O2 Broadband for xboxlive????

cuculainn

Hi

I am looking at getting broadband for running xbox live and for general internet use.

I have been looking around and for the price,(top) speeds and contention ratios I am thinking of getting o2 mobile.

I know there are other treads dealing with hooking up to xbox live and the ping speeds..

My question is will the 10 gb per month be enough to get updates, and play online inaddtion to doing the normal internet stuff on the pc??

I know if i download a movie (non HD) it will be a couple of gbs but that aside what are peoples thoughts??

neilk32

if you have any other options do not go near this whatsoever, its ridiculous for gaming.

cuculainn

neilk32 wrote: »

if you have any other options do not go near this whatsoever, its ridiculous for gaming.

Yeah I have other options....Is it poor for gaming because it is wireless and runs through pc??

Or is it just down to the ping speed??

I could get 1mb wireless from someone like digiweb. but this has a contention ratio of 1:48??

davenewt

I have 02 BB which I used to download demos etc and as long as you're in a good coverage area (I'm in an attic room, presumably near a mast and get very good reception most times *touch wood*) you'll be fine for that.

As for online gaming, I can't say - haven't tried it and assuming you might get worse-than-average lag and ping times from a mobile BB dongle. So if you're planning on doing a lot of realtime online stuff you may need to look elsewhere.

The O2 BB dongle works fine for my purposes though, with the above caveats!

D.

Aldebaran

From my own personal experience, o2 broadband is fine for online gaming. I've been using it with the xbox for the past month or so with little or no problems, but I suppose it all depends on your location, mine probably works ok because the mast is just down the road from me.

10gb probably isn't enough if you're planning a lot of downloads though, they only thing I downloaded from the marketplace were the Halo 3 map packs and they came to 1.1 gb, so I don't plan on downloading anything else this month.

cuculainn

Aldebaran wrote: »

From my own personal experience, o2 broadband is fine for online gaming. I've been using it with the xbox for the past month or so with little or no problems, but I suppose it all depends on your location, mine probably works ok because the mast is just down the road from me.

10gb probably isn't enough if you're planning a lot of downloads though, they only thing I downloaded from the marketplace were the Halo 3 map packs and they came to 1.1 gb, so I don't plan on downloading anything else this month.

Thanks for the reply,

What sort of games have you been playing? was hoping to get FIFA 09 going online?

I wouldn't be too worried about the downloads eg demos movies etc....I think I could manage the quota from month to month as long as updates and the online play were not eating it up

Aldebaran

cuculainn wrote: »

Thanks for the reply,

What sort of games have you been playing? was hoping to get FIFA 09 going online?

I wouldn't be too worried about the downloads eg demos movies etc....I think I could manage the quota from month to month as long as updates and the online play were not eating it up

I've been mainly playing Halo, Call of Duty, and Left 4 Dead. I was actually suprised by how few MBs are used up in online play, I was expecting to only be able to play it now and again but I've been playing it pretty much every day and still manage to stay under the quota, and thats with using the internet through the pc as well. I find that it all depends on the game though, an hours play with Halo might only use 20mb but an hours play with Left 4 Dead would use about 50mb, haven't played Fifa online so can't comment on that particular game. Updates use very little as well so I wouldn't worry about them.

cuculainn

Aldebaran wrote: »

I've been mainly playing Halo, Call of Duty, and Left 4 Dead. I was actually suprised by how few MBs are used up in online play, I was expecting to only be able to play it now and again but I've been playing it pretty much every day and still manage to stay under the quota, and thats with using the internet through the pc as well. I find that it all depends on the game though, an hours play with Halo might only use 20mb but an hours play with Left 4 Dead would use about 50mb, haven't played Fifa online so can't comment on that particular game. Updates use very little as well so I wouldn't worry about them.

Thanks for your help.

I'm gonna get the months trial with O2 and see how it is.

Good to know how little the onlin gaming uses.


I'll let you all know how it works

qpirate

yeah ive been using it for a while in the middle of dublin, and conversations can go funky when downloading demos, its fine for online gaming.

cuculainn

Hi I said I would give an update on the o2 broadband,

I have it since Monday.

getting download speeds of 3mb up 1mb.


It seems perfect for tigerwoods golf
played GOW and Farcry online and its hard to say as I am crap with those games but it seems fine......even thou I get killed easily.

Voice can be a bit groggy but mostly ok

Macker14717

i had vodafone and it was crap plus redicilous prices

D4RK ONION

I have the Vodafone one at home, out of pure necessity and it works ok. I get good days, and I get bad days.

