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  • (January 12, 2023, 01:18:11 AM)

Author Topic: LAN Parties  (Read 2873 times)

ho0ber

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« on: October 07, 2004, 12:46:53 AM »
Okay, so I run (weekly) LAN parties here at Bucknell University and recently they've hit the 20+ person mark.  I need to start taking a lot more things into consideration, and my equipment is starting to not be enough.  I mean, I always make sure everyone doesn't just plugstrip chaon themselves down the row, but now I'm starting to deal with mapping the power, and making sure no breaker is gonna get overloaded.

That, and my networking setup works okay, but I've only got one 24 port 10/100 switch, and a couple of 10/100 24 port shitty hubs, a 5 port linksys switch, and my little netgear router to assign pretty IPs.

So if anyone has any ideas of what I should think about doing, or what I might not be thinking of, let me know!

Oh yeah... Hardware... I need a bunch of things for my setup, so any donations or good deals on the following would roxxor my boxers:

-Network Switches (100 base or better)
-Network Cable (CAT 5e or better)
-Old server boxes or parts
-Gigabit anything (i need another NIC)
-A KVM switch of any kind
-An AGP graphics card better than this streaky 2 MB crapling i have in my server
-And any other random shit.

So yeah, I know all of those are a stretch, but if anyone has some random crap, or sees a good online deal, let me know.
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Anonymous

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« Reply #1 on: October 07, 2004, 07:30:32 AM »
Start charging people if they wanna get in. Use the profits to upgrade hardware and use the price to keep the number of players under 20. Think people would pay like $5 to get in?
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ho0ber

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« Reply #2 on: October 07, 2004, 11:35:21 AM »
Every weekend, no.
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snyperx

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« Reply #3 on: October 07, 2004, 01:15:06 PM »
Try getting 20 dollars for a month of gaming, then. It sounds better to some people.
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Anonymous

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« Reply #4 on: October 07, 2004, 01:44:18 PM »
Looking up the specs, a modern gaming computer (P4, with an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro All-in-Wonder, and a 17 inch monitor) will draw about 1.20 amps when it is running Quake 3. You also have to take into consideration that most people also have speakers, or something else plugged in when they are there, so it is safe to assume that each person will need about 1.50 amps. Your average household breaker provides 20 amps. These breakers can run at 110% over short periods of time, but not suggested. I'm not sure what kind of breakers you have there, given that the building that you're using probably isn't like a house. I honestly wouldn't try to run more than three or four computers per outlet, and a max of about 8 per breaker.

As far as networking stuff goes, you might want to check out Ebay's section containing Nortel Networks stuff. I managed to find my 16 port 10/100 BayStack 350T swich there for about 50 dollars. That's a very good price. I suggest you look for something with a gigabit uplink port to use for your gaming servers.
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Nowledge

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« Reply #5 on: October 07, 2004, 04:18:59 PM »
I've had good luck with not networking the computer(s) I don't own with the firiend(s) I don't have , no amp problems as of this post.
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ho0ber

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« Reply #6 on: October 08, 2004, 10:50:14 AM »
Quote from: Chris
Looking up the specs, a modern gaming computer (P4, with an ATI Radeon 9700 Pro All-in-Wonder, and a 17 inch monitor) will draw about 1.20 amps when it is running Quake 3.


So what about my beast server which has a 520w power supply?  Does a computer actually draw that much all the time, or only what they need?
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Anonymous

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« Reply #7 on: October 08, 2004, 01:46:29 PM »
From what I've been reading, I think it's an as needed basis. So when your server starts using more processing power, it will draw more power from what I understand. I don't believe the server is always drawing 520 watts, rather it can draw a maximum of 520 watts if needed.
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Nate

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« Reply #8 on: October 08, 2004, 06:12:18 PM »
:P I got a 550W
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Lurch

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« Reply #9 on: October 09, 2004, 06:23:08 PM »
Another thing to consider about power consumption is when starting equipment, power consumption will spike affecting others. Monitors tend to throw breakers the most often.

Would a donation pot get used? Just an idea, I know a lot of college guys have little money.
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The_FOO

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« Reply #10 on: October 14, 2004, 03:41:34 PM »
Get all this stuff worked out ho0b?

I think Chris hit things pretty much on the head. Cruise ebay for some cheap 10/100 switches. Maybe a smallish cisco router 2500/2600 maybe.
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