How to take Advantage of your connection speed and NIC (Vista/7)

First, "What is a NIC?" you might ask yourself. A NIC is a Network Interface Controller. Pretty much it's the device you stick your CAT-3(Ethernet) cable into. This device can be altered as well as some software based settings implemented by the OS(referring to the windows operating system.) These option if set correctly to your system can become very beneficial to having better gameplay and taking advantage of your ISP. Okay, time to get to the point. You can either a.(do all this by using the registry editor and command prompt in windows.) or b. use http://www.speedguide.net/downloads.php. I will do this by using the TCP Optimizer. Okay lets go through each setting and select the best setting for you. Connection speed: This should be set to your max download rate. So if you download at 256 kilobytes a second, it would be 2 Mbps. Here is a list of speeds: 128 KBps = 1 Mbps 256 KBps = 2 Mbps 512 KBps = 4 Mbps 1 MBps = 8 Mbps 2 MBps = 16 Mbps The calculation to find your exact speed is you take your highest download speed you've ever reached and multiply it times 8(assuming it was in megabytes) and select the closest number on the slider. You can also use this site to help you with any bit/byte calculations. http://www.matisse.net/bitcalc/ Now, select your network adapter. You're MTU should be set as high as your ISP can give you, and you can find your MTU by using the MTU/Latency tab. The PPPoE setting will not be explained in this guide due to the rarity of use. TCP Window Auto-Tuning should be set to disabled because windows tends to make it TOO large, and can cause some bandwidth slow down. Congestion Control should be set to CTCP. TCP Chimney is set by depending on your NIC. If you run a non-dedicated(attached to motherboard NIC) then this should be set to disabled. If you run a dedicated NIC like the Killer Xeno Pro or any other NIC attached via USB or PCI then set this to enabled. Receive-Side Scaling State should be set by how many cores(CPU cores) you have. If you are running a Single core processor then this should be disabled, but if you run a dual, triple, quad, or hexa core then set this to enabled. DCA should be left at Auto or disabled due to not many people knowing if their systems supports DCA(as of right now the only home computing processor series that supports this is the core I3/i5/i7 series and all server xeno processors.) NetDMA can be enabled to take advantage of Direct Memory Access. TTL should be set to 64, but if you notice a loss of connection or increase disconnects set this to 128. ECN should be disabled due to game instability ex. Battle Field Bad Company 2. Windows Scaling heuristics should be disabled unless you want all these settings to be set back to default. Checksum offloading is just like Chimney offload, non-dedicated = disabled and dedicated = enabled. Windows Scaling should be ticked to allow website to use high TCP window sizes if the website supports it(helps with TCP window auto-tuning disabled) Timestamps should be disabled to free up some bandwidth. Now for the Advanced tab. You can leave the IE optimizations alone or play with them if you want. Best to set them to your max connections per server. There is a site to help you find your max, but I forgot the link. The host priorities should be set accordingly. Local = 4 Host = 5 Dns = 6 Netbt = 7 SynAttackProtect should be set to disabled to stop any internet checks(can cause slow downs). Leave on if you feel paranoid about the internet. TCP Max Data Retransmissions is best set to 7. I personally use a low value of 1 because I have a good computer and ISP.(no packet loss) Large System Cache can be enabled if you have a lot of RAM(random access memory). If you have less than 4 gigs then leave this to disabled. Size should be set accordingly: Default = Good for average internet user. Balanced = Average user with slight LAN use. Optimized = Lots of LAN use(local file transfer) and heavy internet use like torrents. QoS should be set to 0 AT ALL TIMES! This setting can heavily hurt your games if set above 1, due to it's trying to control bandwidth. Going to skip DNS errors because they are not needed to be changed, Gaming tweaks: TCP Ack Frequency is best left at default, though some users like it at 1, I've noticed that MW2 and internet browsing perform better at a value of 2. TCP No Delay should be enabled to allow for instant transmission of TCP packets. TCP Del Ack Ticks shouldn't be messed with unless you don't want TCP No Delay on. Dynamic ports can be left alone. They are fine at default. After all of this, you can apply changes and restart the computer. Then try browsing or testing it by playing MW2 or pingtest.net. Some might not notice a difference, some might. Depends on your ISP and computer. Have any questions? Post them below, or PM me. Sincerely, PertyPiiinkPonie