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How to increase ARK server Performance


Neil1024

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How to increase ARK server Performance

I'm running a couple clusters (about 24 servers) off my server and there's lag on some maps and none on others (so it's not a networking issue - also have 1gb up and down and have 3750G switches in my network) 

RAM - I have about 350gb unused

Ark is not evenly utilizing my cores:

cpu.JPG

 

Would a GPU help? I have seen mixed answers if ARK can utilize Physx on a GPU so I'm not sure if that is a viable option. 

Are there any 3rd party apps that will help the servers utilize all the cores? 

I'm not sure the best route to go to increase performance. Anyone have and good ideas? 

 

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The Ark server is multi-threading, NOT multi-processing.  It will only ever use one CPU core per map, so performance is dependent on the CPU Core's speed.

My server has a GPU, which sits mostly at 0% utilisation despite running 12 maps on the server.

You can reduce the CPU usage with this entry in the Engine.ini
[/script/onlinesubsystemutils.ipnetdriver]
NetServerMaxTickRate=15

image.thumb.png.cf5fc41497db5486b8967bceb3978c96.png

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Yeah as Larkfields has said, number of cores only really affects the number of servers you can run if the rest of the hardware spec is good enough. Ark will only use one full core, it mostly uses one thread but some control stuff goes onto the second thread, but it will only use one core per server.

The two most important things for running Ark servers are CPU core speed (and yours is pretty slow for Ark servers at 2.2Ghz) and disk I/O performance. Of course you need enough memory too but the key things are those two.

I run seven servers 24/7 on a dual Xeon E5-2643 (3.3Ghz) machine with 64GB RAM and on a RAID 6 array of Western Digital Black drives. It runs seemlessly, with zero lag apart from a tiny blip at save time, transfer between servers is rapid also. This is with them idling with only a couple of players on line.

image.thumb.png.3b7903ad34bd0f49d890dcdf5ea281e6.png

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I have noticed that it only detects 12 of my 24 cores. Is there a way in the settings instead of -useallavailablecores to just have it use a specific set?

Eventually I'll be running 4 or 5 separate game servers on this same PC, and it would be nice to just assign each process it's own set like I can with the other game servers I run.

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Agree with Larkfields above, I also had servers assigned to cores using affinity and found the servers performed worse, I'd avoid that to be honest. I use Ark Server Manager to run my servers on Windows Server 2008 R2 (yes I'm aware it's old and out of support but i have a licence for it and it does a very nice job of the Ark servers lol) and it sorts the handling of processor allocation without any issues.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 3/11/2020 at 8:16 AM, Larkfields said:

The message at the end of the Ark startup log where it tells you the number of cores is irrelevant.  It only uses one Core.

I used the affinity mask setting for Ark for a while.  It actually hits performance.  Just let Windows assign processes to Cores - it knows far better than we do ?

I can't confirm that!

- First, ARK uses 2 Cores/Threads  ... 1 for all the main calculations / 1 for networking Things.

....So if you only give 1 Core/Thread, it has to calculate the network parts on the same CPU where all the other calculations run too.

- Second.  Windows auto assignment of cores doesn't work as good as manually set it with affinity. If for example there is a load of 20% on one core caused by windows... for windows its fine to place the ARK server there too because 80% is still free.

If you place the ARK servers manually, they will use at least 50% on that core... which results in windows doesn't place any of its load on the same CPU.

 

Thats how the CPU usage looks like if you set the affinity manually (Server fps is way more stable/powerful than let windows set the affinity itself):

image.thumb.png.53e39e3a2cf311db5daa849b84e90ae3.png

 

 

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  • 5 months later...

Hey Everyone

I want to share my experience about hosting a Pretty large cluster. I have tested lot of hardware NOT any AMD CPU yet.
I run 3 large cluster total 40 maps, mabee more? I have stop counting.  At 3 diffirent types of computers.

