Which Network Switch for LAN party?

[brwainer]

2 hours ago, KuJoe said:

Who are you asking? I don't see routing being an issue on a layer 2 (unmanaged) switch.

The point @Trikein is making is that the router has to sit between the switch (and computers) and the internet, and that for every single packet the router has to process firewall and NAT in CPU and keep the NAT table in RAM. If the router can't handle the load, you will not have a good experience.

[Zack_Hill]

7 hours ago, Trikein said:

Problem downloading games? No. But if you are trying to have 9 people play a game at once, then it's not the switch you should be worried about, its your router. That will be doing the heavy lifting. That doesn't have anything to do with your ISP speed, but the RAM and CPU in your router for all those simultaneous processes. If you have a gateway or some value router, you are probably going to get some lag and match making issues. Was this something you wanted to address, or were you just looking to discuss switches? 

Hello. 

 

I really didn't put much thought into the router. Below is the specific one that I have. Do you think it will do it?

 

http://www.amazon.com/TP-LINK-TL-WDR3600-Wireless-Gigabit-300Mbps/dp/B008RV51EE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1454643254&sr=8-1&keywords=tp+link+tl-wdr3600

[Trikein]

4 minutes ago, Zack_Hill said:

Hello. 

 

I really didn't put much thought into the router. Below is the specific one that I have. Do you think it will do it?

 

http://www.amazon.com/TP-LINK-TL-WDR3600-Wireless-Gigabit-300Mbps/dp/B008RV51EE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1454643254&sr=8-1&keywords=tp+link+tl-wdr3600

That should work fine. 533Mhz with 128RAM is good. My main concern was if you had a ISP provided gateway which can have issues with UPnP and the max simultaneous connections that gaming can use. I would suggest stress testing it before the event. Try to play a few games on different devices at once and see if you have any problems. If you do, port forwarding or changing firewall settings on it might help.

[KuJoe]

4 hours ago, brwainer said:

The point @Trikein is making is that the router has to sit between the switch (and computers) and the internet, and that for every single packet the router has to process firewall and NAT in CPU and keep the NAT table in RAM. If the router can't handle the load, you will not have a good experience.

I didn't know online games were so network intensive. I'm going to research this more now.

[brwainer]

2 hours ago, KuJoe said:

I didn't know online games were so network intensive. I'm going to research this more now.

They're not network intensive from a bandwidth perspective, but they use lots of small packets and require low latency. 9 players on some games might bring a cheap or old combo modem/router to its knees. The one you have should be good but a stress test beforehand is a good idea. I'd recommend trying to play a few games as well as watching a few livestreams all at once.

[Zack_Hill]

Thank you to all who replied. The LAN turned out great and the internet had very few issues. At first we had lag spikes here and there, but as the night went on, everything was golden. The switch worked perfectly and kept everyone's connection great. If you plan on using this switch too, I definitely recommend it!