See what's shakin': use vibrance!

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Optimize your CoD2 settings like a pro

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Pro Config files for CoD2

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Shut up already!

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Lean on me: The Lean Bind

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Bind your CoD2 Sweet Spot on the fly

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The Sweet Spot

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Screencast on the use of Ventrilo

To really enjoy the full experience of multiplayer online gaming you must communicate with your fellow players.

There are a few programs on the Internet (e.g. Roger Wilco, Teamspeak) that will allow you to do this, but my favorite is Ventrilo.

You can get it here: http://www.ventrilo.com/download.php

Also known as "vent", Ventrilo uses Voice of Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology. Some of its features include:

- surround sound positioning and special sound effects on a per user, per channel, per server or global configuration level

- the program provides each user the option to fully customize exactly how they wish to hear sounds from other users or events.

- it has excellent sound quality and uses very few CPU resources (nearly no effect on your ping!).

- hotkeys

- recording and playback feature

- text-to-speech functions

- VOX

- multiple chat rooms

To show you what it looks like I've prepared this little Flash screencast (you need a Flash plug-in for your browser to view it). The screencast is my first ever attempt at this new media (please let me know what you think).

If you have downloaded it and want to try it out, point it to the Devil Dogz server (and come play CoD2 while you're at it!):

Devil Dogz Ventrilo IP address: 66.55.149.15 Port: 4664

Tell anyone there...Jock sent ya!


Enjoy!

We've been punked! *UPDATE 2*: Lowkee edition

BASH...the Blog reader, Lowkee (BF2142 player) made a stunning discovery recently and posted it in the comments section in our article on the PunkBuster lag article on this website (We've been punked! *UPDATE 1*).

I did not want his comments buried, so I am posting them here. Please read if you have been having lag issues with Punk Buster:

Although it pains me to release this fix where EvenBalance can read it and give me absolutely no credit for wasting hours of my life in finding a solution, here is a proof of concept, as such, of the PunkBuster service bug:

Trillian == lag in-game
ICQ == lag in-game
ATI Control Center == lag in-game
Winamp == lag in-game (in certain instances)

What do these programs all have in common? Global Hotkeys.

It seems the new PB service chokes if any application hooks into for global hotkey support. So, disabling global hotkeys in all of your application will bring your FPS rate back to normal with no more slowdown due to PB beta testing on your PC.

As an added FPS boost, setting the following in your BF 2142 (or any other PB enabled game) console will also help:

(type in the game console)
pb_system 1
pb_sleep 500
pb_writecfg

Happy playing everyone, in spite of PunkBuster.

-Lowkee

This is an awesome find. Lowkee. I've been having issues myself with PB (as with nearly all my COD2 friends) and your comments are quite interesting. I am running Itunes (I believe that program uses Global Hotkeys).

I'll be experimenting with this and report back with any positive information.

I would encourage our readership to do the same. Please post your findings in the comments section of this post.

THANK YOU LOWKEE! And keep up the good work!

System Requirements Lab

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Gimme a shout if you're in a bind

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In a bind: Changing your name in CoD2

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Changing mouse sensitivity on the fly

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We've been punked! *UPDATE 1*

BASH has just received a straightforward reply from Evenbalance regarding the lag induced by their latest Punkbuster update.

As you can read in the BASH article We've been punked!, Evenbalance has added two background processes that run while Call of Duty (or any other Punkbuster enabled game) is running; namely: PnkBstrA.exe and PnkBstrB.exe.

A few days ago, we opened a ticket with Evenbalance and asked them the following questions:

While we greatly appreciate all the efforts you folks are doing to keep us playing in a Cheat-Free environment, the lag induced by the new update has caused some issues.

Can you explain what has caused the lag and if there are any solutions to mitigate it. Currently there are community workarounds.

I have posted a few on my blog. I am sure you cannot sanction such activity; however, can you suggest what we CAN do? Currently your 2 new executables (PnkBstrA and B) are eating up a significant amount of CPU resources and undoubtedly contributing to a slowdown in-game. I would greatly appreciate any information you can provide my readers/listenership.

Glenn Courington, from Evenbalance, replies:

04/16/2007 14:39:41 - "Glenn Courington"

Note #2: As your blog states, yes, these new services will take additional CPU cycles, as this is by design to use CPU cycles that aren't allocated to the game or other processes.

As for the "solutions" posted, no, those wouldn't be solutions. While it hasn't been initiated yet, it will soon be required to run these services to play on a PB server. Uninstalling them or turning them off will result in a kick from the server.

As for lag issues, we have been making updates to correct such issues, and we will continue to do so as needed.

http://www.evenbalance.com/index.php?page=pbsvcfaq.php

So there you have it. Please ensure that you do NOT remove the PunkBuster background processes.

Hopefully, Evenbalance will sort out the lag issues.

If anyone is having lag issues, please let us know. You can email us here at BASH:

jockyitch@devil-dogz.com



Additional articles:

remove those un-needed processes
protect yourself from malware

We've been punked!

Has anyone noticed increased lag, higher pings, packet loss, lower FPS and loss of system resources lately when playing online?

Well, it can probably traced to the latest Punkbuster updates.

The latest updates of Punkbuster have certainly wreaked havoc with us here in the COD2 community.

What you may not have noticed is that Evenbalance (the authors of PunkBuster) have added two new processes to their PB suite:

PnkBstrA.exe and PnkBstrB.exe!

That brings them up to a grand total of four processes total - all robbing you of system resources while your playing, albeit for a good cause, I suppose.