Cluster: EVO (Only steam 20 mods)
Hardware: Intel I9 10940X Run at 4,4Ghz all cores all time
20 Players at the same time
A RIG i have built by my self

Cluster: EPI (Steam+Epic No mods)
Hardware: Intel i9 10900K run at 4,9Ghz all cores all time
+ 100 Players at the same time 
A RIG i have built by my self

Cluster: RUN, PURE (Steam+Epic No Mods
Hardware: Xenon Gold 5218 Run 2,3Ghz
Few players
A real Server from Dell

The server performence impact have everything to do with the settings. I run 4X at all, Breed is pretty high rate at 30x. All servers have lot of memory and i have done everything what a admin can do to use so much memory a ARK server can use. To easy up the load of the CPU. Like Stasis keep controller, Use no memory Bias.

No server have great Server Frame Rate at peak times. More player less SFR ofc

- Lets take a look at my Ragnarok server at EPI 35 players online. Everyone say ARK can only use 1 core, 2 threds. But thats not the real true, i see when a server goes over 20 players it kick in another real core.  Ragnarok use core 14,15,16 and 17 No other process use this cores.  And as you can see a very poor Server Frame Rate. I play all the time at this server, and have very little to no lag, rubberbanding at all at this low Server Frame Rate.   I can not explain this? I have learn 1core 2 threads are the limit. But take a look by your self from my screen.

I have tested all this server hardware at all clusters i have, to test the performence and the impact with the same rates and player count.
I can say Higher Ghz do not make it so much better everyone want to think. Running a lot of ARK servers on a real Server like A Dell with a low Xenon Ghz Freq is almost, if not greater? Not a bad choice.

The high Memory Bandwith who comes with Xenon doing great for the Server Performence. And many forgot the networkcard, a real server have networkcards who can offload much of the TCP and UDP load from CPU (NO your homenetoworkcard not doing it, even it say it does) And ARK do not crash so much at Xenon Data Integrity Check memorys. 

High Populated server have so much to do with the TCP Traffic. When the Networkcard can not handle the stress, it will eat up your CPU. Intel CPU are great at singelcore performance and have more cores then before. But the memory Bandwith are not so great at this Intel CPU´s. When you run so many ARK servers at the computer the memory will be a bottleneck. And the performence will suffer badly as you can see from my screens.

I must test a AMD CPU, and see what this CPU can do with lot of Ghz and a high memorybandwith  

Sorry for my English.

Best Regards
ALF 

 

cpu.jpg

serverrate.jpg

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How do you know that Ragnarok is running on threads 14,15,16,17 ?

The CPU is running at 83% utilisation overall.  Some cores are hitting 100%.  This is the cause of the poor frame rate you see.  
BattleMetrics says you have 10 maps on the EPI cluster, so each map should have 1 Core (2 threads) each.

https://www.battlemetrics.com/servers/search?q=epi pve&sort=score&game=ark
 

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17 hours ago, Larkfields said:

How do you know that Ragnarok is running on threads 14,15,16,17 ?

The CPU is running at 83% utilisation overall.  Some cores are hitting 100%.  This is the cause of the poor frame rate you see.  
BattleMetrics says you have 10 maps on the EPI cluster, so each map should have 1 Core (2 threads) each.

https://www.battlemetrics.com/servers/search?q=epi pve&sort=score&game=ark
 

Yeah, pretty much.

Took a look at mine, and here's what I have going on...

Challenger.thumb.PNG.a07684f4de2cde5e319c23445714817d.PNG

This is a Dell PowerEdge R710 with two X5680's. We have had zero issues. Each row is on it's own network adapter.

Empyrion hosts 60 players, and our Ark servers are set to 30 each. 

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LarkFields: How I know they use this CPU? I have set Ragnarok map to use this cores only. All High populated maps have 2 cores/ 4 Threds by there own. This is basic knowledge about to know where your Server process are placed.  Very simple thing to control, and a most for anyone who hosting any kind of Server. Not only ARK.

When you have so many maps, and not enough of Cores, You set the less populated maps to share the cores. 100% CPU usage do not say its laggy or poor Server Frame rate.  Extinction, Aberration, Genasis, Center and SC share the same 2 cores/ 4 Treads. Total 10 players at all this low populated maps and 100% CPU. But all this servers have 30 Server Frame rate and no lag at all when there are so few players.. 

Sometimes its hard to know what some one says. Some say its only support 1 core / 2 treads and other say it support 2 cores. I think this is the proof, ARK use 2 Cores and 4 Threads.

This is only a theory. But I do not think ARK Server know its using total 4 Threads. Its support 2 Cores, if the server have hyperthereding the cpu it self lay the load in the Threads it have access to. 

