What Rates/Config settings do you use in CS:S?

[Twatybollocks]

I've recently been reading up on rates and config settings and am a bit peeved off that there is no auto setting in the game to examine your system and set everything accordingly.

Don't know what I'm on about? Well neither did I until a couple of weeks ago!

Have you ever shot at someone, opened up a full clip at point blank range and you don't do any damage to them? Or are having no luck at all sometimes at longer distance battles but your opponents don't?

You've probably put it off to bad luck, skill (or lack off) server lag, those damn hitboxes or something. However it could be your rates. You may have a 1Mb + internet connection but the default rates in the game means you don't always take advantage of your connection and a fake delay can ocurr.

So the way around it is to create and autoexec.cfg file in you cstrike folder and setup your own config. now, I've been scouring the forums and the main suggested settings are this:

cl_rate 20000
cl_cmdrate 101
cl_updaterate 101
cl_interp 0
cl_interpolate 0
cl_lagcomp_errorcheck 1
cl_smooth 0

Now can anyone explain what these do or suggest some good settings for me? I have an Athalon64 4000 with 1Gb of ram and am on a 1 Meg line. Also there seems to be some argument about setting the interp and interlope to 0 as some people seem to think it is cheating. But from what I read it means if you aim at a model and shoot you have a better chance of hitting because it stops that annoying hitbox problem?

I don't want to cheat, but what I do want is to be on a level playing field so any advice is appreciated.

[Playbus]

The CS:S FAQ on the Steampowered.com forums simply says this:


Q-What should I set my rates to?

A-Here are some good rates/guildlines:
rate = 10% of your download speed
cl_cmdrate = 100 is a good one for broadband
cl_updaterate = 30 is also good for broadband


Personally I use default rates, just setting my connection speed in Steam and letting it do the rest. I have no problems. My system specs are slightly lesser than yours but not by much. I have a 512kb connection at the moment (upgrading soon!).

[Twatybollocks]

A-Here are some good rates/guildlines:
rate = 10% of your download speed

That doesn't make much sense. 1Mb is 131072 bytes so 10% of that (those maths classes finally pay off!) is 13107. That's no-where near the 20000 (some suggest 25000) rate suggested on the forums I've looked at, including Steams!

[Playbus]

I know it doesn't make much sense, but that's all the Valve boys seem to have to say on the subject. I'm sure there will be a third party tutorial somewhere on rates though.

You have got your connection settings right in Steam haven't you? For you, it'll be the DSL>768kb setting, I would imagine. Steam sets your rates based on what you select here. Works for most people.

[Twatybollocks]

I know it doesn't make much sense, but that's all the Valve boys seem to have to say on the subject. I'm sure there will be a third party tutorial somewhere on rates though.

You have got your connection settings right in Steam haven't you? For you, it'll be the DSL>768kb setting, I would imagine. Steam sets your rates based on what you select here. Works for most people.

I'll have to check, I think I've got it set like that but not sure. I suppose I'll just have to use Net_Graph and 'experiment' but I was hoping someone would have the 'magic numbers' for me...bah!!

[Playbus]

Alas, one of the main reasons that guides are so rare/innacurate on this subject is that there aren't really any "magic numbers" -- different connections will work better or worse with different settings. I think you might have to do some netgraph experimentation, as you say.

[Twatybollocks]

I tried last night, I created an autoexec.cfg file in my cstrike folder and tried

cl_cmdrate "60"
cl_updaterate "60"
cl_smooth 0
cl_lagcompensation "1"
cl_lagcomp_errorcheck "1"
rate "20000"

Fired up a game, started Net_graph and noticed no difference at all. So then I thought, how do we know the settings have been applied? So I included an Echo "Autoexec is loading" in the script and tried again but I didn't see anything. So is there any way of knowing your rates have been applied?

[Playbus]

Servers can force you to use rates that they specify. This seems more common in CS: S than in plain ole CS.

They don't always, but they can, and I don't know of a way to check if rates are being enforced or not. The console will report your rates as whatever you set them to, even if the server is making them something else. :nana:

So the reason you saw no difference could be that the server enforces default rates.....

Best way is to find a server with a friendly admin who can confirm that rate enforcement is not being used.

[Twatybollocks]

That's so crazy it just might work.

Oh and on my travels I came across this:

http://chi.speakeasy.net/

It tests your internet connection so you know exactly what your upload/download speed is so I thought I would share.

[Twatybollocks]

Sorry for the double post but I found this fantastic guide to rates which may help!

Rates

A lot of people think that rates tweaking is hacking and people should leave their rates at default. This is complete rubbish. Rates are there to enhance the speed at which the game plays on different connections, and the defaults are often sub par when you select your internet connection. A good analogy of this is when a game auto detects graphics settings; it will always choose lower than what the system can optimally run at. Rates are no different and will often be set lower than they should be for different connections. This section I will break down into three parts, rates for 1.5Mbit ADSL and above and Cablers, 512Mbit ADSL, and 256Mbit ADSL. This guide is not intended for dialup users, as no matter how good you are at the game, you will never mess with the best on such a slow connection, go and buy ADSL now, and if you cant, I feel for you.

