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They had the opportunity to improve latency for most people in the US and instead they make it objectively worse for everyone living east of Kansas.

Yeah, that was dumb. Good job.

Well at least doing it now means the servers will be stable by expansion release... right? .... RIGHT? /cry

I don't believe the location of game companies really have an effect on where the servers are located. Then again, I could be very wrong. Southern California probably has the largest amount of game companies congested in one area (Blizzard, Riot Games, Obsidian Studios, Atlus to just name a few) so I wouldn't be all too surprised if the servers are truly within the State.

I don't know what people still think SE is sensible.

These are the people that have AST a 20% balance. Just saying.

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Originally Posted by Arcsol93

What can I say, our providers like to rob from their customers and no one bats an eye...

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You have to take into consideration that all of USA isn't on fibre cabling, a lot of it is still on slow coppers, this is what the biggest issue would be, rather than just your service providers. Somehow I doubt there is a direct fibre link from east to west.

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Originally Posted by LaylaTsarra

Oh my how dare you... this is the forum and the Sky is Always Falling here!

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Well it already fell once!

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Originally Posted by Sagittarii

When I heard the NA data center was changing, my first guess was somewhere in El Segundo, CA, because that's where the NA office is, and there are a lot of data centers in the area.

If it's in Sacramento, that's still just a 1hr flight from the NA Square-Enix office.

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Offices have nothing to do with data centers, the people working at the office have zero access to anything server related.

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Originally Posted by alimdia

Offices have nothing to do with data centers, the people working at the office have zero access to anything server related.

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How do you know this?

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Originally Posted by Sagittarii

How do you know this?

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It's a reasonable guess, though there's no hard evidence one way or another.

Generally speaking, data centres don't share a location with office space. There are some exceptions - particularly if a company has built a large campus-style office complex - but if they haven't, it's likely they're housed separately.

The main reason for this, of course, is that office space / data centre space is typically rented or purchased from someone else. Most buildings are built with one or the other in mind, not both. So the probability of a company like SE, that hasn't built a large complex within the US, magically finding a dual-purpose location that works well for office space and data centre storage, is rather low.

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Originally Posted by Sagittarii

When I heard the NA data center was changing, my first guess was somewhere in El Segundo, CA, because that's where the NA office is, and there are a lot of data centers in the area.

If it's in Sacramento, that's still just a 1hr flight from the NA Square-Enix office.

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They also own Crystal Dynamics in Redwood City which is closer to the new data center site, not that it actually matters...

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Originally Posted by Vhailor

It's a reasonable guess, though there's no hard evidence one way or another.

Generally speaking, data centres don't share a location with office space. There are some exceptions - particularly if a company has built a large campus-style office complex - but if they haven't, it's likely they're housed separately.

The main reason for this, of course, is that office space / data centre space is typically rented or purchased from someone else. Most buildings are built with one or the other in mind, not both. So the probability of a company like SE, that hasn't built a large complex within the US, magically finding a dual-purpose location that works well for office space and data centre storage, is rather low.

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It's more likely that they lease space with a data center provider who also maintains a second site just in case of natural disaster, etc...

They moved it to California...as an Arizonan, hallelujah but I was expecting a far more centralized location. Why Cali?

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Originally Posted by Vhailor

It's a reasonable guess, though there's no hard evidence one way or another.

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All companies do their own thing, but I've worked for a few companies that hosted web services and leased data center space. In each of these companies, the network/server team worked out of one of the offices and rarely visited the data center unless it was necessary. All the gear was accessible via remote tools, so there was no need to be there unless something major was happening.

I'm impressed that we've only reached 30 pages of server location anxiety. I expected it to be worse.

I live in the southern parts of Australia, a nation renown for lousy internet infrastructure, and play on a server in Japan and the game is quite playable. You guys will all be fine.

i thought the idea was to make the data center to a more central location i was expecting Colorado,Texas, Ohio... but California just seems to just cause the opposite problem... unless they plan to add a sub data center on the other coast as well sometime in the future...:confused:

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Originally Posted by UltimusVivi

i thought the idea was to make the data center to a more central location i was expecting Colorado,Texas, Ohio... but California just seems to just cause the opposite problem... unless they plan to add a sub data center on the other coast as well sometime in the future...:confused:

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I was under the impression the relocation was a necessity to solve a capacity/infrastructure problem, not a location problem.

