Holyabyss - Prot Paladin-Horde on Scilla

[Crazy Diana]

Bear in mind that changing the TCP ACK Frequency can have VERY adverse reactions to other TCP/IP traffic, such as downloads and whatnot. Basically, here's what that setting does:

In TCP/IP, the recipient of data is expected to send an acknowledgement packet (or ACK) upon receipt of data. In modern networking, an ACK is not expected after EVERY packet, but rather, the recipient often sends a packet acknowledging receipt of multiple packets of data. So, a typical download session might look like (greatly simplified):

Server sends Packet #1: Data
Server sends Packet #2: Data
Server sends Packet #3: Data
Server sends Packet #4: Data
Client sends ACK receipt of packets 1, 2, 3, 4
Server sends Packet #5: Data
etc...

The registry entry you're changing makes it do this, instead:
Server sends Packet #1: Data
Client sends ACK receipt of packet #1
Server sends Packet #2: Data
Client sends ACK receipt of packet #2
etc....

So for network transactions where you are receiving a LOT of data (downloads, torrents, HD streaming media, etc.), this change generates a significant increase in the amount of outgoing data on your connection, and may slow transfer speeds both because of the increased upstream bandwidth use (if you're already pushing it, say, via torrent uploads), and because the server sending you data is now dealing with 2-5x as many incoming packets from your machine as it was before.

So if all you do with your machine is play WoW and browse the web ... probably won't notice any adverse effects. You may, however, notice your ping going back up in action-heavy situations, such as a 25-man raid, for the aforementioned reasons of network saturation. Otherwise, what you're essentially doing is adding extra overhead for network transfers for a minimal decrease in latency (not NEARLY as much as the WoW client indicates -- it would be a whole extra post to explain why =P).

The PROPER way to do this is to run a hardware firewall and SOCKS/socat-style proxy. This will allow you to adjust network parameters (such as the TCP ACK Frequency) on a per-connection basis, so that it only affects your WoW connection and nothing else.

Anyway, just a word of warning...also, if you do decide to test out the change above, you will have to restart Windows before it takes effect.

Also, if you really want to know how to set up a proper SOCKS/socat firewall, reply and I'll get you some info. You will need a separate machine from your WoW box to do it correctly, however. =) If your computer WAY outclasses the requirements for WoW, you may be able to get away with running VMWare instead of a separate machine.