What are these new services? Try reading this:

http://www.evenbalance.com/index.php?page=pbsvcfaq.php

Beginning with PunkBuster client version 1.500, we have extended the PunkBuster Anti-Cheat system to operate without the requirement to run PunkBuster supported games with Administrator privileges when running under Windows 2000, XP, or Vista. In order to do this, we have developed new Windows service components to work with the PunkBuster system. We are currently conducting open beta testing for the new service components. To participate in the open beta testing, issue the "pb_installservice" command in your game console after joining a server (at this point, you must still be running as the Administrator user). This command will attempt to install a new PunkBuster service called PnkBstrA. Alternatively, the PBSVC Setup Program can be used as a standalone installer/uninstaller for the PnkBstrA service; PBSVC can be downloaded from here. Once the PnkBstrA service is running along with a new PB client version 1.500 and higher, running PB enabled games under Windows 2000, XP or Vista no longer requires Administrator privileges.

It appears that both executables are part of the latest Punkbuster update. And one, PnkBstrB.exe seems to be looking for cheats on your drive.

The upshot is a very significant increase in system resources while playing. Try bringing up your Task Manager while playing to take a peek. Some people are seeing 30-40% of the their CPU resources being taken over! This is higher than what COD uses most times.

While my initial anger at this made me point to PB...the real culprit is the cheating hacker! Well what can you do about it?

SOLUTIONS?

BASH has found a few solutions that have been found successful by non-COD gamers and we post them here. We have not tried them out and you should use them with great caution:


A. This was found referenced on http://forum.americasarmy.com

1. Click on the start menu, click on Run.... Type services.msc.
2. Under services find PnkBstrA. Right click it and stop it from the option in the drop-down menu.
3. Now double click it. On startup type select disabled.
4. Repeat 2 and 3 for PnkBstrB.
4. Go to your windows/system32 folder.
5. Find the two files, PnkBstrA.exe and PnkBstrB.exe and delete them.
6. Go to AA/system/pb folder.
7. Delete PnkBstrB.exe and PnkBstrK.
8. Go to http://www.americasarmy.com/includes/bumper.php?goto=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.evenbalance.com%2Findex.php%3Fpage%3Dpbsetup.php and download the pbsetup for your operating system.
9. Install. Select game directory and update PB.


B. Also from americasarmy

1) delete Punkbuster folder contents in system folder
2) goto start>control panel>administrative tools>services
3) goto extended tab select PnkBstrA. Double click it to see properties you will see a drop down menu select disabled.
4) goto PnkBstrB Double click it to see properties you will see a drop down menu select disabled.
5 ) Download this for your OS http://www.evenbalance.com/ind...tup.php
6) run pbsetup select your game directory and update PB
7) should be gone now go play with out lag!

Both solutions are similar. The folks who have come up with the solutions say their lag was gone once they performed the tweaks and PunkBuster has not kicked them from any server.

The jury is still out on these fixes...stay tuned.


Notes:

Punkbuster support is apparently telling its users that CPU usage has increased with this latest update; however, PB will use "unused" CPU cycles as it completes scanning your system for hacks. They are stating that this will not be detrimental to gameplay.


Related posts:

remove those un-needed processes

protect yourself from malware

Remove those un-needed processes: msconfig

Speed up COD by shutting down any un-needed or unwanted processes!

If you want to speed up COD on your machine, you might want to disable un-needed programs from running in the background while you are playing.

To disable a program from running you can do so PERMANENTLY or TEMPORARILY (they will return next time you boot up your computer). For example, Apple's IPOD SERVICE runs on startup on my machine. This service is used to download mp3 files for my iPod. I want it to run, however, it does take up resources while I am on my computer.

Each background process can consume CPU cyles and memory. Other services are more necessary than others. To get every ounce of horse-power out of my machine to play COD, I might want to stop this program from running.

Some processes can be downright useless...adware or spyware for example.

BEFORE YOU GO FURTHER - MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND THAT YOUR SYSTEM COULD BEHAVE ERRATICALLY IF YOU DO NOT KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A BACKGROUND PROCESS THAT IS CRITICAL FOR YOUR MACHINE AND ONE THAT IS NOT.

TEMPORARILY DISABLE A PROCESS

Disabling a process temporarily should be your first step if you do not know exactly what it does (for example, if you suspect it is spyware).

On Windows XP:

Press Ctrl-Alt-Del

This will bring up Task Manager. Click on the tab that says Processes.

Select the process you want to delete.

Note that Windows Task Manager gives you the memory usage for each program running. For example, my IPOD service takes up 3.6 Mb of RAM!

During your session on the computer, this program will not run - but may come back (if it is set up to start up again on next re-boot). You can temporarily disable after each boot up to determine what loss of functionality you experience.

PERMANENTLY DISABLE A BACKGROUND PROCESS

If you feel comfortable to disable a process (or one part of a process), You can use the System Configuration Utility (MSConfig) that is given to you in Windows XP.

1. Click on Start
2. Click Run
3. In the window that just opened, type the word msconfig.
4. Click the Startup tab.
5. Uncheck any process you do not wish to have start on next start up of your computer.

If you realize that you need this program after all, re-check it and reboot.


Here's yet another way:

1. Click on Start
2. Click Run in the window that just opened, type the word services.msc
3. Click on the service you want disabled on startup (Extended tab)
4. Click on Stop the service (top left)



See also:

How to protect yourself from Malware

How to protect yourself from malware

SHOW NOTES FROM BASH EPISODE 15: VIRUS!

