cFosSpeed - Anybody tested this software?

Has anybody tested cFosSpeed?

You seeing any results while gaming / downloading stuff like that? The idea seems nice but don't know if it will work for real.

 

It's still not clear to me if it works or not, some think it works and some don't.

For example I have a 24mbit connection and max speed is around 2000-3100kb/s, with Newsleecher on low priority... will my browsing be as "quick/smooth" as without Newsleecher? or while playing games... will I be able to play it without the occasional lag?
*leaving out processor/hdd/ram-speeds*

 

It works, needs to train itself for a week, then you can play online games while doing P2P suffering no high pings, of course, high end routers do it on hardware level so in that case, its redundant. Game fuel is one such example in high end D Link routers.

 

I have the D-link Dir655 router, is cfosspeed better than the built-in "QoS-engine" and "WISH" ?

 

Gamefuel works really nice. In the original GamerLounge router it worked really well. The latest GamerLounge also incorporates it. Some of the other Dlink routers, I have the Dir-655 wireless now, they use QoS to prioritize packets, and it works a charm too. There is a noticable difference if others in the network are active online. I decided not to get the new GamerLounge because I think it looks dorky, and was pleasantly suprised that the QoS works just as well.

Sul.

 

What do you think is better cfosspeed or the DIR-655 QoS?
Would you buy the program or just keep it at the router?

 

Looked at it sometime ago...traffic shaping that seemed to work and quite well I found on speeds upto 2MB+. It cut out noticeable delay on that connection when downloading and streaming/surfing at the same time.

If I remember it had some sort of inspection firewall and was configurable in respect of ping and priority.

 

I only played with the software a little bit. I have messed with gamefuel/qos a lot more. I can't honestly say that I used cFos long enough to tell any effects. I do know that I can tell the effects using QoS right now though. Experience should show that a router (running it little *nix OS) is faster than software on machine.

Meriadoc is correct, there is priority and such involved. But at a basic level, without using WISH, just based on IP, setting my IP as priority level 1 pretty much eliminates any lag my wife or kids were causing if I was streaming a movie or playing a game like CoD. There is much more you can do with it, but I have not been too techy with it yet.

I guess there is no answer other than I would think the router would perform faster.

Sul.

 

Do you have any guides on configuring the QoS and WISH in the DIR-655?
I tried cfosspeed yesterday while downloading with newsleecher and utorrent and these were the results:


Team Fortress 2
Ping WITH traffic-shaping on: 20-60
Ping WITHOUT traffic-shaping on: 80-140

it seems it works, while having QoS and WISH off in the router, haven't tried doing anything with QoS and WISH because somehow I don't really know how to configure it correctly to make Torrent and other Downloading traffic having lower priority than browsing/streaming/online-gaming and actually making it work.

Please help me with that, or else I just have to buy cfosspeed for 15 euro, not much but still if my router can handle it why would I need extra software?

 

To enable Qos in the DIR-655 just check out the right side panel, and click on "more" at the end of the statement. This'll bring you to the help you'll need in order to configure Qos properly.

Until I first read this thread, I hadn't bothered w/ Qos, since I thought it was just for gaming. I decided to check it out and after configuring it my up-load speeds were down a bit, but my download speeds were up a bit.

Average before configuring Qos: 23102Kbps / 5188Kbps
Average after Configuring Qos: 26189Kbps / 4847Kbps


...screamer

 

My speeds are fine as it is but when downloading, gaming and browsing at the same time it's usually the latter two that are impacted greatly when downloading via newsgroups and torrents.


cfosspeed is a great program to prioritize browsing/online-gaming on my computer while I am downloading, so even when I am leeching the world I still can browse and game without unnecessary lag.

But can the same be done within my router? (Dlink Dir-655 firmware 1.11EU) and how?

 

If you are using wired connectin ( have not tried with wireless ), you can easily set it up.

For examply, you set the first entry. My internal IP is .10. I enable traffic shaping. I enable qos engine, auto classification & dynamic defragging. Then in first entry a name 'gaming CoD4' or similar. Priority 1 (highest or first), protocol ANY, local ip range .10 to .10, local port 0-65535, remote range 0 - 255.255.255.255 (that is all) and remote port range the ports for CoD4 on BOTH (tcp & udp).

The next entry might be for all other remote ports. Or it might be another internal ip. Or it might be for only certain remote ip's. Or certain local ports.

