111122_M1n1M0nk3y_Building_DreamHack_0226.jpg
A lot play games, but some people just go to watch TV, movies, surf, or hang out with friends.
There's a fairly big social element to them, too -- it's one of the few places where you can go to a pub/bar and be surrounded by likeminded geeks, for example.
The current system intentionally encourages exercise! Two or more round trips when you find them occupied.
You mean that haze floating over the crowd in the photo?
with a 120Gbps internet connection
How do I get one of these run into my apartment?
If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits
I never was present at any official, large LAN parties, but I have hosted/attended several back in my high school days for just with close circle of friends. Size was never more than 12 people and the length was about three days. It is actually very simple formula with nothing really interesting or sinister about it
Essentially the host orginised the event based on when his house will be free (ie. Parents out). He would make some space in the living room by moving a couch to the side and getting one or two large tables in with some chairs. Ideally he would also stock up the fridge with drinks and have a hub or a switch (With at least 12 ports).
Attendees must bring with them their computer, monitor, power strip and all the cabling that goes with it. On very rare ocation we would decide during organisation stage on what games would be installed, but in majority of cases everyone would just bring their entire collection of CDs and external hard drives with pirated games. Some extra cables also come in handy because as a rule at least someone will forget a power strip or a network cable.
First half of the day would consist of assembling everyone's machines and installing/copying whatever games we decide we will be playing. Normally everyone would have their drives fully shared, so after the software are installed everyone just browses each other's PCs and external drives for anything interesting to copy (Movies, games, music, porn, etc). Once everyone finishes installing the games/had their fill of copying the we start plaing games. Starcraft, Quake 2, Counter Strike, Total Annihilation were very popular choises.
In terms of food, we would either pool the money for pizzas or car pool to go the nearest shopping centre. In terms of sleeping arrengments everyone just finds a free couch/bed or in worst case on the floor in a sleeping bag. Othervise it is just gaming non-stop with nothing else in the between. That is where the smell comment comes from: By second day of just sitting around eating junk food and gaming everyone starts to smell earthly.
The party ends at the agreed time (Normally at least half a day before parents of the host come back) and that really is it. Large ones are probably vastly different since with more people further organisation will be needed. Entire thing can be held in a net cafe, but then you need to pay and just lacked certain charm. Certanly there won't be any swapping of pirated materials and porn :-)
That's probably from the smoke machines for the laser show. God, I hate those things.
So it all becomes the world's largest distributed seedbox?
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More smoked sausage than Oscar Mayer.
The US government have made it clear that we have no inalienable rights; any we do not defend vigorously will be taken.
Oh, then I guess I have indeed been to a LAN party, but just didn't know that's what it was called. I was Resident Faculty at a dorm for a while when I first started teaching. It was before I was married so it was just me and the dog. This was at a small Catholic liberal arts college in the bluffs of Minnesota along the Mississippi, so in the winter there was nothing at all to do outside at night. We'd drag out our computers and play Starcraft or Total Annihilation for hours and hours. Drink Leinenkugel that we bought on the Wisconsin side and eat pizza if we could get a pizzeria from the small nearby town to deliver in the heavy snow.
When we got wasted enough, we'd take cafeteria trays and use them to slide down the side of a rather steep bluff. Then we'd take someone to the hospital. In the wee hours we'd stand on the roof and look at the Northern Lights.
The son of the mayor of a medium-sized city lived in the dorm and always had great weed. The dorm was in a building that was once a monastery. One wing was said to be haunted and a lot of weird stuff did happen over there, but predictably, it usually happened when we were buzzed. I know I was supposed to look out for these kids but really it was all much harmless fun and nobody got hurt. I was a newly-minted academic, just a few years older than my charges. I did occasionally give a little advice and a sympathetic ear, but mostly just made sure nobody went overboard.
OK, so now I know. Those were "LAN parties".
Thanks.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Back when I was younger, I used to go to LAN parties all the time. Typically with friends, at their place, but twice I went to a big LAN party. In each of the big LAN parties, the drama was almost more overwhelming than the BO. It was like being in a room full of three-days-unbathed tween drama queen girls that were obese and all used to being the center of their own worlds. Tempers flared easily when no one was around to bring everyone snacks and drinks and take away their piss jugs.