This is the first in a few articles on BASH...the blog that will focus on the basics of computer/data safety while connected on line.


I'm embarassed.

No, I wasn't caught trying to steal women's underwear at the Walmart! Um...that was last month.

I am embarassed because I was infected by an internet worm a few weeks ago.

This "worm", a software program, took over elements of my computer and made it do various tasks without my consent or control.

Yup. I picked up a worm and it ruined my gaming life for about a week before I cleaned it off my computer. The embarassing part is that I should have known better.

I thought I understood something about internet security but I failed to act on that knowledge and it cost me one week of frustration. Could have been worse I suppose. I could have had to reformat my drive and re-install XP on my PC. Or it could have been really bad and I could have suffered from identity theft.

I have taken a week out of my gaming life to, number one, clean out my PC of any web-derived infestations and number two, protect myself from any future attacks.

This article will try to atone for my sins by providing you with what little I know or have learned about trying to protect your computer from these devlish creations (viruses, worms, trojans, malware...) and keep your online presence a safe and happy one. The focus here will be on the gamer who uses a PC running Windows XP and a cable-modem to connect to the world, but most of what you will read is applicable to anyone who ties a PC into the internet.

The Axes of Evil

There are many types of programs that are making the rounds on the internet that can cause you problems. The presence of these programs is a natural consequence of the versatility of the personal computer. It is very difficult to exclude programs that have good intentions from programs that have bad intentions.

It's hard to come up with a definition for these programs, you hear the word virus used a lot for these malicious pieces of code, but any program that somehow gets on your system and whose purpose is to alter the behavior of your computer without your permission is by definition malicious and has bad intent.

A decade ago these malicious codes could be very destructive, some for example some programs back in the 80's and 90's even attempted to erase your harddrive.

Nowadays, this "bad" software, or malware, is more than likely simply trying to:

1. Use your computer to send out spam email for which the author of the malware is compensated.
2. Spy on you and turn the information over to adverstising agencies for money.
   or
3. Use your computer in conjunction with millions of other computers (botnets) to launch attacks on computer networks (denial of service - or DNS attacks).

The reason malware is not as destructive anymore is that most of the time the author does not even want you to know it's there. Because if you find out you have one of these little programs, you'll try to delete it and thereby removing the author's source of income.

Here is a quick list of such evil programs, or also known as malware... you have all heard their names before if you have ever used a computer:

Virus:
A computer virus is a program that can copy itself and infect a computer without permission or knowledge of the user. Viruses can spread to other computers by infecting files on a network (e.g. the Internet). Viruses spread by attaching themselves to other files they come in contact with.

Most of the viruses spreading nowadays are designed to take control over (hijack) your computer system, turning into what tech experts call a "zombie system". Why would anyone turn your computer into a zombie? Well, there may be some truth in the news that virus authors are getting nearly a dime for every computer they hijack. The virus author then turns the control over your zombie computer to an email spammer who makes your computer spit out spam emails. If you get spam email you'll see that the authors seem legit - these poor folks have had the control of their computer stolen right out from under them and have no idea their system is transmitting these emails. It is no wonder that there are four spam emails sent out for every "real" email.

There are some estimates that say that one-thirds of all computers on the net are zombies. According to the BBC, eighty percent (80%) of all the computers in China have been hijacked! PC Pitstop Spyware Center says that 20% of all computers have spyware!

You get a virus by running a program on your computer. More often than not the user clicks on a program without realizing that the program is a virus.

Trojan Horse

In the computer world, a Trojan is not that rubber thingy in your wallet that you've never used. It's a program where a hacker has hidden their evil-doing code inside what appears to be a harmless program or data file.

It's a program that claims to be one thing, but is in reality, something else. Some people who have used Kazaa (music sharing software) consider it a trojan program because it actually carries spyware inside.

Worm:

A computer worm is a program that can make copies of itself. It employs the internet to send these copies to other computers. You don't have to visit a specific internet site to pick up a worm. In fact you don't have to do anything other than connect to your computer to the net to get a worm.

Worms can spread through computers that have out of date operating systems. For this reason it is important that you constantly keep your operating system up to date by downloading the latest patch.

Some worms spread through email. Most through Microsoft Outlook or Outlook Express.

Worms and viruses are different in how they are transmitted: a worm is a stand-alone program, while a virus propagates by attaching itself to another program.

Spyware
Spyware describes a type of computer program that will try to advertise, collect personal information, or change the configuration of your computer without your permission. Some spyware tries to track visits to a website for example and then send this information to an advertising agency. More evil versions of spyware try to record your passwords or credit card numbers as you type them in on the web.

Spyware typically can get installed when you visit websites. Most websites, even very legitimate sites like CNN and Amazon will try to keep track of your on-line behavior. Usually this happens when your browser settings are not set to a sufficiently high security level and you visit a website that distributes spyware. This is sometimes called “drive-by downloading” since it installs itself when you “drive-by” a website.

Some of the more notorious websites will do more than track your presence on their website though. But it's all a matter of degrees.

How do you know you have been hacked?

The way I knew I was hacked was that the ping or latency I experienced on my favorite game servers had gone up. And I mean way up. For example, on my clan's server, the DD public server, I usually run a 45 ms ping. After being hacked I was running over 100ms all the time. I knew I was the problem and not the server, because I was using CoD2 built-in lag-o-meter running at all times when I'm playing CoD2. More about the lag-o-meter at another time.

