Dedicated Server - could we possibly configure to utilize more available RAM?

[Gamepalooza]

Hi,

I LOVE this game and have allocated a nice refurbished Windows workstation to run a dedicated server for my gaming group with nothing else running on it.  This may seem like a very odd request but I'd actually like to try consuming MORE RAM if it would help with loading new areas of the map.  The workstation has SSD only storage and also has 16 GB of RAM on it but never goes above 6 GB of RAM usage in this role.  This setup runs really smooth for us except when we are travelling in our vehicles and we hit a new area of the map where there is dramatic stutter and vehicle spasms (even with the SSD).  I would gladly trade more RAM usage on the server for less of these incidents. 

This is just a nice to have type of discussion.  The Fun Pimps ROCK and have made the best game ever in my opinion.

Thanks so much for any thoughts on this topic.     

 

[SylenThunder]

I don't run my servers on Windows, but I've never seen them be limited in RAM usage. Previous tests in Windows never showed any issue with them using more RAM. It's been a couple of years since the 16GB limit inherent in Unity was lifted too.

 

I believe your issue lies somewhere else..

[-Holo-]

Isn't the map sortof preloaded in the client's ram (too) now?

I mean just starting a 16K map uses up a ton more ram on the client then a 8K map.

(atleast did on A18, friends with 16Gb of ram ran out of memory just connecting to a 16K testworld on my server)

 

 

[Gamepalooza]

Thanks so much for the 2 replies thus far.  My line of thinking about this question is as follows. 

Are areas of the map are cached into memory from disk as players move between them?  If so, I was hoping to change a server side setting to load more of the map into memory rather than having to load it from disk as we drive around the map.  I mean I have 10 GB of memory unused in my scenario and it would be really cool to modify some setting to consume more if it would help.

Again, it is a very minor annoyance and just a quality of life thing.  

 

 

[-Holo-]

Is the client running windows on a SSD disk?

the server's world gets loaded to the client on first connect, and stored under appdata/roaming/7 days to die folder,

I'm guessing it's from there the client loads in worlddata, so hitching is probably a issue there, not on the server

(I could be 100% wrong, but I guess the world and all config's are sent to the client for a reason)

 

in the good old times before A17 the server sent the chunks as they generated on the server so having the save on a fast storage was good to avoid hiccups.

 

[Liesel Weppen]

2 hours ago, Gamepalooza said:

Are areas of the map are cached into memory from disk as players move between them?  If so, I was hoping to change a server side setting to load more of the map into memory rather than having to load it from disk as we drive around the map. 

No, the WHOLE map is obviously in memory anyway. As -Holo- stated, memory requirements depend on the map size. Why should a bigger map require more memory if there are only regions of the map in memory?

6GB is what i get by running an 8K map. 4K map is only ~1,5GB (suprise: a quarter), i once tested a 10k map and... surprise it used ~9GB.

 

The stutters are a client issue, not related to the server. And even they may not depend on RAM. It could also be loading geometries or textures to VRAM when they become visible.

 

Further: do you have any problems? If not, what are you trying to solve? Filling memory with garbage, just because you have more memory? There are tools that can do this for you.

[meganoth]

Earlier this year the company I rented my server from switched to new servers. This was the time when driving on fast bikes (for example in mods) went from stuttery performance to almost smooth sailing. As others here have showed it isn't the size of the RAM, neither on server nor (in our case) on the client.

 

My theory of it is that:

1) I know from Fataal that the game operates on an internal clock of 20 updates per second and that it isn't good for the game if it can not provide at least those 20 updates per second.

2) Obviously it isn't world data that is streamed to the clients (as that is local already) and if everyone is driving it also isn't changes to the world. But it is highly likely that the update cycle is synchronized by the server and that it therefore is not good if the server gets below 20 updates per second

3) In the logfile of the server there is a regular log entry that has information about memory usage AND a number called FPS which is probably the servers updates per second. On my old server this was just above 20 when nothing serious happened and often went below 20, on blood moon for example. On my new server it was above 30 and never really went below ~28 even on blood moons. 

 

Now this is just a theory. But check those lines on your server. If it often dips below 20 FPS, in one way or another your system may not be fast enough as a server.

 

I don't remember if the old server had hard disks or SSDs for storage, LW will, in his "polite" way, correct me that that can't be a factor, but that could have been another difference between old and new server. But I'm pretty sure you have everything on SSD on your refurbished system so it can't be a factor in your case anyway, right?

 

 

 

[Gamepalooza]

Thanks everyone for the great explanations and input.  It definitely sounds like the entire map is cached into memory which is good to hear from my perspective.  My theory that the game was loading the map in chunks seems entirely unfounded.  The game does seem to run really good for us most of the time (even on hoard nights).  We just have a few occasional issues when we are driving multiple vehicles out exploring the map as a group.  We call them vehicle spams where they are driving along smooth and all of a sudden someone just hangs for a second before leaping forward.  Not that it is unplayable or anything.  Possibly is network related, but not something that has to be figured out.

Was just looking to see if there was something easy I could change server side to clean it up for us.  It is good to know we could probably do larger maps.

  

[Gamepalooza]

Oh, as far as a server here are some specs just in case anyone was interested:

i7 3770 ( 3.4 GHZ base) 
16 GB DDR3 1600 MHZ
single 480 GB SSD
during play the only thing running on it is windows with Norton 360, steam and 7D server

internet connection is 90 download and 10 upload (Megabits Per Second)

Number of players is 4.  Default settings on almost everything.

 

[SylenThunder]

On 10/20/2020 at 6:26 PM, Gamepalooza said:

Oh, as far as a server here are some specs just in case anyone was interested:

i7 3770 ( 3.4 GHZ base) 
16 GB DDR3 1600 MHZ
single 480 GB SSD
during play the only thing running on it is windows with Norton 360, steam and 7D server

internet connection is 90 download and 10 upload (Megabits Per Second)

Number of players is 4.  Default settings on almost everything.

 

Make certain the client is fully excluded from Norton. Also note that Norton is a resource hog, and you might want to switch to something more lightweight.