Best Regads
ALF

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Goodmorning

Anyone who have experience about AMD Ryzen ThreadRipper 3960X how they performe to run as a ARK server? 3,8Ghz is pretty low Frequenz.  But duel memory bandwith is good and very high transferrates at NVMe with PCIE 4.0 should be good to a ARk servers. 

I have try to read how they perform. But the tec nerds only do test at games and renders programs. And this tests are long away from how good it can run as a ARK server. I have try to search how this CPU perform as a Datbase server. Database server test should be most similir to a ARK server. But it seems no one have ever run this CPU as a dabase server. 


Anyone who know or have read how they Perform? 
 

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On 9/8/2020 at 3:18 AM, SylenThunder said:

Yeah, pretty much.

Took a look at mine, and here's what I have going on...

Challenger.thumb.PNG.a07684f4de2cde5e319c23445714817d.PNG

This is a Dell PowerEdge R710 with two X5680's. We have had zero issues. Each row is on it's own network adapter.

Empyrion hosts 60 players, and our Ark servers are set to 30 each. 

Very nice to see this. :) Can i ask what Rates you run? And how many players was online when you take this screen?

This give some more idea. Planing my New server:
I will also spread the servers to more Networkinterfaces.
And use more NVMe Disks. Spread the servers to more disks.

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I have done some more tests.  I moved the EPI cluster (most populated cluster i own) to a  Thredripper 3960 24 cores CPU at 3.7Ghz No OC.
I also dedicated the Ragnarok Map 3 real core. Total 6 Threds. For a test, it seems to use all 6 Threds. But one core work harder then the rest. But it is using all cores.

AMD CPU work much better then an Intel 10900K 5Ghz at almost the same amount of players. This amzing me alot, i did not think this AMD CPU should beat a intel 10900k working at 5Ghz at all cores. 

CPU Usage
AMD CPU at 32 players SFR at 18.
intel CPU at 35 players SFR under 10. 

Ping 
AMD Ping 27-32ms under this load
Intel Ping 40-50ms under this load

Both servers have the same Memory setup. AMD had a Server networkcard from Intel. Rest is the same.

What to say? A good Server Networkcard seems to take some load from CPU. High Ghz CPU is not always better? AMD Quad memory support seems to feed the CPU with what it need and can process? In the test other have done with AMD. say its a good Multthred CPU but Intel are better.  However, ARK servers seems to like this CPU.




 

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It isn't surprising at all that the AMD chip out-performed Intel. AMD has always had slightly better single-core performance, and the 3rd and 5th gen AMD chipsets are blowing Intel away completely in both single-core and multi-core performance. In many cases they beat Intel on price as well.

And yes, splitting your servers across multiple network adapters really helps too. Sure a single adapter can more than handle the data load, but they can lose performance handling many different data threads.  I have our servers spread out over 4 adapters, and have considered adding a couple more.

To answer your question about how active the servers were, I'm not sure since I wasn't really looking. Was probably 5-10 players each. Empyrion has been a lot busier than Ark lately though, so it might have been closer to 15 or 20 on that one.

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  • 3 months later...

Hello everyone,

I'm here to ask you guys some suggestion about server performances atm I'm running a 1000x cluster named Iced Den lately it's really crowded, we do wipe every weeks on friday and we are getting 450+ player on wipe day.

All seems fine on day 1 but when people start building up and breeding server start to struggle. So I don't now if it's a CPU issue or a connection issue. I used to only run 3 server with 300 + people on and ping has always been decent so I'm start thinking I should go back to 3 servers instead of 4.  Atm every server uses 2 cores I'm on a Ovh dedi box game-2 series with a Ryzen 7 3800x.

As high rate server we are using 9 mods and a bunch of plugins.

Atm I'm the server runs stable but I've noticed that SFPS it's really low on all the maps it's in the range from 2.5 to 10

So I'm trying to find what it's causing those spikes, I'm thinking could be a mod since I made sure all the plugin that I'm running are Async and multithreaded this way the load on the CPU it's really low.

If you have any clue please add me on discord Auauiuoua『🩸#0023
I don't know if it's allowed but if you want to find me easier you can find me here: https://discord.gg/2hv7gRX

Have a good day.

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