As soon as I realized this was happening I immediately shut down my modem.

Another way to tell you have been hacked, that is, attacked by worms, or viruses, is that:

• Your hard-disk light is constantly blinking, even though your computer is not running any program.
• Your computer is running perceptibly slowly and it just feels like it's chugging along real slow.
• Your network upload/download lights (usually little computer icons on your toolbar) are on when you are connected to the internet but you aren't surfing, playing games or downloading files.
• You have emails in your sent folder that you never authored!

If you have spyware on your machine other symptoms include:

• Pop-up ads will come up when you aren't even on the internet
  Your web browser home page keeps changing even though you keep tyring to set it back to your original home page.
• Your web browser has new toolbars that you did not install.
• Your browser crashes a lot
• Your computer takes much longer to start and runs really slowly.

Things you should do to prevent yourself from being hacked?

Leo Laporte, a celebrity technology expert, has a saying that to prevent yourself from being hacked, you should change your online behavior.

For example, Microsoft has been saying that Vista has become hack-resistant in comparison to XP, but the reality is that you could fall prey to hackers using Vista if you fail to change your behavior. Here's an example:

Kaspersky, a well known anti-virus company, claims that there are already ways around Vista security and compounding this, Vista nags the user so much during an online session that many people might turn off the security suite inside Vista leaving the computer vulnerable to attack. See : Microsoft partner: Vista less secure than XP.

In attempting to change internet user behavior, Laporte mentions this interesting fact, many security experts do not run anti-virus programs.

None.

They rely on a few simple ideas to keep them safe. Here are the basics:

1. PATCH MICROSOFT WINDOWS

Make sure you are running XP with Service Pack 2 installed.

Make sure you are applying all of the critical Microsoft patches. Usually, on the second Tuesday of the month, Microsoft releases its critical patches to fix flaws in its operating systems. It is vital that you apply these patches, for one, to prevent yourself from getting worms. It is doubly important that you make these patches if you hear about them on the news as this can be looked upon as an invitation to the black hat programmers out there that there is an Microsoft vulnerability that they can exploit.

Did you know that if you try to connect an unpatched XP computer to the internet you will get a worm on that machine in under one minute!

Windows should download these patches automatically, but if you suspect you are NOT getting patched and that Windows Update is not automatically doing this check the following:

1. Open Control Panel
   Click Security Center.
   Select Automatic Updates.
2. Select your preferred settings according to your needs and then click OK :
3. Close Windows Security Center.
4. Important: For first time turning on the Automatic Update feature, please visit Microsoft Windows Update web site to make sure you have all the latest updates available from Microsoft at that time. Automatic Update will only help you to download any future updates but not the existing one for your computer.

If this is not working, or you wish to do this step manually, try this:

1. Start Internet Explorer.
2. Select Windows Update under Tools menu and then follow the instructions.
3. Install at least Critical Update and all the updates for Internet Explorer.
4. Install other updates if necessary.

2. USE A HARDWARE FIREWALL

What we are talking about here is a separate device that guards the entrance to a network. Behind that network you can link any number of computers. The wireless router is today's most popular device that can be used as a firewall. Most people buy routers for home use to take a single broadband internet account and spread it to at least two or more computers.

I have a wireless router at home. I've hooked it up by routing my cable broadband connection through the modem my cable company gave me and then through the wireless router. My main computer is then connected to the router using an ethernet cable. I also have a laptop and that can be used anywhere in the house, because after all, it's a wireless router and it will broadcast the connection to the net over radio frequencies that the laptop picks up.

Here is a picture of the back of a wireless router showing the ethernet connections you'll need to plug into. More details on the hook up of a wireless router in later blogs.

How does the router shield you from potential attacks?

A router will prevent unrequested communication from reaching your computer. Think of it as a one way valve. It lets data go out to the internet from your computer, but will not let data in - unless you have requested it. If you are trying to browse a website for example you will send out a request for data to be sent to you, a webpage for example. The router will let the webpage in because you requested it. However, if someone is trying to send you data (an unsolicited malware program for example) the data will be stopped because you never asked for it.

In addition, the router hides the internet address (IP address) of the computers and devices you have that are in behind it. In this way, the outside world doesn't even know you have a computer running. All the world sees is the IP address of the firewall - but it knows nothing about the computer you are on. The router does this automatically as a virtue of its primary function, to take a single IP address and share it amongst many devices. If you didn't have a router you would have to purchase as many internet accounts as you had computers. This way you only buy one account and share it amongst all the computers you have.

Any port in a storm

An important thing to note at this point is the concept of how your computer connects to the internet. When your computer talks to other computers on the net it does so by opening a "channel" or "port". This is a confusing term because in the old days we used to have things like printer ports which was a real connection from a computer to a device. A "port" in this context is a virtual thing. It doesn't exist in hardware. It's a software concept. There are 65536 possible channels or ports that a software program running on your computer can use to communicate to the internet. When a program needs to talk to other computers on the internet it will open a port to communicate. Unfortunately, badly written programs can leave these ports open and once opened can be used by malware to enter into your system. Hackers look for open ports in the hopes of exploiting their existence. This is extremely common on the internet and is known as "port scanning".

Some ports are reserved for your operating system, the others are used by your applications.

Cod2 for example uses the following ports:

Call of Duty (COD2) Port Range

Call of Duty CD Key Validation (UDP) Port 20500
Call of Duty Master Server Monitoring / Browser (UDP) 20510
Call of Duty Master (UDP) Port 28960

The status of any port can be one of 3 things: OPEN, CLOSED, or STEALTH.

