A decent server box for one, dual CPU if possible, Lots of ram 512 is the minimum ideally 1 Gig.

The server I admin has twin 1.3 P3's with Gig of ram with a 100mbit connection. It can host 28 players usually, unless theres a cheat in then it lags. With a better server with the 100mbit it should easily handle 32-34, but the ISP host wont fork out for better

Forget 128 players, no pc currently has the power to handle that many unless you have a nice opertron though. Plus the fact that the server is windows only limits it, if they had made a linux port of the server then maybe stable 50+ servers would be the norm.

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Plus the fact that the server is windows only limits it, if they had made a linux port of the server then maybe stable 50+ servers would be the norm.

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But there aren't 50+ people in the world that have Linux OS and Freelancer so what would that prove?

Window's does not limit the server size, that was a cheap shot and you know it. Last time I checked Linux also runs on a processor correct? That's the limitation, not the OS, jeez Pinger. Even though Linux works better with servers that doesn't mean it doesn't crash occassionally either.

i didnt think that freelancer was utilised to run on a duel proccessor

Any more comments and suggestions on my question? I need to gather as much info as possible. Because I may start a FL server. But I need to collect all the info I can.

get a copy of ioncross server op... you`ll need it, it`ll make life easier, and auto bans cheats.
flstat for generating web page for rankings,
and if u want admin with powers, (kick/ban) you will also need fladmin, which will give admin telnet access, but they will need to run a telnet client, i use kev term. but i belive xp has 1 built.

all available in the d/loads section, apart from the term software, which u can find at http://www.webattack.com/get/kevterm.html ,

hope this helps

** uk server **
www.ko krull.com (without the space, dont u love swear filters )

Stinger , I would have to disagree on some of your post. I am sure that there are more than 50 people that use Linux of some kind and also run Freelancer . As far as discovering whether the server program would run better under Linux , we will probably never know until someone makes a Linux port .
Also I have done some testing on Freelancer servers , and found differing results concerning the CPU speed limiting the server program .

Oh PINGER! You little Linux geek, you!

Heh, but yeah, you're right on the RAM.. The more the better, and if you want to serve any decent number of players (25+) without lag, you'll need at least a gig. It suprised the hell out of me that my overclocked P4 running at 3.3 GHz still started to choke when serving 28 players on my server. Granted, modders make it rough on things altogether, but my CPU usage is normally around 50% when I'm at that number of players online. Dual CPU also makes a HUGE difference - Pinger's dual P3's and my P4 hyperthreaded REALLY help out a lot on a server, especially when you run programs alongside FLServer to help you out (FLStat, FLAdmin, or IFSO, for example). I'm sure I could get more players in my server if I upped the ram to 1gb, but I usually don't have more than 25 on at a time right now anyway and I want to keep the bandwidth down a bit so I won't be making the upgrade. I think having dual-channel RAM helps out quite a bit for this sort of thing as well; any newer server board features this option, whether using RIMMS or DDR ram (if you use an actual server board). Myself, if you want to cheap out, use a P4P800 motherboard. I've found them to be the absolute best Intel solution on the market right now, as far as the price/performance/feature ratio goes.

Unfortunately, I've tried it and AMD CPU's don't cut it for running a decent server. I was lucky to serve 15 players without any lag with a 2GHz XP chip. The way FLServer is run at the moment makes it difficult to do much without having any major horsepower under the hood. I think Browclops was running a couple Xeons on a T1, and it was usually capped at 30 players, wasn't it? It's been so long now... heh.... I just don't think m$ or DA figured FLServer would actually be used for more than just LAN games or for small clans. It's a shame, AMD's are a great way to save a buck

What sort of hard drive you're running doesn't make much of a difference on your server. When FLServer is up and running, it does very little with the drive. The main advantage of having a faster drive is for the startup and shutdown (or crashing) of FLServer. It can take a bit of time for FLServer to start up if you've got 1000+ playerfiles. Stats generation with FLStat goes a bit faster with a better drive (unless you use the new -nice option to slow things down and save of CPU cycles).

Although your players won't like it, I'd suggest serving as many as you can at first, finding the comfort level for your server, and capping your player max at 5 less than that level (to accomodate for lag due to modders). Sure, players won't be able to get online at times when your server's full, but the ones that ARE online will have much less lag. For example, my server gets quite laggy when I get up near 30 players, so I'll be setting the player max to 25. I've had no complaints of lag whatsoever when serving 25 players.

As for your connection, I'd recommend a minimum upload speed of 640 kbps. Most ADSL suppliers are in this range, and with that sort of bandwidth doing up to 30 players should be no trouble. I tried it on cable at 250 kbps and things were just too slow. Ask any of the IONCROSS players how much better things became when I moved my server to my shop and to a fast ADSL line

I also have one more suggestion for running a server. Mod it. People are bored with plain Freelancer and a lot of the more popular servers now are running some sort of mod. If you start from scratch with your particular mod and make it original and interesting, you're bound to have a popular server. People are getting sick of mods that just hash together tons of other mods and bring together tons of already-existing ideas. If you want to attract the players, offer them something new and exciting.

Have fun running your server, and good luck

-- JoeBoomz
IONCROSS

Does not matter what type of CPU you use to run a server with, AMD, Intel, they are all CPU's. I've got absolutely no problems running a server now on an AMD based system. I've got 1 GB PC2700 DDR Ram running on the A7V333 ASUS Mobo. Along with only a 2100+ XP AMD CPU, 80 gig WD 7200 RPM HD at UDMA 133. FSB 266 DDR.

Granted my connection right now sucks and I can only have 14 players at one time, but when no cheaters or modders play there is zero lag on this little one CPU system that I'm using now. I only have about avg of 192Kbps upstream and 2 Mbps downstream on a cable connection. What you do is take your upstream amount and divide that by 15, and the number from that will be how many people you can have if everyone that logged in was on a broadband connection. Every person that logs onto your server on a broadband connection automatically gets about 15Kbps of your upstream amount. Dial up users get around 5Kbps of that. So if you've got a 768Kbps upstream then you could have up to 52 players on your server with minimal lag but you basically would not be able to do anything else. You could have 40 players with zero lag if no one is modding on a 768Kbps upstream and still have enough bandwidth left to do other things like surf the net or play other online RPG's. I have not really had a complaint about lag on my little system, except when we catch modders.

Basically if you know your hardware, then you won't have a problem at all. Ram does make a big big difference, and the more you can cram in your system the better off you are going to be. If you are running Windows XP, it automatically takes about 150 megs of your ram off the top to run various small operations in the background so keep that in mind too. Of course there are ram recovery programs out there that you can use to help recover some of that lost ram from startup.

You'd better also have a lot of fans in that case too, I use 4 personally, 3 pushing out, 1 sucking air in. You'll reduce your case temp by 10 degrees, CPU temp by 5 degrees, and mobo temp by about 7 degrees if you use this kind of airflow setup. Especially in Full Server Towers.

Skyevalen

For There to Be Justice, First There Must Be Chaos....