High Latency in games, PC Gurus please help

Hello my fellow PC gamers. I have been having high latency lately in my games on Steam. Usually I have around 120-190ms in games. Now I'm having over 300 ms for some reason. I have tried resetting the router, calling my isp, and many tricks in the book. Nothing has fixed the problem.

Someone at my ISP mentioned that if I switched to a static IP it might fix the problem. I did submit a ticket with my ISP and they should be changing my ip from dynamic to Static. However upon researching the internet I noticed this makes no difference so I might just end up changing back to dynamic since it's less expensive.

Here is a tracert route I ran recently:

Tracing route to speedguide.net [68.67.73.20]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1

2 * * * Request timed out.

3 9 ms 8 ms 125 ms 192.168.11.1

4 8 ms 38 ms 321 ms 172.21.21.18

5 129 ms 11 ms 127 ms rev33.101.telecablecr.com [200.105.101.33]

6 16 ms 11 ms 11 ms 190.242.134.93

7 20 ms 21 ms 118 ms xe-4-0-0.0-corozal-pamiami.fl.us.nama.pan-corzl-mx01.cwc.com [63.245.106.167]

8 71 ms 129 ms 230 ms xe-6-1-4.0-boca-raton.fl.us.nmi-teracore02.cwc.com [63.245.107.126]

9 210 ms 54 ms 192 ms ve812.r1.mia1.us.atrato.net [78.152.46.48]

10 175 ms 173 ms 181 ms eth2-2.r1.jax1.us.as5580.net [78.152.35.218]

11 218 ms 119 ms 135 ms 80.94.66.157

12 119 ms 62 ms 79 ms 172.30.0.31

13 242 ms 101 ms 62 ms 23.92.92.82

14 71 ms 98 ms 143 ms te-4-1-1131-40g-east.core-a.jcvnflcq.jax.as19844.net [216.238.150.207]

15 137 ms 100 ms 226 ms ve101.e15-1.dist-a.jcvnflcq.as19844.net [198.205.127.6]

16 265 ms 155 ms 212 ms speedguide.net [68.67.73.20]

Trace complete.

So any ideas on how to fix my high latency? This wasn't happening last week.

@Realmjumper:

I am not an IT expert but something looks to be unstable in your connection. Your first connection their should be either your router or router/modem and while the first test is fine at less than 1ms test two failed and test three had one result of 125ms. That trend continues throughout the test and it makes me think the problem is not your service provider but somewhere in your computer/cable/router connection.

If you are in windows 10 open up Cortana, if not windows 10 use the "Run" feature, and type in cmd.exe to get to the command prompt.

Then type "ping 192.168.11.1" and it should ping your router. Do this a few times and if you still get a latency over 15ms I would first suggest replacing your network cable or checking it for severe crimps.

My reasoning here is if this is happening between your computer and router the problem must be there somewhere. It could be the computer network integrated card or the router. It could also be software related but that would probably be a virus or something actively hijacking your requests and causing the latency.

Hope that helps!

Hey thanks for the help. First thing tomorrow I'm going to buy a new network cable. This one is old and it could be the problem.

Here is the result of pinging the ip you told me to ping.

ping 192.168.11.1

Pinging 192.168.11.1 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.168.11.1: bytes=32 time=77ms TTL=253

Reply from 192.168.11.1: bytes=32 time=337ms TTL=253

Reply from 192.168.11.1: bytes=32 time=229ms TTL=253

Reply from 192.168.11.1: bytes=32 time=128ms TTL=253

Ping statistics for 192.168.11.1:

Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:

Minimum = 77ms, Maximum = 337ms, Average = 192ms

The problem is on their end. you need to beg at their mercy to have a guy come out and fix the messed up connection probably on the same block you live. I HAD THIS EXACT PROBLEM and that is how i fixed it. became friends with one of the verizon techs

Hey great news, I spoke to my ISP and they reset the connection. They did some testing and it fixed my ping. I'm at 93-130 ping on Teamfortress 2 now. Thanks so much everybody for your help.

@Realmjumper: 93-130 ping? Do you enjoy Teamfortress 2 knowing that your a sitting duck?

They may have helped your ping but you really have a problem somewhere between your computer and router and the cable is normally the issue. My max ping to router is 9ms. Latency that high is a problem in shooters for a lot of reasons but basically it puts you in a disadvantage. Some shooters set limits on actions taken and over 100ms of latency may mean that sometimes you shoot but the server doesn't accept your action so your bullets never register hitting your target. It will also effect movement which will often mean if you dodge out of the way your character doesn't respond as quickly and you probably die more often than needed as a result. Then you get into the problem of it causing stutter, slow download speeds, and failed downloads like you saw yesterday in your second ping test.

Poor latency is tough to solve but start with a Cat 5, 5E, or Cat 6 cable. I hope that is what is causing the problem!