A router, or hardware firewall, automatically will block * or close* any unwanted data coming to you on any port. In addition, you can configure your hardware to STEALTH any of your ports. That is, your ports are made invisible to the outside world. No one knows you are even there. That is how you want to configure your firewall.

There are many sites that will allow you to determine what others can see on your computer. These sites will test your ports and detect whether you have any vulnerabilities.

This is my favorite site (www.grc.com): SHIELDS UP

Click on proceed and then when the Shields up site pops up, scroll to "Shields UP services"and click on any of the buttons there to test out your protection.

This is what you should see if you click on the File Sharing button for example:

If it says anything else, you may be at risk. More about what you can do about this in a future article.

Routers thus are excellent protection against worms and can defend against hackers who can remotely install spyware on your computer.

However there is still a risk from viruses; that is, viruses that can cross the firewall. Once they cross they can infect all the machines on your side of that wall.

One way for them to cross is for you to download executable programs (those with suffixes that end in *.exe for example) that have viruses. So be careful what you download.

Email is a typical way for viruses to cross the firewall because routers or firewalls allow email to cross over. If there are any attachments on those emails and you the user opens an infected attachment, whammo, you are infected - even though you had a firewall. Getting back to the changes you must make to your behavior, here are a few of the behavioral modifications you'll need to make:

3. EMAIL

Don't send or open email attachments except when you know for sure that they are safe - which is something very difficult to determine.

• Don't trust the icons of attachment files. Worms often send executable files which have an icon resembling icons of picture, text or archive files - to fool the user.
• Configure Windows to always show file extensions. This makes it more difficult to for a harmful file (such as an EXE or VBS) to masquerade as a harmless file (such as TXT or JPG).
  
• Never open e-mail attachments with the file extensions VBS, SHS or PIF. These extensions are almost never used in normal attachments but they are frequently used by viruses and worms.
  
• Never open attachments with double file extensions such as NAME.BMP.EXE or NAME.TXT.VBS.
  
• When you receive e-mail advertisements or other unsolicited e-mail, do not open attachments in them or follow web links quoted in them. In fact it's best to turn off the HTML scripting in email.

4. SURFING

Be careful when you surf the net. If you tend to surf randomly, and most of us do, make sure you run anti-virus software. Don't download programs and run them unless you know they are safe.

• Don't accept attachments from strangers in online chat systems such as IRC, ICQ, XFIRE, Ventrilo, Teamspeak or MSN Messenger.
  
• Avoid downloading files from public newsgroups (Usenet news) or peer-to-peer services (Limewire). These are often used by virus writers to distribute their new viruses.
• Do not share your folders with other users unless necessary. If you do, make sure you do not share your full drive or your Windows directory.
• Disconnect your network or modem cable when you're not using your computer - or just power it down.

You're busted, punk!

As mentioned in the first few editions of BASH, Call of Duty 2 uses Evenbalance's Punkbuster technology to prevent players fraudulently gaining the upper hand during online games. Servers are trying to combat continued cheating by tightening up Punkbuster settings, so this is a good time to learn a bit more about this great technology.

The addition of Punkbuster, at Cod2 patch 1.2, has definitely stemmed the tide of cheating - although it did not stop it - and it gave the cheaters something to think about: a global ban! Yes, hackers and cheaters can be prevented from playing CoD2 on any Punkbuster enabled server. Violators are written onto a master ban list (MBL).

The following is taken from a Punkbuster press release on planetcallofduty.com

1) Cheaters detected by Punkbuster software from all of our admin member servers, are collected, sorted and updated to the Master Ban List (MBL) automatically.
2) Your server's ban list is automatically updated and kept current with our automated download feature at a time and period of your choosing. A cheater caught today will not be playing within hours on all servers using the MBL, Period!
3) The Auto-MBL FTP updating software is available for both Windows and Linux-based servers. (Or update manually, if the auto-updating feature is not possible with your server operation directly).
4) Screen shot MD5 checksums and timestamp are automatically stored in our repository, so that there will never again be a doubt as to the authenticity of a PB screen shot. It eliminates accusations of fake screen shots. PunksBusted's repository will verify it's integrity without question.

As mentioned in Episode 3 of BASH, PB does seem to create annoying lag spikes when it attempts to call home as it reports on how honest a player you are. These spikes can be reduced as follows:

To modify the number of times punk buster calls home create the following file, pbcl.cfg in the following subdirectory.

C:\Program Files\Activision\Call of Duty 2\pb

Use Wordpad (Windows OS) and copy the commands I've typed below.
There are 5 lines in total you have to include in this file.

pb_sleep 500
PB_SsLog 1
PB_SsSave 0
pb_LogToFile 0
pb_logmd5tool 1

The above settings are suggested in Evenbalance's Tech Support link:

PB Tech Support

If you are having problems with PB - you have been kicked off servers but you've not done anything wrong, you might try checking if you have the current version of the code. Sometimes, if the download is interrupted the software might get corrupted or not updated properly. You can upgrade manually here:

PB Download Files

these files have to be installed manually, if you do not think you are up to the task you can try downloading the manual installer:

PBSetup

The Punkbuster Player Manual is a must read here is a link:

PB Player Manual


The latest versions of Punkbuster allows player variable monitoring. From the Punkbuster Server-side Manual we have this definition:

PunkBuster provides the ability for Server Admins to specify a list of acceptable player cvar value ranges while playing on the Game Server. When each player connects to a PB-Enabled Server, the PB Client will download the list of acceptable cvar ranges from the PB Server and will check all of the player's cvars for compliance. The player is warned about any cvars that are unacceptable to the Game Server. The player then will have a few seconds to make any necessary corrections before the PB Server will begin methodically and regularly checking that player's cvars against the list of acceptable ranges. If a player is found to have a cvar that is outside the acceptable range for that cvar, then that player will be removed from the game immediately.