And the thievery. God Jesus did shit ever get stolen. Dozens of people got their shit stolen at both of the big LAN parties I went to. Apparently some shady people would show up with shitty computers, set up a place, and then go around looting. No one would ever think to stop them from walking out with a computer or hardware, because people were doing it all the time. Oh, and the poopsockers. You couldn't play a strategy game without being cheesed to death immediately at the beginning of the game. People with superior skills would send a worker unit over to harass and maybe kill your guys before you could get a soldier out, and then thirty seconds later be in your base with late game units. Oh, and the cheating. People wouldn't admit that their 100% headshot rate and 100:0 kill/death ratio was fake. When they did, cue drama and usually violence.
In short, fuck big LAN parties. They have none of the charm of the small group gaming sessions, and all of the downsides of playing with a bunch of socially inept nerds with strange senses of humor.
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
It's "offline" multiplayer gaming. Basically instead of everyone sitting at home playing online, they gather up their stuff (PC (usually a desktop), monitor, keyboard, mouse, headphones) and drive to a mutually agreed location. Usually a friend's house, and they set up on a table somewhere (basement/kitchen/etc) and they all go nuts playing multiplayer games.
The only console to really be a part of this would be the Xbox (original) prior to Live. People would haul their Xbox and their TV to a friend's house to enjoy a weekend of gaming (with the Xbox, it was slightly easier as one console and one TV handled 4 people).
They were extremely popular just a decade ago. These days, everyone prefers to sit in their privacy of their own home and play online.
It was so popular that people would build computers designed just for this - portable ones with powerful CPUs and graphics cards and LCD monitors (people used to haul 21" CRTs...). For those who visited the large parties, they often added stuff that let them lock up mice and keyboards and headphones because those had a nasty tendency to walk.
And yes, they were extremely social events.
The World's Largest LAN Party after I read a few more lines.
sysadmins and parents of newborns get the same amount of sleep.
This is a conversation with myslef. WOHOO! Of course I'm talking about distributed DNS.
sysadmins and parents of newborns get the same amount of sleep.
Immaculate Conception!
It should be pretty easy to end the sweat immediately during a swedish winter... open the door.
#6495ED - cornflower blue
Dreamhack(this event) hosted a huge starcraft 2 tournament, giving away a few hundred grand in prizes between SC2, street fighter 4, and quake arena. Most of the people at this event just played games together in various un-sponsored tournaments. However around 100,000 people tuned in to watch the SC2 tournaments. Kind of a big deal.
So basically, -1 troll/offtopic is really slashdots way of saying "I hate that you thought of something before me."
Yet another ignorant liar that knows nothing about Scandinavia.
The average tax rate is 32% on taxable income, after deductions and a flat rate discount. The tax rate is proportional, with exceptions for the lowest incomes. The highest income groups pay an additional extra tax on income above a certain threshold. This tax gives you an automatic government paid pension. I can only speak for my own Scandinavian country, but it's mostly the same.
You may deduct interest payments on mortgages, travel expenses if you have to commute a long distance (minimum limits apply), expenses due to your health (special needs equipment) and so on. Too much to list here.
In addition you receive a monthly cash subsidy for each child below the age of 18, kindergartens and after-school parks are subsidied, schools are free, college is free, healthcare is free, hospitals are free, prenatal clinics offer free, extensive pre/post-birth support, maternity/paternity leave is paid for by the government (1 year at 80% pay). Students are eligble for a student loan from the State Educational Loan Fund, no interest paid while studying, and you only pay when you actually have a job. If you end up sick or disabled you will receive welfare and additional support including housing, caretakers and so on. That's just what I can think of at the moment, there's a lot more.
The LAN parties in Norway that I know of actually own most of the equipment involved. :)
Companies like Cisco have been known to offer some discounts and/or sponsor the event with equipment. However it's mostly financed by the members and participants themselves.
Here in Norway I believe they even operate a small company, KANDU, that rents this equipment out where needed [to other LAN parties]. As of 2011 they own 170 48-port gigabit switches, backbone switches, frame relays and much more. The people involved are professionals with years of experience both in their professional lives and organizing this kind of event.
I'm not sure what part of the world you live in, but what you are saying does not apply in Scandinavia [and this article].
Yes. Gaming requirements are measured in kilobits per second, not megabits. Gaming usually needs low latency more than it needs high bandwidth. Considering many games won't even go out of the LAN they probably get that.
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
Nowadays, the parties are mostly about gaming, but the nordic lan parties, as a nod to their ancestry from the old demo parties, still have non-gaming competitions, such as photo contests, video contests etc etc.
