Started playing WoW recently on a 2015 Mac Air - could handle it okay, and not a lot of latency except when at peak times and even then it wasn’t so bad.
Recently upgraded to a gaming PC with better everything, but still playing WoW Classic over the same network I had before. Only this time the latency is ridiculous. Often yellow and red bars, and especially during raids I end up missing half the action (and worried I’ll end up getting folks killed somehow).
I use a university system’s wifi, so I first reached out to them and they didn’t see any problem on my end re hardware. They suggested I switch to another wifi network, which I did, but no improvement. When not playing WoW my speedtests seem to be just fine for ping and upload/download. What I really don’t get is why things ran better on my older Mac Air than the newer Alienware PC, since nothing else changed.
Other than Windows 10 software, the PC uses the same suite of programs my Mac did.
If this is happening on multiple networks and doesn’t happen on the Mac, then it’s likely something on the PC. Have you tried testing the game after a UI reset? You may also want to close all other programs temporarily to narrow down the problem.
I did that and it may have helped somewhat; I also stripped out the 2 addons I was using. Still, as of now I’m getting yellow and red bars. Haven’t done a raid or dungeon and tomorrow is AQ on my server, but I don’t think it’s entirely resolved.
I have no idea what could be causing the issue on my PC. I ran winMTR and it didn’t pick up anything. I’d like to sort this out but I have no idea where to begin; if it’s a matter of the routers communicated with my PC I’d love to know why it’s different between the Mac and the PC in this regard.
Let me know what else you can suggest I do, or what data I can report here for insights.
The winMTR shows a horrible connection. Starting at the first hop and persisting through the run you are losing 14% of the packets.
Given that, have you updated the drivers for the wireless card in your PC? Is it the same type b,g,n,ac,ax as the macbook? Is it the same band (2.4 or 5ghz)? What type and band is the university using?
I’m glad it makes sense to you. It’s all numbers to me.
Drivers are updated; my mac runs an ac type, my pc runs an ax type. Uni is running an ac type with a 5ghz band. I found my way to the network properties and manually selected 5ghz as preferred to 2.4ghz - I’ll see if that makes a difference. It’s the worst at raid times so if things are mucky tonight I’ll run winMTR again and see if there’s any difference.
5ghz is faster, but generally has range issues. 2.4ghz has better range, but is slower. 2.4ghz is still way faster at max speed than you’d need to play WoW.
AX is new, so it may have some bugs. Definitely check for driver updates, or google to see if there are specific notes about your card and connecting to ac access points. If you have a Killer wireless card, make sure you are on version 3 (I think) of the Killer software.