Just recently I found myself with a problem when logging into a server that had tightened up it's cvar policy. I was booted from the server due to a "cvar com_maxfps=0" issue. This "tweak" has been known for sometime and has never been considered a cheat. This variable can be set from [0 - 1000] - It determines the maximum frames per second (fps) possible. If set to 0, it disables the framerate cap. Any value higher than 0 though, caps your FPS to that level. The main reason to use this command would be to smooth framerate fluctuation, as framerate spikes can cause jerky gameplay.

In my opinion, this tweak is a known quantity in the gaming community and should not be considered illegal; however, the server wanted to standardize player variables for competition reasons and thus used PB to enforce their regulations.

I quickly modified the cvar (client variable) by editing the file in which it is found:

Program Files/Activision/Call of Duty 2/Main/Players/"Your name"/config_mp.cfg file.

I simply opened the file and re-wrote the variable to "cvar com_maxfps=85" which rectified the issue. Here is more information on PB's cvar monitoring:

Why do I get messages on some servers telling me that I have cvar violations and what should I do about it?

A cvar is a game setting. Cvars can be used to customize the game, but cheaters sometimes abuse cvars to exploit holes or bugs in the game in order to cheat. Admins of PunkBuster Servers have the ability to add specific recurring checks for players' cvar values during gameplay. If you have downloaded or written game scripts to automate tasks, then those scripts almost certainly will add and/or change cvars in your system. You will receive a warning if a cvar on your system is not in the range allowed by the Admin of the Game Server to which you are currently connected - the warning will also include the allowed range of values for the specified cvar. If you do not heed the warning, then after a few seconds or minutes, the PunkBuster Server will raise a violation and remove you from the Game Server. To change the current value of any cvar, press the tilde (~) key to bring down the game console, and then type the cvarname followed by a space and the new value, then press the Tab key and then the Enter key. For example, entering "cg_shadows 0" as a command will set your cg_shadows cvar to the value of 0. The Game automatically saves most cvar changes so that the next time you play, any changes from a previous session will still be in effect. You may request a list of all checked cvar rangess from the server using the "pb_cvarlist" command. You will see all checked cvars, the allowed ranges and also any of your cvars that are currently set outside the allowed ranges.

CVAR VIOLATIONS REFERENCE LIST

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Here is a list of Cvar violations and there numbered catagories:

Remember not all violations are hacks or cheats,

Technical Violations: (Resolution: Reinstall PunkBuster from the latest game update patch)
#101 - Communication Failure
#102 - Communication Failure
#131 - Initialization Failure
#132 - Protocol Error
#141 - Distress (This indicates a problem trying to update to the latest version of PunkBuster - it may indicate a problem reaching one of our Internet-based Master PB Servers which can be caused by firewalls, router problems, etc.)

Miscellaneous Violations:
#111 - Bad Name (Resolution: Change player name or play on a different server)
#112 - Too Many Bad Names
#113 - Too Many Name Changes (Designed to eliminate name change spamming)
#114 - Protected Name (Resolution: Change player name or play on a different server)
#121 - Negative Score Too Low (usually from Killing Teammates)
#151 - Extended ASCII Characters in Player Name (Resolution: use regular letters, numbers and symbols in the player name or play on a different server)
#9001 - CVAR value failed range check (see the FAQ for more info)

Integrity Violations:
When PunkBuster is unable to verify that a player's gaming environment is functioning properly and/or has not been alterred, an Integrity violation is raised. This also involves the detection of modified game or PunkBuster files. These violation numbers are between 10000 and 29999.

Cheat/Hack Violations:
When PunkBuster detects a cheat or hack by repeated positive identification on a player's computer, a violation is raised. These violation numbers are 50000 and higher. Families of cheats are listed below. Resolution: Remove cheats and hacks from the computer.

I have included some links to videos showing what the hacks look like. Click on the links.

#50000s - Aimbot
#60000s - Wallhack
#70000s - Multihack
#80000s - Gamehack
#90000s - 'Cheat' Video Drivers
#100000s - Speedhack
#110000s - Autofire
#120000s - Game Hook
#130000s - Attempted PunkBuster Hack

Also see:

Tweaks

What's your reaction to this?

Here at BASH we have talked quite a lot about tweaking your system to maximize the speed of both your computer and your Internet connection so as to get an advantage when playing Call of Duty on line.

One thing we have not talked about is the last and probably most important interface to COD ... you!

You could be set up on a multi-threaded, multi-CPU computer with an overclocked video card and plugged into a T1 line, but if you are inattentive, tired, ill or simply untrained to respond to stimuli, you probably will find yourself constantly losing when you go up against a fresher opponent.

The best measure of this performance parameter is player Reaction Time.

What is Reaction Time?

It's the time it takes for the player to respond to a stimuli. In the case of COD, the stimuli is typically the sight of an opponent player, an immediate threat - or opportunity.

You can measure it here:

Why do some people have lower or higher Reaction Times than others?

Well it has to do with your own internal wiring.

