Microsoft KB Archive/177952

= Age of Empires: Turtle, or yellow or red dot next to player name =

Article ID: 177952

Article Last Modified on 8/16/2005

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Age of Empires

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This article was previously published under Q177952



SYMPTOMS
When you play a multiplayer game, you may see a turtle, a yellow dot, or a red dot next to a player's name in the Scores window.



CAUSE
If the frame rate (the number of frames per second of video images on the screen) drops below 15 frames per second, a turtle appears next to the name of the player with the slowest computer. If the network latency (the time it takes for a packet of data to travel between two computers) is from 300 milliseconds to 1 second, a yellow dot appears next to the name of the player with the slowest Internet connection. If the network latency is more than 1 second, a red dot appears next to the name of the player with the slowest Internet connection.



RESOLUTION
The following information may help you improve the performance of a multiplayer game.  The fewer players in the game, the faster the game runs. For example, game performance is slower in an 8-player game than in a 2-player game. The player with the fastest computer must be the host, even if there are no computer players participating in the game (the host computer is responsible for running the computer players). The host computer does the extra work during the game. Multiplayer games run only as fast as the slowest computer in the game. To see which players are experiencing network latency or frame rate problems, click the S button in the lower-right corner of the game screen to display the player scores and the following information:

If a turtle appears next to the name of a player, that player has the slowest system. The player can try to improve performance by following the tips provided in this article, or the player can drop out of the game.

If a red or yellow dot appears next to the name of a player, indicating network latency problems, the player can reestablish their Internet connection and restart the game to try to improve performance.

 If you play a multiplayer game with eight players, game performance is best when each player's computer meets the Age of Empires minimum system requirements of a Pentium 90 processor and 24 megabytes (MB) of RAM. The game host must have the most powerful computer and the most RAM.



MORE INFORMATION
For additional information about how to troubleshoot networking issues, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

819836 How to troubleshoot multiplayer issues in Microsoft games

Additional query words: 1.00 rise of rome expansion pack age aoe ages empire ageofempires t-shoot trouble shoot multiplay multi multiple igz networking multi-player speed performance

Keywords: kbnetwork kbsyssettings kbprb kbconfig kbusage KB177952

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