Mac users: Can you run SMB/Network games smoothly?

[grunge782]

First of all I am using a Macbook Pro with OS X 10.6.4.

In OSX I am able to find my games fine in OPL and I can boot them. However, during movie sequences there is a lot of stuttering and I in every game I have tried at some point the game freezes. I can only get in about 5 to 10 minutes of play before the game freezes.

When I use bootcamp with windows xp, I am able to run games smoothly, without any game freezes (though there is still the same stuttering in some movie sequences). I believe I have the network settings exactly the same in both bootcamp and xp, at least I have the gateway/router, mask and IP address set the same.

So is it just a problem with Mac and OPL or are other mac users out there able to run games fine through OPL SMB?

I am able to run games fine one way or another so it isn't a big deal, I just like using OS X when I can.

[Gnom]

Never used it thoroughly since I find the internal hdd more practical, but I did some test when the smb feature first got available and I don't recall any freeze problem. The tests were done with shadow of the colossus, using a 2008 iMac running 10.5. Still, the smb implementation shows some problems, and especially when reconnecting to a server, so I don't exactly know how smb works in opl but it is possible that problems occur when not loading data for a while. This is just a lead, though, so it is possible that the problem is completely different.

[izdubar]

If you are using OPL 0.7, then you don't have the anti-freeze counter measure

OPL 0.7 is not able to respond to NBSS keep-alive packets sent from the samba server, thus the server would close the connection after some time.

So, either you need to use a beta revision of OPL which now support them:

jimmikaelkael commit 277

Or you can tweak your samba server configuration to not send these packets. I don't know MAC configuration, but under linux, you just have to add this line into the [global] section of the smb.conf:

keepalive = 0

[Gnom]

I didn't spend a lot of time on fine tuning my SMB server, but if memory serves the keepalive option was similar. smb.conf is located in /etc/ , so given the correct rights you should be able to configure it accordingly.

[grunge782]

Never used it thoroughly since I find the internal hdd more practical, but I did some test when the smb feature first got available and I don't recall any freeze problem. The tests were done with shadow of the colossus, using a 2008 iMac running 10.5. Still, the smb implementation shows some problems, and especially when reconnecting to a server, so I don't exactly know how smb works in opl but it is possible that problems occur when not loading data for a while. This is just a lead, though, so it is possible that the problem is completely different.

If you are using OPL 0.7, then you don't have the anti-freeze counter measure

OPL 0.7 is not able to respond to NBSS keep-alive packets sent from the samba server, thus the server would close the connection after some time.

So, either you need to use a beta revision of OPL which now support them:

jimmikaelkael commit 277

Or you can tweak your samba server configuration to not send these packets. I don't know MAC configuration, but under linux, you just have to add this line into the [global] section of the smb.conf:

keepalive = 0

Thank you for the help.

How exactly would I go about getting a beta revision of OPL on a mac? You have to compile it from the source code if it is a beta revision correct? I am trying to understand that website as this kind of stuff is new to me, but I am not sure if it is worth the effort with my current knowledge and lack of experience. I might just wait for the next public release if it fixes this problem and use bootcamp in the meantime.

Also if somebody could explain to me if the above is true why it is better for people to compile it from the source code instead of just getting the beta revision .elf file directly that would be very helpful to me.

I didn't spend a lot of time on fine tuning my SMB server, but if memory serves the keepalive option was similar. smb.conf is located in /etc/ , so given the correct rights you should be able to configure it accordingly.

Okay thank you. I am trying to research as how to do that.

[Gnom]

Thank you for the help.

How exactly would I go about getting a beta revision of OPL on a mac? You have to compile it from the source code if it is a beta revision correct? I am trying to understand that website as this kind of stuff is new to me, but I am not sure if it is worth the effort with my current knowledge and lack of experience. I might just wait for the next public release if it fixes this problem and use bootcamp in the meantime.

It might be possible to compile OPL using Mac OS X, but this would require some dev knowledge, which you don't seem to have. So the easiest way would be to download VirtualBox for Mac and use one of the VMs available on these forums.

