Skyrim

Nexus server upgrades and increased download speed cap

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Over the past month Axel and I have been secretly working away on a side project to upgrade and improve our file server infrastructure, primarily to make us future proof and increase the storage capacity of all our file servers, but also to ensure we have more than enough bandwidth to go around.

If you're particularly astute, you may have noticed that some servers have gone missing from the server selection window for days or even weeks at a time, and new servers have cropped up (for instance we now have 2 servers in Washington DC, and 2 servers in London). We've been taking down servers for upgrades and putting up new ones to bolster the ranks. And the reason? We're now pushing over 1.8Gbit of traffic a second across our network. Here's some maths:

1.8Gbit a second = 230 MegaBytes a second
230MB x 60 = 13.8 GigaBytes a minute
12.8GB x 60 = 828GB an hour
828GB x 24 = 19.9 TeraBytes a day
19.9TB x 30 = 597TB a month

Impressive stuff.

Our upgrades are now complete and a direct result of these upgrades is that I am going to be doubling the speed cap on downloads for normal members from 500kb/sec to 1MB/sec. This will apply to both "manual" downloads and downloads through the Nexus Mod Manager. Expect this to happen some time next week.

We're very close to announcing the new site code going in to beta (any hour/day now!), which is something I've alluded to recently in the news and my recent State of the Union video blog. The beta and subsequent roll-out of this code is the spring-board for us to roll out a host of additional features and upgrades for the sites, so this is a really exciting time for us.

Axel is currently working on a new download mechanism for manual downloads that will do away with the server selection window and provide you with the best file server for downloading at the time. It should save you a few clicks and a bit of waiting around for your download to start. But more on that later.

Keep your eye out for the beta announcement as we're hoping as many of your as possible will take some time out of your busy schedule to make sure the sites are as bug free as possible before we go live. I want no complaints if we roll out the new code and things you use are broken because you didn't help us beta test!

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  1. Fhaarkas
    Fhaarkas
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    New site code. Exciting.
  2. thunder1234567890
    thunder1234567890
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    You guys are doing an awsome work ! Long live the Nexus !
  3. AxelDominatoR
    AxelDominatoR
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    I'd like to see more than 10 screens worth of latest files.


    Wrote it down in todo list, it will be changed to address the problem as soon as we change the new search/listing mechanism. <img class=">
  4. AxelDominatoR
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    Y U NO use P2P with HTTP peer?


    It has been proposed and is currently in the todo list for evaluation. We will work on it as soon as some other very important things are finished.
  5. AxelDominatoR
    AxelDominatoR
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    So I hope you still give us the option to pick a server.


    You will be able to choose your favourite server <img class=">
  6. Deux89
    Deux89
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    Awesome stuff!
  7. Natterforme
    Natterforme
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    This is great news! Doubled download speeds for all normal users! I dont really mind the amount of time it normally takes to download mods, mainly because it doesnt usually take that long to begin with, but also because it is free so I have no reason to complain. Thank you Dark0ne and Axel!

    -Natterforme
  8. mook1022
    mook1022
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    Amazing work guys keep up the awesomness that are The Nexus Sites!!!

    Congrats on all your accomplishments with these sites!!!
  9. FierceSlayer
    FierceSlayer
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    This is great news! Keep up the awesome work guys.
  10. meteor71
    meteor71
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    I'd like to see more than 10 screens worth of "latest files". As many submissions as have been posted here since the release of the Creation Kit, all ten available screens can easily fill up with new submissions in less than a day which in turn means that if I only check what's new once a day, I miss some new submissions.