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Originally Posted by Kethic

I was under the impression the relocation was a necessity to solve a capacity/infrastructure problem, not a location problem.

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Yeah i doono, I like to know for sure, and interested if the old servers have anything do with the slowness I keep seeing.

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Originally Posted by Mature

I hope this happens again. my concerned is the amount of Gil I got and they won't allowed me to take. Gil that earned and saved for over 3 years.

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Transfer prevents moving over 1m gil, but you can transfer all your items. I was "forced" to transfer my alt from a nice friendly low population server. Low MB volatility was pressuring me to become an omnicrafter if I wanted to stay. After moving to large server, my alt's net-worth increased by roughly 6x and I don't have to craft.

I didn't do anything special -- just checked the destination MB before moving and converted non-transferable gil into items to resell. It's certainly far more tedious than transferring blindly, but it does mean that gil is one of the good things about moving.

The bad is what you absolutely can't take with you: friends, community, FC, etc.. There are a LOT of nice people all over in this game, but it's always a shame to leave some behind for game reasons.

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Originally Posted by Ama_Hamada

Yeah i doono, I like to know for sure, and interested if the old servers have anything do with the slowness I keep seeing.

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I recall an interview... I can't find the link... where they implied that many of their design decisions were based around NA data center limitations. Even now, they're talking about increased inventories and such for SB, and they've pointed at the new datacenter as the enabling piece.

Well I think it would benefit eeeeveryone if the servers moved to Kelowna B.C ;P Juuuust saying, we've got beautiful scenery, SE, and tons of room!

All jokes aside, people are acting like everyone who weighed the decision at SE is probably sitting in a corner eating glue and crayons. I'm sure if it even is on West Coast that there are a number of reasons that went into making that choice, not solely location.

I can understand if the European players are balancing on the edge of their seat hoping any changes don't ruin their gameplay, and I hope that nothing worsens for them. But they're giving us shiny new servers and we're still complaining just because the SPECULATED area isn't ideal? Let's lay down our torches and pitchforks, have a nice cup of coffee or tea, and actually wait and see how things turn out? Everyone just needs to mellow out a bit / v \ The two day maintenance has everyone going into withdrawals lel

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Originally Posted by Bjond

Transfer prevents moving over 1m gil, but you can transfer all your items. I was "forced" to transfer my alt from a nice friendly low population server. Low MB volatility was pressuring me to become an omnicrafter if I wanted to stay. After moving to large server, my alt's net-worth increased by roughly 6x and I don't have to craft.I didn't do anything special -- just checked the destination MB before moving and converted non-transferable gil into items to resell. It's certainly far more tedious than transferring blindly, but it does mean that gil is one of the good things about moving.

The bad is what you absolutely can't take with you: friends, community, FC, etc.. There are a LOT of nice people all over in this game, but it's always a shame to leave some behind for game reasons.

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Clearly you got no idea how much some people can have. You can have 8 chrs, buy crap on the markets and still find it hard to move all your gil, since ill be hard to find enough items that will transfer well.

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Originally Posted by Kethic

I recall an interview... I can't find the link... where they implied that many of their design decisions were based around NA data center limitations. Even now, they're talking about increased inventories and such for SB, and they've pointed at the new datacenter as the enabling piece.

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Yes I know, but I am wondering how much they thought about location, not just "we need updated servers"

If the rumors about California hosting the new data center is true, that is disappointing since I expected them to go more towards the middle of the United States. I just hope I won't have to meld more skill speed to make my rotations work in the future.

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Originally Posted by Scott

If the EU Server Where always there I would ne with all the people who say "fuck EUs".
But EU Servers Where announced way After release of Housing. And by transfering Servers you loose that House. So yeah. Until they allow You to Transfer with your House Transfering is no option.

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they would have to switch to an instanced housing model. somebody already owns your plot on the other servers in most cases.

This feels a bit ridiculous. I live on the west coast but have always played on an EU server. Sure, when the EU servers moved it was a bit of an adjustment and things weren't quite as snappy as before but I adjusted. I even raid as a ninja and it's FINE. Where ever the new servers end up being it's not going to affect people that badly at all, certainly not to the extreme of a west coaster playing on a EU server.