Some of this wiring is set in your nervous system (hard-wired so to speak). Your nervous system is divided into two, with a central nervous system (brain and spinal cord) and a peripheral nervous system (all the nerves that deliver signals to the spinal cord). Both parts are at work here.

First, the nervous system must recognize a stimulus (an opponent with an MP44 for example), then neurons (cells in the nervous system) relay the message to the brain, muscles and other nerves.

Then, the peripheral nerves comes into play: the message travels from the brain to the spinal cord and is finally delivered to your hand. The motor neurons tell the muscles in your fingers to fire your weapon.

Clearly, the speed of the signals making their way through all these paths varies from individual to individual.

For about 120 years, it has been accepted that the average Reaction Time for a college age individual is about 190 ms (0.19 sec) if the stimuli is visual or 160 ms for a sound stimulus.




A learned skill?

The interesting thing about reaction time is that it apparently is a learned skill. Here is an article from Reuters news service, quoting the respected Acta Psychologica which reports that gamers are able scan their environment and acquire a target more quickly then their non-gaming peers.

"Video game players may spend a lot of time on the couch, but when they're ready to go out they can find their keys quicker than the rest of us, a study suggests. Researchers found that gamers who devote much of their free time to Grand Theft Auto and Super Mario may be able to scan their environment and spot the target of their search more quickly than non-gamers can. In experiments with college students who were either hard-core video game players or novices, the researchers found that players were quicker to detect target objects on a busy computer screen than their peers were." July '05

The good news is that we might be able to improve our reaction times!

In an article by R.J. Kosinski from Clemson University titled: A Literature Review on Reaction Time, Kosinski summarizes what affects Reaction Times:


Men vs. Women

Scientists have shown that in almost every age group, males have faster reaction times than females. In one study, the average response time to press a key in response to a light flashing "on" was 220 msec for males and a whopping 260 msec for females.

In response to sound, the difference was 190 msec (males) and 200 msec (females).

Tests done last year indicate that the gap is shrinking compared to tests done in the 70's. This may be due to the fact that more women are becoming involved in sports or gaming and they are training themselves to react faster.

The difference in the times is primarily accounted for by the lag between the presentation of the stimulus and the beginning of muscle contraction. Note that muscle contraction times were the same for males and females. Clearly men and women are wired differently.

Interestingly, dehydration caused a longer reaction time for women but a shorter reaction time in men!

Also, it was found that while men reacted faster, the women were more accurate.

Young vs. Old

Reaction time shortens from birth into the late 20s and then increases slowly until the 50s and 60s. It then gets much slower rapidly as the person gets into their 70s and beyond.


Intensity

The stronger the stimulus, the faster the reaction time! This is true for both sound and light stimuli.

Arousal

The amount of attention you are paying to what is going on will affect your reaction time. So will the amount of tension in your muscles. Reaction time is fastest with an intermediate level of arousal, and drops when you are either too relaxed or too tense.

Left vs. right hand.

It is known that the left and right side of the brain are specialized for different tasks. The left side is regarded as the part of the brain that specializes in logic and speech. The right side govern creativity and can deal with three dimensional spatial problems.

The right brain hemisphere controls the left hand, and the left hemisphere controls the right.

For this reason, scientists think that the left hand should be faster at reaction times involving spatial relationships (such as pointing at a target).

Tests have shown this to be correct.

Left-handed people were faster than right-handed people when the test involved the left hand, but there was no difference between the reaction times of the right and left handers when using the right hand. That is, left-handed people have an inherent reaction time advantage.

Right-handed people are faster with their right hand over their left, but left-handed people are equally fast with both hands.

Direct vs. Peripheral Vision

The fastest reaction time comes when a stimulus is seen by the cones in the eye (that is, when the person is looking right at the stimulus). If the stimulus is picked up by rods (around the edge of the eye), the reaction is slower.

Practice

Studies show that reaction times decrease with practice.

Fatigue

Reaction time gets slower when the subject is tired. Mental fatigue, especially sleepiness, has the greatest effect. Muscular fatigue does not increase reaction time.

Fasting

Eating or fasting does not affect reaction time.

Distraction

Studies show that distractions increase reaction time. Background noise lengthens reaction time by inhibiting parts of the cerebral cortex.

The reaction time to sound stimuli seems more susceptible to distraction than response to visual stimuli.

Warnings of Impending Stimuli

Reaction times are faster when the subject is warned that a stimulus will arrive soon. A great reason to use the HUD on your screen more often.

Alcohol

Tests have shown that females who drink one to six cans of beer did not suffer delayed reaction times the next morning, although they made more errors on a choice reaction time task.

Subjects who had drunk an impairing dose of alcohol reacted faster when they were warned that this was enough alcohol to slow their reaction time. Unwarned subjects who drank suffered more decreased reaction times. However, the warned subjects were also less inhibited and careful in their responses.

Even subjects who drank some nonalcoholic beverage and then were warned (falsely) about impairment by alcohol reacted faster than unwarned subjects who drank the same beverage.

Breathing Cycle

Reaction time is faster when the stimulus occurs when you breathe out than when you breathe in.

Personality Type

Extroverts have faster reaction times than introverts.

Exercise

Physically fit subjects had faster reaction times. Subjects had the fastest reaction times when they were exercising sufficiently to produce a heart rate of 115 beats per minute. The effect only seems to occur while you are exercising - not afterward.

Punishment and Stress

Shocking a subject when they react slowly shortens reaction time. For example, scientists have found that soldiers told that they were deploying to Iraq caused them to have shorter reaction times.