Though I'm a bit mixed about the removal of some competitions, such as speed drinking of soda, printer/disk/monitor throwing etc...
According to a Swedish news article (can't find a link to it right now) every participant gets a 100 Mbit link.
Everyone with a table seat got 100Mb/s except those seated at Telia's VIP tables, who got 1000Mb/s.
The traffic from the LAN to the WAN on the router, as was seen on the public dashboard, was pretty low in RELATIVE terms... often it was below 1Gb/s :p
And I thought Euskal Encounter was pretty monumental (big LAN party in the Bilbao Exhibition Centre in Spain every year, which I go to). Here's a couple of pics from the 2010 event (I've been too lazy to upload 2011's pics):
http://photo.alioth.net/RE10/pabellon.jpg - the main hall, it's about the size of a football pitch
http://photo.alioth.net/RE10/tentcity.jpg - Where many people sleep, another BEC hall full of tents!
http://photo.alioth.net/RE10/bushnell1.jpg Nolan Bushnell, Atari's founder visited us.
http://photo.alioth.net/RE10/bushnell2.jpg
Nolan Bushnell is still highly enthusiastic about gaming, it was a real pleasure to meet him.
http://photo.alioth.net/RE10/twitter-euskera.jpg Retro activities, twittering from a 1980s vintage Sinclair Spectrum!
http://photo.alioth.net/RE10/descansar.jpg Random geeks getting a bit too tired :)
Oolite: Elite-like game. For Mac, Linux and Windows
It still will not get the stink off you from the guy you are sitting next to that smells like he has not showered in 12 days and has a hint of cat piss.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
According to Wikipedia JÃnkÃping has an average high of 4 degrees celsius in November, but these people are dressed like it's summer.
FWIW, I'm a long-time LANner, and yeah... the smell can sometimes be pretty pungent.
Part of this seems to be that on no LAN party I've ever seen, have the age limits been enforced.
Younger = smellier.
Another logistical error is to have the parties during winter. People arrive dressed for cold, not realizing that with 1000 people and 1500 computers in one room, cold is not going to be a problem.
The earliest LAN parties I remember had a smell of tobacco and beer, not teen sweat.
Oh come on, everyone knows Gamers never shower.... Now getting enough Mountain Dew and Hot Pockets to feed them all, that might be a logistical nightmare.
I think they ceased to become LAN parties once you went outside. Still sounds like a lot of fun though.
All the world's a CPU, and all the men and women merely AI agents
I suppose it would depend on if they are having to go through external servers. If they were using battle.net for SC2 then they would have to go through b.net servers, but SC2 still has a LAN option, doesn't it? And 10 Mbps should be enough, as long as there's a decent amount of upload speed as well as down. Most modern games are designed to work within the context of a standard Broadband connection, which is around 10 Mbps AFAIK (at least it is in my area, can't speak for the rest of the world of course)
All the world's a CPU, and all the men and women merely AI agents
Hehe... Used to both go to and organize Demo-parties, before they all became game-centric and started to be called LAN-parties. :)
One of the biggest I was involved with that actually had a LAN hosted over 500 computers networked in a 10Mbps 10Base-2 coaxial cable network.
I was, amongst other things, doing network-tech duty and keeping such a network free from too long segments, loops, broken cables and all sorts of strange connection, like someone cascading lots of BNC-t's in order to connect several computers, is no easy task.
Especially since people brought their own coaxial cables of random length and quality and constantly during the 3 or 4 days reconnected the network in random ways...
/.Mattsson - My native language is not English, so please don't whine over linguistic errors. (That's lame anyway...)
Think of the smell.
My cousin's ~14 year old daughter went there this year. I hear there's not much geekiness at Dreamhack, and hasn't been for many years.
I'm not from Sweden... I'm Norwegian.
I can't be bothered to rehash all of this now. The flat rate discount is actually that here. Healthcare [for children] is free, my mistake I should have made the context clear, adults do in fact pay a fee to see their GP. The Education Loan facility does not work that way in the US, not like every other country, even if you go bankrupt that debt stays with you for the rest of your life! And so on...
If you want to talk rubbish about Sweden, be my guest, Norwegians love to mock our Swedish friends! :) I find it interesting that you bothered to talk about how terrible Scandinavia is when you live in the UK... Your country's not exactly the place to be at the moment. Have a nice day!