For those thinking about going down this line I would say:

1) Only if you're absolutely CERTAIN it's the only option available. If you can go with Eircom or any other though the line broadband, I would definitely recommend it.
2) You can't change the NAT restrictions, and I know that each company has different NAT settings in place. These are V.important with regards online play so look into that too...

toby2111

hi cuculainn

I just got o2 mobile broadband but still cant connect to xbox live!!!can you explain step by step how you did it???thanks

D4RK ONION

By the magic of Google!!

http://www.mobilecomputermag.co.uk/20080513490/connect-to-xbox-live-with-a-usb-3g-modem.html

cuculainn

toby2111 wrote: »

hi cuculainn

I just got o2 mobile broadband but still cant connect to xbox live!!!can you explain step by step how you did it???thanks

Hi If you follow the instructions in the link in the previous post then you should be sorted. Thats exactly what I did (for vista)

Just a couple of things though,

o2 is set to open NAT cause I have had no problems with NAT settings.

also if you can't connect after you follow the instructions in the previous link....then you might have to uninstall and reinstall the o2 modem software...I have had to do this a couple of times.

Think it was down to plugging it into different USB ports.....always use the same usb port as you installed the modem on


What o2 modem have you....is it the sierra??


Let me know if it works or not

toby2111

Hi cuculainn!

Yeh,I followed all the instructions above from D4RK ONION(thanks for that!),went through the network wizard afew times but it keeps showing IP address "failed" when I try to test xbox connection!I've tried it a few times,manually typed in different IP address' but still no joy.To be honest,dont know what type of O2 modem I have??Its the black one(size of a pack of cards roughly),costs €20 a month...if thats any help!!Any other advice??Thanks

cuculainn

toby2111 wrote: »

Hi cuculainn!

Yeh,I followed all the instructions above from D4RK ONION(thanks for that!),went through the network wizard afew times but it keeps showing IP address "failed" when I try to test xbox connection!I've tried it a few times,manually typed in different IP address' but still no joy.To be honest,dont know what type of O2 modem I have??Its the black one(size of a pack of cards roughly),costs €20 a month...if thats any help!!Any other advice??Thanks

I would say reset all settings to default.....on the xbox, unplug your modem, then uninstall the modem from your pc, restart, then plug in modem and reinstall.

Connect the ethernet cable and check the connection to xbox

I will check out how to connect with windows XP at the weekend when i can get my hands on my old pc

toby2111

Thanks cuculainn!

I'll do all that when I get home later.At least I know that its possible,so hopefully it'll work!The reception can vary when I live so does the connection speed which Im sure will affect me being able to play online,but I'll give it a shot.Thanks for all the help...so far!!

toby2111

Result!!!!!

Thanks cuculainn.Unplugged modem,removed then re-installed O2 broadband,followed the steps as per d4rk onions link..(had to manually type in IP,subnet,gateway etc as given on this link).Unplugged ethernet from both xbox and PC,reconnected,ran the test and hey presto...I'm in!!!So,now I just have to suss out how to navigate around xbox live and what are the best things about it??Any advice?
Oh and another thing,I'm downloading a demo of Tiger Woods 09 but its taking forever....5% downloaded in 15 minutes!!!Is this the norm or is there anyway I can speed this up??Thanks a mill so far!

cuculainn

toby2111 wrote: »

Result!!!!!

Thanks cuculainn.Unplugged modem,removed then re-installed O2 broadband,followed the steps as per d4rk onions link..(had to manually type in IP,subnet,gateway etc as given on this link).Unplugged ethernet from both xbox and PC,reconnected,ran the test and hey presto...I'm in!!!So,now I just have to suss out how to navigate around xbox live and what are the best things about it??Any advice?
Oh and another thing,I'm downloading a demo of Tiger Woods 09 but its taking forever....5% downloaded in 15 minutes!!!Is this the norm or is there anyway I can speed this up??Thanks a mill so far!

Good to hear that you got connected.

I haven't down loaded any demos yet so I dont really know.......I would suggest doing a speedtest. The max speed on that modem is 3mb. Speedtest.net will give you an idea of your speed.

As for whats good on Xbox live, it depends on what your into.....

Dextor

Alright lads,

Got broadband from O2 the other day, gonna try xbox live with it, just wanted to know what sort of pings you're getting?

Did a quick test earlier using speedtest.net and it was around 250 ms. Any idea what the max is for live?

cuculainn

Dextor wrote: »

Alright lads,

Got broadband from O2 the other day, gonna try xbox live with it, just wanted to know what sort of pings you're getting?

Did a quick test earlier using speedtest.net and it was around 250 ms. Any idea what the max is for live?

Dont think there is a max.....you'll still be able to play but with serious lag.......i tend to get about 100ms........but this is fine for the games I play

faceman

Dextor wrote: »

Alright lads,

Got broadband from O2 the other day, gonna try xbox live with it, just wanted to know what sort of pings you're getting?

Did a quick test earlier using speedtest.net and it was around 250 ms. Any idea what the max is for live?

Anything less than 130ms is fine for online gaming but ideally you want something around 50ms.

Its really only FPS that suffer however with high ms/ping as those games require quick reactions.

Slightly off topic but it would be useful to sticky a thread outlining what BB is good for online gaming etc as it comes up alot.