The idea is, even for only your computer, that you start with the exclusions of granular approach. In my case I make sure certain remote port ranges for my app are at higher level than others. So that if you play a game, and it's info is Priority 1, and you also start download from newsgroup or ftp site, you can be specific or not, and still get the desired priorities, even by protocol.

I had an elaborate set of rules in there at one point for all 5 computers in the house, and who should get priority over whom, and even which ports or remote ip's would get priority over others. For example my computer had priority over all. My boys had priority when playing his favorite game over my wifes if she was just browsing. But if my wife was up/downloading pictures or video from specifice remote IPs, she had priority. Alas, a firmware update did not like it when I imported my settings back in.

If you did not know it, that router lets you export your settngs, so if you have to reset it, you can just import.

A mighty fine router IMO.

Sul.

 

Sooo in short, it CAN do the same as cfosspeed, it's just that you have to manually fill everything in?

Which means I can add just the following rule so it prioritizes that above everything:

Name: Steam
Priority: 1
Local and Remote Port Range: 27000-27050

 

http://img21.imageshack.us/img21/7176/qos.jpg

Is this good, or not?

At priority can I fill it in like 1-2-3-4-5-6 etc. instead of making big jumps like in the image above? The effect will be the same right?

 

Ok, you get the idea. Level 1 will be first choise. etc etc. But help is needed I believe on your local port ranges. I am unsure you even need local port ranges normally.

In you example, you make a range of ip addresses for the router to prioritize first access to, on port range 27000-27050. This will get top priority, and ANY computer on the network with those ports. If one computer should be above others, you might put its specific IP as priotrity 1, then your current rule to priority 2.

Next look at browsing. Local port range will not be 80. It should be in the 1500-5000 range most likely. So I am unsure if this rule will fire, as always you go out TO port 80 USING port 2134 (etc). You should have ports 80,8080 and 443 for a browsing rule (remote ports).

The torrents and newsgroups rules look to be ok. Check your local port ranges though. Most of the time port opened (1234) will be destinationed to port (53), and then on the server it will respond port (53) to open and send data back to requesting port (1234). So if you don't have your local port ranges correct, I am not sure this router rule will associate an escelated priority or not.

If I am explaining this correctly, and I'm pretty sure I am.

Sul.

 

I guess local ports change all the time? or do they stay the same .. and if they do what are they exactly
setting it to 0-65535 will not work because then any port in that range will trigger any of the rules, or will they not? lol
my idea is to make the rules work for ANY computer on the network

 

You need to understand that most programs pull from a pool of ports to use to use as outbound. Some use lower physical ports some use the extended ports. Games like cod use 28000 or so. These are extended. Many apps like browsers use the lower physical ports, usually in the 2000-4000 range. If an app needs outbound, it requests port. Port preference may exist, but it is assigned outgoing port number. It is the destination port that is important, where a webserver is typcially running http port 80. Also secure http port 443.

A server is listening on a port, or a range of ports. As someone incomes on the port it is listening on, an application is associated with that port. An incoming request to port 80 will let server know whatever program is running listening on port 80, that it may need to respong to the incoming request. The server reads the request, pilfers through it's files as to the request, and sends back the data outbound to the same port the request came in on. So if FF requests outbound port 1234 to go to www.wildersecurity.com port 80, the server on the other end will send it back to now inbound port 1234. Because FF initiated the communication, it holds port 1234 open awaiting an answer.

Your rules will typically ignore outbound ports unless you know always that some certain application will be utilizing a local port for outgoing connection requests.

Of course there is the possibility that you have a server or two up, and you want one server (maybe a teamspeak server or something) to have priority over another. In this case you would reverse the logic, where you are more concerned to watch outbound port 8767 or incoming port 8676 or both. I have not played with it extensively though.

Most firewalls make the assumption that you don't care what outbound port an app is using, but more care about what remote port it is heading to. You don't want an app to use port 53 on some server in TimBuckTwo. You want to restrict all remote port 53 communications to YOUR Dns servers.

Does that help?

Sul.

 

It seems easier to just let Cfosspeed do it's job hehe..

 

It could be argued as such, very true. However, I believe once you get your understanding down and set up your router correctly, the router should out peform the software. Not only that, but also the router will work with any computer attached in the network, where the software will not on a client based machine.

There is no negative to you using the software though. If you are happy with it, then use it and don't look back.

Good luck.

Sul.