Stimulant Drugs

Caffeine has often been studied in connection with reaction time. Moderate doses of caffeine decreased the time it took subjects to find a target stimulus and to prepare a response for a complex reaction time task. The amount of caffeine in one cup of coffee reduces reaction time and increases the ability to resist distraction, and it does so within minutes after you drink it.

Intelligence

Among people of normal intelligence, there is a slight tendency for more intelligent people to have faster reaction times, but there is much variation between people of similar intelligence.

Conclusions:

Here is a summary of ways to improve your reaction time:

Tense your body - but not too much and keep up your heart-rate.

Ideally have sex while you are playing (who said gaming is a lonely hobby?) because you'll be aroused and your heart should be pounding faster - both decrease reaction times.

Apparently you can do drugs or drink to the point of impairment - but just make sure someone tells you that you're reaction times will suffer as this will apparently actually decrease your reaction time! (We're kidding about taking drugs, or drinking - remember kids, just say no).

Play dehydrated if you are a man or drink plenty of water if you're a woman.

Get plenty of rest.

Crank up the sound as you react faster to sound than what you see on the screen.

When you are getting ready to enter into a fire-fight, breathe out.

Let me console you

This post is for those of you who have never used the in-game console in COD2. You have undoubtedly heard about it, but probably thought it too difficult to mess with.

Well let's try and give you some examples on its use and we'll see if you get the hang of it.

NOTE that all the modifications you do here will be lost as soon as you quit your COD2 session. To remember these changes you will need to modify your player configuration file. We will discuss that in a later post.

This will be the first post in a series, I'll be labeling these under "tweaking" so that you can find them. There's not much here that you cannot find on the net; however, I hope that I can explain some of these things so that even the most non-technical of you will be able to understand.

The Console

The console is a program that runs when you are running COD2 in multiplayer mode. It let's you change your game configuration, monitor your framerate, check your download/upload speed, even connect to a different server.

This is all heady stuff, unfortunately, the user interface consists of typing text comments (direct entry) and is not at all intuitive. For that reasons, many players ignore the Console. Hopefully, after you have read this, you won't as it can be quite useful.

To enter into "Console" mode, when in COD2 and logged into a server, you must first type the tilde symbol: ~

Console Commands

Now that you are in Console mode, here are some of the things you can do:

1. Change your name

Let's say you decide that you would like to change your current screen name from Jock Yitch to Cap'n America (may he rest in peace). Then, type the following (after entering into Console mode).

/name CapnAmerica

Colors in your screen name are all the rage, you can add colors in this command by simply using the caret symbol (^) as follows:

/name ^3CapnAmerica

This command will make CapnAmerica yellow - which was just the opposite of his character. Poor, brave Cap (RIP).

2. Connect to another server

If you decide to connect to another server, mid match, bring up the Console mode and use the /connect command. This allows you to manually connect to other servers without having to back out into the COD2 server menu screen. Here's an example. Say you are in a server and your clan tells you there is a scrimmage at 181.12.1.300. You can quickly head there by typing the following in Console mode:

/connect 181.12.1.300

If that server is password protected (for example, say the password is "scrim") then use the password command THEN connect to the server as follows:

/password scrim
/connect 181.12.1.300

The password must be set before connecting.

3. Frame rate check

How many frames are being drawn on your screen? Well this is an important question as it really affects your gameplay. Although there are many factors in this equation, your in-game reaction times will be better the faster your framerate is.

When in Console mode, use the /cg_drawfps command to have COD2 tell you your framerate. The following sets the framerate display on:

/cg_drawfps 1

This sets it off

/cg_drawfps 0

The framerate is in frames per second (fps). Tweak your system to keep that number above approximately 60 fps and you will be doing well. Let it fall into the 30-50's and you will notice perceptive lagging.

4. Game Lag

We will be discussing lag in another post, in the meantime you can see if you or the server is causing your gameplay to slow by using the /cg_lagometer command. Turn the lagometer on by typing:

/cg_lagometer 1

Turn it off by typing:

/cg_lagometer 0

You will see two graphs on the right side of your screen. We'll talk extensively about the lagometer in a future post. For now, the bottom graph is roughly representative of your ping. The lower the green line on this graph, the lower your ping. Red lines mean dropped packets.

The top graph is a measure of your graphics card. Video performance can be affected by ping - but not the reverse. If you have a connection interruption, or are dropping packets, or your ping goes high, you will likely see the top graph go up as well.

5. Recording mode

To record your play in the game, you can set COD2 to save your game like you were using a VCR. This is done with the /record command. The following example labels the name of the file "game1":

/record game1

You can use this feature for training purposes, demos, bragging rights, or even to catch cheaters! Remember, if you don't use a name for record mode - COD2 simply gives you a default name. If you look at the bottom left of your screen you will now see a "game1 xxK" title - this means you are recording! Use the following command to stop recording:

/stoprecord

To play what you have recorded back, use:

/demo game1

6. Binds

You can set "binds" in Console mode. For example if you want to set the "[" and the "]" keys to turn off/on the framerate viewer, you can type the following commands while in Command mode:

/bind [ "cg_drawfps 0"
/bind ] "cg_drawfps 1"

The keys will be "mapped" for the current session only. The bind will be lost the next time you log in. A better way to always have these commands set is to add them to your configuration file. We showed how to do this this earlier, in the post "A brighter day in COD2". A future post will show you how to permanently bind the above commands onto your keyboard.


Related posts:

A brighter day in COD2