Before we begin with the actual rate settings themselves, I will give you a little background on how the game runs at the moment. Counter-Strike Source is quite different from Counter-Strike 1.6. The aim in 1.6 was to have your packets in and out as close to 100 as possible. Counter-Strike Source has a seemingly physical cap at 33.9/34 for packets both in and out per second from your computer. What does this mean exactly? Essentially you send 33.9 chunks of data to the server per second, and the server sends you 33.9 chunks back per second. However, it is not uncommon on bad nights for these to drop, so this will happen from time to time and it gives the game a very laggy feeling. The rates section is designed to try and keep these numbers as high as possible (eg, locked on 33.9) while keeping choke and loss at 0. I currently regularly experience 1-2 choke on good servers regardless of rates so expect a small bit of choke from time to time, I think this is currently inherent in the engine itself. So while this rates should improve, don’t expect them to be perfect or to mean that you will always get 33.9 packets in and out per second. Typically, anything above 30 is decent, but if it drops below this I tend to find the game pretty unplayable and very inaccurate. To monitor your packets in and out make sure you have net_graph 3 enabled. First of all lets take a look at all the rate commands.

rate [0-99999] - Sets the max bytes/sec the host can receive data (Download). Now I have read tons of articles on this value over the years and each one basically comes up with a different answer on what this value should be. So I went onto a server and tested different values to see what worked best for me. I used values of 1000, 5000, 10000, 15000, 20000, and 25000, and did not notice any major differences in my ping, loss, or choke. Now the server I was on could have had a max rate set for clients, but I would have thought the 1000 would have been too low, but it wasn't.
(Recommendation - All I can say is try different values until you feel like you have the best connection possible. Most articles say between 10000 - 20000 for a cable internet connection. I tend to use 25000 to ensure the maximum rate possible but you would be hard pressed to notice any difference between 20000 and 25000.)

cl_rate [0-99999] - Sets the max bytes/sec the host can send data (Upload). Once again, I have read tons of articles on this value over the years and each one basically comes up with a different answer on what this value should be. So I went onto a server and tested different values to see what worked best for me. I used values of 1000, 2500, 5000, 75000, 10000, and 20000, and did not notice any major differences in my ping, loss, or choke. Now once again, the server I was on could have had a max cl_rate set for clients, but I would have thought the lowest value of 1000 would have been too low, but it wasn't.
(Recommendation - Try different values until you feel like you have the best connection possible. Most articles say between 7500 - 10000 for a cable internet connection. I use a cl_rate of 20000 but it is worth experimenting with.)

cl_updaterate [0-999] - Number of packets per second of updates you are requesting from the server (Download). This is another one of those mystifying values that everyone has a theory on, but each theory is a little different. This command is the number of packets per second that is requested from the server. Now the server can put a cap on this value, and the last time I checked the default was "60". So you can play around with this setting, but anything over 60 will probably not show any improvement.
(Recommendation - Try different values until you feel like you have the best connection possible. Most articles say between 50 - 100 for a cable internet connection. I use 100, which works pretty well for me but some people use around the 85 mark which is also fairly optimal.)


cl_cmdrate [0-999] - Max number of command packets sent to server per second (Upload). This should be in proportion to your cl_updaterate. Normally your download is 1/4th to 1/8th your upload, but once again you will read numerous articles that show these 2 values either the same or very close.
(Recommendation - Try different values until you feel like you have the best connection possible. Most articles say between 30 - 100 for a cable internet connection. I always max this out with 100 but anything that gives you an optimal 33.9 packets out is fine.)

cl_cmdbackup [0-4] - For each command packet, how many additional history commands are sent (helps in case of packet loss). By increasing this value you will also increase your ping, but you will send more accurate data to the server, which allows for the server to send out your information more accurately.
(Recommendation – I would recommend setting this to 2 on any broadband connection. The higher you have this set, the more it will lag your cmdrate.)

cl_interp [0-0.1]- Enable/Disable whether you will interpolate object positions starting this many seconds in past. This is a valuable setting if you are having stuttering issues with cl_smooth off. This value is supposed to be in relation to your ping. So if you have a ping of 100, then your cl_interp should be 0.1 and a ping of 50 should have an cl_interp of 0.05.
(Recommendation – Some people recommend leaving this at the default value unless you are having hitbox issues, then try to align this setting with your ping. However I normally always have this set to 0 by default in my autoexec.cfg)

cl_interpolate [0/1] - Interpolate entities on the client. Changing this setting will give you somewhat of a jumpy screen, so you may want to test this on "1" which should be the default, then "0".
(Recommendation – Due to the extreme jerkiness that this setting gives me, I find it actually makes people harder to hit than when disabled. Some people swear by it but my recommendation is to not use it.)

cl_lagcomp_errorcheck [0/1] - Player index of other player to check for position errors. When on, this will help with your shot accuracy by checking for position errors. This will only be useful if you can aim in the first place.
(Recommendation – I have this set to 1.)

The following commands are useful but I am yet to muck around with them at the moment. Feel free to experiment with them as you will.

net_channels - Shows net channel info, a great way to determine your optimal network settings

net_maxfragments - Max fragment bytes per packet. Mine is defaulted to 1280 bytes.
(Recommendation - Leave this value at the default value unless you are experiencing severe choke or bad pings. I have mucked around with this and haven’t noticed any difference with larger fragment sizes.)

1.5Mbit and Cable Users (My Rates)

rate 25000
cl_cmdrate 100
cl_updaterate 100
cl_rate 20000
cl_lagcomp_errorcheck 1
cl_interp 0
cl_cmdbackup 2

512kbit Users

Majority of 512 users will get away with using the same rates as the 1.5Mbit or Cable connections but these are slightly lowered but probably not noticeable.

rate 20000
cl_cmdrate 81
cl_updaterate 81
cl_lagcomp_errorcheck 1
cl_interp 0
cl_cmdbackup 2

256kbit Users

For those stuck on 256, its better than dial up however muck around with these rates until you get minimum choke. I don’t have a 256 connection to test these on but from what I have seen and read on the internet a lot of users are having success with rates similar to the following.

rate 15000
cl_cmdrate 51
cl_updaterate 51
cl_lagcomp_errorcheck 1
cl_interp 0
cl_cmdbackup 1