As of this year Iceland now has direct internet connectivity with New York where as previously it had connectivity only via Denmark, UK and Canada... Who cares?

Well.... there is now also a VPS Provider who will host cheap Linux virtual servers suitable for Quakeworld and qwfwd in Iceland. Based on the new connectivity and location of Iceland it may be a great location to put up some QW servers to lower the ping difference for North American and European QW matches.

The only downside? By having a qwfwd in Iceland with direct Canadian and Danish routing there is a good possibility that BloodDog might get a lower ping to Europe.

The VPS provider in question offers a free temporary 4-hour server to test their servers/routing and I would like to take advantage of this. I would need a Canadian and an American for testing to quickly setup a server and then test pings within a 4-hour window. Who is interested?

(Edited 2014-06-03, 11:53)

Newfoundland Canada to Iceland is 1,764 mi and Iceland to Denmark is 1,123 mi

Newfoundland Canada to London is 2,438 mi
New York to Iceland is 2,706 mi
New York to London is 3,458 mi

There really is a huge potential here. Iceland is is around 700miles (which is over 1000km) closer to both New York and Canada than London.

(Sorry for the use of miles for distance, that is just what google gave me)

Hmm, interesting... If this works it could actually be a super good idea. Perhaps a proxy that every NA player would use.

I'm not in a position to try these things out, so perhaps someone (perhaps you dirtbox? ) might take the opportunity and test this stuff! Gogogo!

That's excellent idea dirtbox. I'd love to try my ping on non-eu servers using your fwds

I have purchased a server in Iceland for 1 month for 6 euros. From Amsterdam the (real) ping is 45ms. Unfortunately not able to test via America.

The problem, i suspect, will be that most people route via London to Iceland from America. As Canada is located closer to Iceland we may need a qwfwd there also.

This sounds great. Check out the routings and pings from the states to your vps with a looking glass:

http://www.hostvirtual.com/lg
http://ny.lg.cloudshards.net/

Already a step ahead of you... from Amsterdam 45ms but from the 2 hosts in New York I tried, both unfortunately went via London.

I also had a guy in Canada ping the servers and it also went via London

Cloudshards goes New York > Amsterdam > Iceland and hostvirtual also appears to go via Europe first

bugger

wonder if the USA to Iceland cable is up and running?

OK - So perhaps the VPS I signed up for isn't any good but there appears to be about 10 options for server hosting in iceland: http://www.exoticvps.com/

Bad news..... The NewYork-Iceland link won't be up until the end of the year:

http://www.emeraldnetworks.com/wp-content/files_mf/1386630220_magicfields_link_pdf_1_1.html

But that doesn't mean it isn't possible. There is still already existing connectivity to Iceland from Newfoundland in Canada... We just have to find a VPS host which utilises it...

Worse news - Iceland's connectivity to Canada in actual fact isn't direct. It goes via Greenland which connects to Canada.

If we could find a VPS provider in Greenland then this could be a solution but until the end of the year it means that Iceland is off the cards.

Do you think there will be a VPS provider in Greenland when there's only 50 k inhabitants ? (that would be a good place to host servers though, no cooling problem)

Right now there is no cooling problem... but their ice is melting fast.

Servers ready for testing:

is.besmella.com:28501
is.besmella.com:28502

Some QTV and qwfwd there too

There is a company setting up a direct link from NYC to Iceland which is what prompted me to re-raise this idea. Unfortunately it won't be live until later in the year. We can try again then. http://www.emeraldnetworks.com/system-map/.

We are working on some more ideas too... Servers in Hawaii and New Zealand for games between AU/NZ and North America.... Servers in Miami for games between North America/Brasil and Portugal

The Iceland server project/dream is officially dead.

The cable which was supposedly being built from New York to Iceland that kept being delayed appears now to have been cancelled entirely. The cable no longer appears on the Submarine Cable Map and the website of the company who was building the cable no longer exists.

R.I.P NA-vs-EU games on equal ping.

Meh

Thanks for your effort on this project and the update.

Around 2004(?) there was a server in Iceland that we played some games with NA players (mostly from clan Fired Bronx/Blakbeard/Squeeze/Thumpa etc). Bronx or Blakbeard pinged about 65-77 from what I remember. There was definitely a route from NA to Iceland that didn't go via UK/DK back then.

i volunteer to dig a cable np

http://www.submarinecablemap.com/#/submarine-cable/greenland-connect

^^^ this is the only cable that goes from North America to Iceland... it isn't really direct. There was a new one in the works that went direct from NYC to Iceland but it was cancelled.