Setup for large tournament

[kamranki]

Hello everyone,

I'll keep it brief. My company is setting up local Counter-Strike tournaments (LAN). We have 20 cleint PCs (running Windows VISTA Home Premium) in total. The organizers have insisted that they need to conduct two matches at one time. They have provided us with 4 large plasma screens for HLTV broadcasts i.e. 2 screens per 1 match.

As I understand, this is how all should be set up:

Client PCs = Windows VISTA Home Premium x20
Server PCs = Windows XP Professional x2
HLTV Servers = Windows XP Professional x2
PCs connected to plasma screens = Windows XP Professional x2

As you can see, I would need 6 PCs for conducting and broadcasting 2 matches at once; 2 game servers, 2 HLTV servers and 2 PCs that connect to the HLTV servers respectively and display the matches on plasma screens.

Is there something else that I'm missing? Or is it possible to reduce the number of PCs required for hosting maches and broadcasting?

Thank you for taking time to read this. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,

Kamran

[Mr.Bob]

You could probably get away with one good computer hosting both matches at once. Also why would you need a HLTV server? That's built into the server/mods, as far as I know, so you just need a viewing computer per match. There, you're down 3 servers.

" The core of the HLTV broadcasting system is the HLTV server, also called
HLTV proxy. The HLTV executable is a console application that works much
like a HL dedicated server. To broadcast a game running on a certain game
server, the HLTV proxy connects to this server just like a normal player.
Spectators connect themselves to the HLTV proxy and the game data stream is
relayed through the HLTV proxy to all connected spectator clients. The next
figure shows a basic HLTV configuration:

HL Game Server -> HLTV Proxy => Spectator Clients

The number of clients that one HLTV proxy can serve depends on available
hardware and network resources. Theoretically, a single proxy can hold a
maximum of 255 spectator clients. But be careful, even a proxy with 100
spectator clients needs a full 2 MBit line to run smoothly. If more
spectator slots are needed, the required network load must be distributed
over multiple HLTV proxies.

The first HLTV proxy connected to the game server is called the Master
proxy, which sets the general broadcast settings like game stream delay or
packet rate. All other HLTV proxies linked to this proxy are the Relay
proxies. Their total number and link order is not restricted, they may form
a chain or tree of proxies. Most important is that their location is in
different networks to ensure a balanced bandwidth usage.

-> HLTV Relay Proxy 1 => Spectator Clients
HL Game Server -> HLTV Master -> HLTV Relay Proxy 2 => Spectator Clients
-> HLTV Relay Proxy 3 => Spectator Clients

4. Broadcasting Games
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Let's assume the most simple configuration, a single HLTV proxy in a LAN
environment. This is a very common situation and the default HLTV settings
doesn't need to be changed. Choose a dedicated computer as your HLTV proxy
and install the Half-Life Dedicated Server, which also includes all files
needed by a HLTV proxy. This isn't needed if Half-Life is already
installed.

Start the HLTV application (HL icon with a small camera) and the HLTV
console will open, showing some initialization messages (if that takes a
long time, HLTV maybe can't resolve some IP addresses, then start HLTV
with the '-nodns' command line option). Then the console is ready to accept
your commands, here we use '>' as the console prompt. First give your HLTV
proxy an unique name:

>name "My HLTV Proxy"

Let's assume you have started the proxy on host 192.168.1.2 and the game
server, you want to spectate is running on host 192.168.1.3:27015. Then
connect the HLTV proxy to this game server by typing:

>connect 192.168.1.3:27015

After a few seconds HLTV will be fully connected and ready to serve
spectator clients. Use the 'status' command to verify that the HLTV proxy
has connected properly :

>status
--- HLTV Status ---
Online 00:23, FPS 79.0, Version 2435 (Win32)
Local IP 192.168.1.2:27020, Network In 1.7, Out 1.0, Loss 0.00
Local Slots 128, Spectators 0, Proxies 0
Total Slots 128, Spectators 0, Proxies 1
Source Game Server 192.168.1.3:27015, Delay 30
Server Name "Half-Life dedicated server"
Time 01:35, Game "valve", Map "maps/rapidcore.bsp", Players 1

The 'status' command shows your own IP address, HLTV system cycles per
second, total incoming and outgoing network traffic in kB/sec. Local slot
and spectator numbers your HLTV proxy is providing, total numbers are the
sum of all slots & spectators on all proxies broadcasting this game. The
game source can be a game server, another HLTV proxy or a demo file."

Right out of my HLTV Read Me file.

[kamranki]

Hello,

Thanks for your reply. I forgot to mention earlier that we would be running Counter-Strike 1.6. And current update from Valve has dedicated server broken for CS 1.6. They have suggested me to run Listen Server. Hence, the need for two separate PCs. But even if I'm able to run dedicated server somehow, how do I run two instances of it on the same machine? Because the IP would be same, would I be needing to run both servers on different ports?

As for running HLTV, I tried running HLTV on the same machine as the server (and connectied it to the Listen Server) but the clients are unable to see the HLTV broadcast in LAN server browser. Is it because the HLTV is connecting to the Listen Server? The example from HLTV documentation shows dedicated server and HLTV running on two different machines.

Thanks again.

Regards,

Kamran

[Mr.Bob]

With 1.6 and older version you can set different ports, which means you can run servers on ip: 1.1.1.1:27015 and 1.1.1.1:27020. Then you may need a seperate server for HLTV, IDK, never ran it, that's why I posted the read me file sections. I would suggest waiting for more info or try to google it if it's something you need right now. I also don't see why you have to have Listen servers. Make sure you have the legal copies of CS 1.6 from Steam and you'll get the Dedicated Server with it. That will allow you to run all of this on one server.

[kamranki]

Thanks Mr. Bob! I followed your instructions and was able to get 2 servers running on 1 machine. I did the same for HLTV servers.

Appreciate your kind response. Thank you.

[Mr.Bob]

No prob, good luck with the turney.