Also if somebody could explain to me if the above is true why it is better for people to compile it from the source code instead of just getting the beta revision .elf file directly that would be very helpful to me.

It's not supposed to be better, it is just that devs don't wish to release binary files (.elf) of the betas, in order to avoid inexperienced users to mess with it and then come and complain.

Okay thank you. I am trying to research as how to do that.

I assume you don't know how to use the shell, so I'm going to try to be as clear as possible.
1) Open the Terminal program (located in /Applications/Utilities)
2) In the shell window, type "open -a /Applications/TextEdit.app/Contents/MacOS/TextEdit /etc/smb.conf" then press Enter. You will be asked for your password.
3) The SMB config file will open in TextEdit. Add the keepalive = 0 options somewhere in the [global] section of the file then save it in your home folder as smb.conf.
4) Go back to the Terminal program and type "sudo cp ~/smb.conf /etc". You might be asked for your password or not.
5) Reboot (actually you just need to restart the SMB server but I think that rebooting is the easiest way for you).

With this you should have no further problem.

[grunge782]

It might be possible to compile OPL using Mac OS X, but this would require some dev knowledge, which you don't seem to have. So the easiest way would be to download VirtualBox for Mac and use one of the VMs available on these forums.



It's not supposed to be better, it is just that devs don't wish to release binary files (.elf) of the betas, in order to avoid inexperienced users to mess with it and then come and complain.



I assume you don't know how to use the shell, so I'm going to try to be as clear as possible.
1) Open the Terminal program (located in /Applications/Utilities)
2) In the shell window, type "open -a /Applications/TextEdit.app/Contents/MacOS/TextEdit /etc/smb.conf" then press Enter. You will be asked for your password.
3) The SMB config file will open in TextEdit. Add the keepalive = 0 options somewhere in the [global] section of the file then save it in your home folder as smb.conf.
4) Go back to the Terminal program and type "sudo cp ~/smb.conf /etc". You might be asked for your password or not.
5) Reboot (actually you just need to restart the SMB server but I think that rebooting is the easiest way for you).

With this you should have no further problem.

As is easily observed, I am still quite the computer noob.

In terms of that last response, if I were to follow your directions and change my smb.conf would this have an affect on my internet usage?(I use wifi only for my connection to the internet on the computer I am using).

[Gnom]

No, this would only change the settings of your SMB server, which is the program on your computer that allows sharing files on network. This has nothing to do with any other aspect of your network configuration. The only thing you might risk, if not done right, is to mess up with your SMB server, which would make remote access to your shared files impossible, but even that is unlikely and can be taken care of easily.

If you're really unsure about that, I can make you a script that you'd only have to open, and entering your password when prompted, but I still think it's pretty safe even for newbies.

[grunge782]

No, this would only change the settings of your SMB server, which is the program on your computer that allows sharing files on network. This has nothing to do with any other aspect of your network configuration. The only thing you might risk, if not done right, is to mess up with your SMB server, which would make remote access to your shared files impossible, but even that is unlikely and can be taken care of easily.

If you're really unsure about that, I can make you a script that you'd only have to open, and entering your password when prompted, but I still think it's pretty safe even for newbies.

Okay thank you. I was able to follow your instructions perfectly and games are running great now. Thank you! I really should read more on how to do basic commands in terminal.

[homunkurus]

Okay, i have done the smb.conf part in terminal (i have a mac too) and it worked just fine, now i have compiled the rev455 OPL, and tried using a game iso in the DVD folder, but it just won't appear(its correctly named SCUS_973.99.GOD OF WAR), the weird part is that the other winhiip formatted games disappeared too, now after trying over and over i discovered that, if i move the DVD folder from PS2SMB, my other games reapear like normal, i noticed that if there's a CD directory, or a DVD directory, nothing appears, and if i get them out of the way, everything comes back, tried with cracyc latest OPL too. whats wrong?