I am very interested in the posts so far on this thread, as they may support a theory I have on why the problems with CMP, CCP and Launcher occur.
Sometimes I do have problems with Trainz components hanging, slow to open etc. and others times it works like a dream.
Now, my theory is based upon an observation. I have an application called DU meter installed on my PC. It basically monitors network activity. I have noticed that when I use Trainz, there are spikes of usage increase, and these start when individual parts of Trainz open i.e. CMP. Now my theory is that the times I have problems with Trainz are related to not being able to connect to a server, and the application hangs or crashes as it did not get the desired response.
The thing I noticed about the posts of people not experiencing problems at all, are they are mainly based in Australia or nearby countries. This would support my theory in terms that they potentially will always have a better chance of always connecting to a server when that server is based locally, response times are better, etc.
I am currently looking to find a decent Freeware Network Sniffer to see if I can find any evidence to support my theory. Any recommendations would be grateful received.
That sounds like a good theory, but I live in the USA up in New England, which is quite a distance from both Texas and Brisbane, Australia. I'm on Comcast broadband cable if that makes a difference.
In regards to sniffers...
Check SourceForge
www.sourceforge.net for some network utilities. Many of these are mainly for Unix and Linux, but there are also Windows builds as well. A good one that used to work well is SNORT. You maybe able to find the application, but the network component won't install nicely in the newer versions of Windows. It has something to do with the security level that the network port runs on.
The alternative would be to build a Solaris box (Solaris is free to download from Sun), and setup snoop, which is built in. Use snoop /promiscuous /verbose and pipe the output to a log file to catch the output for later viewing.
It is recommended that a sniffer be placed on a seperate machine rather than run it at the same time as other applications. The reason being that the sniffer can impact the performance of the network that you're trying to monitor as well as cause some performance problems on the machine that it is running on with other applications.
Having said that, sniffers won't work if they are behind a router or switch. They have to be used outside in a DMZ, or inline with the PC. This means that a sniffer has to be connected to a hub, not a switch in serial with the PC. The reason is that switches multiplex the connections and rotate (electronically) handing off incoming packet requests as requested where as a hub works like a lawn sprinkler. When the packets come into the hub, they get sent to all available ports, and the machine that requested the packets picks them up. This is what makes hubs slower than switches.
At any rate, let us know what you find.
John