I also wasn't going to say anything about this but it's really cringe reading a couple comments about the inconvenience of a natural disaster on the game. I'd like to think people losing their lives in a quake would be a SMIDGE more of a problem.

It really needs to be in central.

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Originally Posted by Ama_Hamada

Clearly you got no idea how much some people can have. You can have 8 chrs, buy crap on the markets and still find it hard to move all your gil, since ill be hard to find enough items that will transfer well.

Yes I know, but I am wondering how much they thought about location, not just "we need updated servers"

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It's a fair question, but I imagine they thought about it more than people in this thread are giving them credit for.

Servers aren't even up yet. Before everyone cries foul, we should at least wait and see how it works.

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Originally Posted by Hitsuzen

You shouldn't expect them to know any better. A lotttt of foreigners think traveling from california to texas is like pulling into a walmart, but it really isn't. Heck driving from San Diego, CA to Sacramento is still a hell of a drive probably 12ish hours.

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Wouldn't they have stuff like consultants to explain that to them?

I'm just gonna wait it out and hope the people tracing the servers are getting it wrong, because if they seriously moved the servers into a far corner of the country rather than somewhere relatively central I'm going to lose my last shred of faith in SE's decision making abilities.

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Originally Posted by Duelle

Wouldn't they have stuff like consultants to explain that to them?

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Yoshi has travel agents explaining how good the beaches in California are

Doing a google search both ip addresses are in Chicago. Unless google is lying to me.

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Originally Posted by xJimmehx

I dont know the difference between higher ping and more packet loss.

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High ping means more delay (lag) -- your view on reality (the server = reality) is further behind everyone else's; ever been hit by AE you were SURELY outside? Your client knew, but the server didn't and so you got hit.

Packet loss is FAR worse. It's the same as having your connection cut. That's when your entire raid freezes while you get to run about, but all the server saw was you standing there stupidly doing nothing while the AE blasted you over and over.

It's simple to design around poor ping. It's more difficult to deal with packet loss, especially with player/player interaction (eg. any pvp or pve healing). Most games assume losses will mostly be tiny and non-critical -- movement data, for instance, will be quickly corrected because the next packet will have another new position. FFXIV seems to be no exception; even moderate PL makes it unplayable.

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Originally Posted by RylaiShendelzare

Yoshi has travel agents explaining how good the beaches in California are

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Y: Where should we place this server? I think we should really make sure the player experience is first.
Consultant: California has great beaches. With the best sand, absolutely the greatest sand.

.... XD

I would watch a TV series that had meetings like that lol.

South American player here. We have a big group in Behemoth server.

Old location: 140ms
New location: 300ms

Goodbye FFXIV.

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Originally Posted by Shougun

Y: Where should we place this server? I think we should really make sure the player experience is first.
Consultant: California has great beaches. With the best sand, absolutely the greatest sand.

.... XD

I would watch a TV series that had meetings like that lol.

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Well he did rent a entire castle in france for a weekend for some reasons.

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Originally Posted by Voltres

South American player here. We have a big group in Behemoth server.

Old location: 140ms
New location: 300ms

Goodbye FFXIV.

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Judging ping times before the servers are up running and probably even optimized is probably not going to give you anything close to accurate results. Just sayin...

Can someone explain to the laymen out here what exactly is considered in a ping? I am in Indiana, play on aether, and I just speedtested to Sacramento and I was at 79 ping? I would have thought it would be a lot worse than that??

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Originally Posted by savageink

Judging ping times before the servers are up running and probably even optimized is probably not going to give you anything close to accurate results. Just sayin...

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I hope so. I'm pretty hyped for the expansion :)

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Originally Posted by BreyVoreas93

Can someone explain to the laymen out here what exactly is considered in a ping? I am in Indiana, play on aether, and I just speedtested to Sacramento and I was at 79 ping? I would have thought it would be a lot worse than that??

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it's how long it takes for a packet of data to get from you to the server and back. but being in indiana you are probably close to the chicago backbone which is a big chunk of fibre basically that moves it to Cali pretty fast.

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Originally Posted by BreyVoreas93

Can someone explain to the laymen out here what exactly is considered in a ping? I am in Indiana, play on aether, and I just speedtested to Sacramento and I was at 79 ping? I would have thought it would be a lot worse than that??

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Hello fellow Hoosier! o/ I got pretty much the same ping when I did the speedtest to Sacramento.