LAN Party is the first and only book to tap into the growing popularity of LAN parties-literally thousands gather each and every week across the country to duke it out, computer to computer, playing games like Quake, Diablo, and others
Players are tired of the slow response of playing games over the Internet, and are gathering in garages, basements, and even large convention centers to play their favorite games head to head
Throwing a LAN party is not as easy as it might sound, but author William 'The Ferret' Steinmetz knows all the tricks, from setting up PCs to blocking cheaters, managing power drain, and debugging the network
No matter if the party is with a few friends, the whole neighborhood, or a large convention, LAN Party will transport the reader to gaming nirvana
Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
Rating: - Good book, Networking portions need technical reviewing
This is an excellent book overall. One of the core problems that I see with the book is it's take on networking. It has a tendency to give misleading descriptions of certain topics. The demonstration of making cat5 cable has one of the ugliest cables I've ever seen.
Discussion of managed switches and VLANs as an alternative to routing? VLANs create virtual lan segments. In order to connect VLANs you need a router. For large scale LAN parties the only benefit you'd obtain with VLANs ... Read More
Rating: - Good
Overall, not a bad book.
Does an excellent job of compiling all the "arcane" knowledge of how to plan for a LAN Party. Goes into some of the specifics of IP configurations, etc but leaves the reader hanging dry when it comes to managed switches and routers. I believe that the writer would have at least recommended some other books on the subject or maybe some online references.
There are some very useful tips on how to keep your LAN Party guests entertained and I am sure to utilize them on ... Read More
Rating: - Documents a subculture
The amazing continuation of Moore's Law for cpus and memory and of Metcalfe's Law for bandwidth has reworked entire industries and led to phenomena like outsourcing. But within the developed countries, it has spawned a subculture of twitch computer gaming. It has elements of the video arcades, post-1979 Space Invaders. But those were usually single player games, or turn-based two player games.
Now Steinmetz writes for so-called LAN Parties. The book has a lot of gritty hardware and software ... Read More
Rating: - Who said computer gaming didn't require social skills?
As someone who has hosted a number of LAN parties, I found the book to be very helpful for the seasoned hosts as well the first time host.
The book is well written and organized to allow readers to quickly find information that is pertinent to their plans. It covers all aspects of setting up a LAN Party from the small friendly gathering to a large professional event. It covers all of the technical aspects as well as all of the social and logistic issues that each type of LAN Party must deal ... Read More
Rating: - An excellent guide to making it all work
Yeah, I've hooked a few PCs together to go head-to-head with buddies, but getting more than that organized? No chance. We've talked about it, but who wanted to do the legwork? Now, the legwork's done. This book covers everything, from putting it together to making a big party work. There's security information and stuff we just wouldn't have thought about. We're getting ready to set up a frag fest, thanks to this book. Awesome!
- Good book, Networking portions need technical reviewing
- Who said computer gaming didn't require social skills?
