Today we are going to take a quick look at how a server admin is able to set the tickrate and server side FPS rate on a Counter-Strike: Source game server.

This guide will work on most all Valve games, such as DOD:S, TF2, etc. as long as they are running the source or orange box engine. This guide does not apply to the order games like Counter-Strike 1.6 & Day Of Defeat Original.

-Tickrate

The first thing we will look at is setting the tickrate of the server. This is best set in the commandline therefore not allowing to be overridden in the server config file.

You will need to add the following to your commandline:

The number 66 will be just a place holder for the moment, we will explain below what the valid options are.

The -tickrate command can has numerous values in place of the "66″ with have listed above. The most common and suggest values at "33″, "66″, or "100″ (Without the quotes). It will depend what you are running and the slot count you plan to use the server for. Most times you will want to stick on the 66 tick level, as it is what I would call the "normal" value.

However, if you are playing in competitions, you may be required to use a 100 for the tickrate value.

Note: We will not be getting into the debate on what is better, only showing how a server admin is able to set the tickrate, so please don't make a reply asking which is better or start a flame war on how this is better than that. Thank you.

When you have set the tickrate of your server via the commandline you will be set to go, even if you are renting out the server to a client, they will not be able to change unless you give them access to the commandline.

-Serverside FPS

Now that we have set the tickrate, we will take a look at how we will set the server side FPS rate. This setting needs to be set via the server.cfg and cannot be locked down in the commandline. So if you plan to limit your clients to a X amount of FPS, you will need to find another way.

With that out of the way, we will need to add the following line to your server.cfg (Or server config file).

Adding this line will tell the server it is allowed to go up to, but no further than 600 FPS on the server side. This value you can set to just about anything depending on what FPS rate you want the server to run at.

Now once you have added this to your server config file, you are set to restart your server and enjoy the new FPS rate. Check the server console window to see what rate you are getting.

Note: If you are not getting the full FPS you were expecting, keep reading!

-FPS Not Working (Windows)

If you are reading this, you have found you are not getting the serverside FPS that you were expecting, so now we will do a little more work to the server.

Note: As I am not a Linux tech, I will only be showing how to get this done on Windows, Linux is much more messy and can require kernal hacking to get the FPS working as desired.

By default, Windows does not support more than about 64FPS without changing the windows clock.

Not to worry, this is a very easy fix!

Solutions:

1. Easiest solution is to open Windows Media Player on the server. You do not need to be playing anything, just open and running.

As soon as you open it, you should see a nice boost to your expected FPS.

2. Second solution is to run an added piece of software on your server machine, called FPS Boost. You can download FPS Boost as an attachment to this post.

All you need to do, is extract it, click it to start it and let it run. Once you start it, you should also see your FPS boost.

There is one more added problem, you will not be able to boost the serverside FPS any higher than about 512 on a windows server 2003 server, if you are wanting to hit 1000FPS you will need to be running Windows Server 2008 and have a motherboard to support it. We will have another guide coming later that will touch specifically on 1000FPS servers.

-The End

This wraps up our tutorial on how to get Counter-Strike: Source up and running on non-default tickrate & serverside FPS.