VROC: Virtual Racers' Online Connection

Cool Stuff for GPL Racers

Online Leagues

VROC serves as the focus of a thriving internet-based worldwide racing community. Many online GPL racing leagues and clubs host their races on VROC, and most of these use WinVROC Chat to meet before and after races.

See the Online Leagues section on Alison's Site for a discussion of some of the leagues and clubs you can join. See also the Online Leagues and Clubs page for more information about online racing organizations.

"F2" and "F3" Races

See Racing the Trainers for information about joining the "F2" and "F3" races that appear in VROC's race list. You can also join the VROC Formula 2 Club.

Going Faster

See also Alison's Eagle Woman's Grand Prix Legends web site for setups, setup utilities, track guides, and more.

GPL World Rankings

You can compare your best lap times with those of GPL enthusiasts around the world at the GPL World Rankings site. This superb site allows you to compare your skill and proficiency in driving GPL's cars with the achievements of GPL enthusiasts worldwide.

When you upload your own player.ini, the site's software calculates your worldwide ranking and your "handicap". A sophisticated database and custom retrieval software allow you to compare your times with those of thousands of GPL enthusiasts, including world champions like Greger Huttu and Wolfgang Woeger, GPL developers Dave Kaemmer and Randy Cassidy, and even the VROC team!

Setups

Help reduce the carnage and have a lot more fun on VROC by downloading Alison's race setups for the BRM, Coventry and the Murasama!

Some unsolicited comments about Alison's race setups for the Coventry:

"The Coventry setups kept the sim on my hard drive."

"I reckon you've done exactly what was needed here. Beginners the world over may now rejoice!!

"Your setups are an absolute delight to use. Fast, surefooted, and forgiving. Just what the doctor ordered.

"If you know you're not yet in the absolute top rank of sim-racers, what more do you need? Frankly, I see no need to develop my own setups for the time being. Yours will do just fine, thank you very much!!"

"I just wanted to thank you for the tip on your site to try the Coventry. I'm definitely no hot shot racer. Previously I had my best luck with the Brabham. It wasn't the fastest car I tried, but it seemed the easiest to me to drive. My best time at Monza was 1:40:21. I put in your Coventry setup and in less than a half an hour hit 1:39:46 for the first time."

Some comments from readers about Alison's race setups for the Murasama:

"Your Murasama setups are wonderful. I was able to lap consistantly around my best times with the Eagle and Ferrari. Without feeling on the ragged edge and out of control."

"Love your Murasama setups!"

"Today on VROC I noticed two Murasamas on the track. ...they finished one and three and smoked us all. They were using Alison's setups.

"...the Murasama that got behind me today was frightening. I could not believe his boldness to get by me. I had to try the setups.

"Readers, this baby does rock. It rocks every lap.

"I get this funny feeling we are going to see a lot of white grids soon."

Driving

See the VROC Driving page for information about racing techniques and tactics that are especially useful when racing online.

Also see the Driving page of Eagle Woman's Grand Prix Legends for tips about driving and car setup in GPL.

Technical Stuff

See Alison's GPL Hardware FAQ for more information about new hardware tweaks which improve GPL's performance online and offline.

Hosting Tweaks

Bart's revised track.ini files place the cars farther apart on the grid, which should increase the chances for a clean start. If you host a race with these files, all starts will use the revised grids, so clients need not modify anything.

These are widely used in online races and work very well. The risk of collisions at the start and in the first lap is greatly reduced.

USB Modems

Mounting empirical evidence suggests that for many users, GPL online racing is greatly improved when using a Universal Serial Bus modem.

With the USB modem, the common problems attributable to the serial port, including warping, giant warps (clock smashes), scoring problems, frame rate degradation*, and disconnects, can be dramatically reduced or completely eliminated.

Read Alison's USB Modem evaluation for a discussion about why GPL suffers so badly from the serial port and how a USB modem can help.

*When GPL is running on a Rendition card, frame rate seems to be improved when a USB modem is used instead of a serial port modem.

Some users, however, experience a frame rate reduction when a Voodoo card and a MultiTech USB modem are used together on a machine of less than 400 mhz.

The 3Com/US Robotics USB modem seems to cause less or no frame rate degradation on Voodoo-equipped machines.

SoundBlaster Live! Value

Alison is getting much improved online performance (and great sound) after installing a SoundBlaster Live! Value in place of a SoundBlaster Vibra 16. Sound quality, performance, and online racing are dramaticaly improved.

Alison can now run all graphics on at 800x600, all 19 AI cars, 16 engine sounds and still get 36 fps! Crackling and scratching is gone.

Online racing is dramatically improved. Alison can run full graphics at 800x600 and get 36 fps almost all the time! It's no longer necessary to get nonstop 36 fps. Clock smashes, which have plagued her PII-350 since she built it, seem to be a thing of the past, and disconnects have dropped dramatically.

The SB Live! makes a great companion to Patrick's new engine sounds for GPL (see the Add-ons page at Eagle Woman's GPL).

Alison got the SB Live! Value for $75, which makes it a great deal for the GPL enthusiast.

I've added a new subsection on the SB Live! in the sound section of Alison's GPL Hardware FAQ. If you haven't already, read Achim Trensz' detailed discussion of the SB Live! in the hardware section of her GPL Reader FAQ. She's also added comments by Steve Smith and Andy Booth on significant improvements they experienced with PCI sound cards to this section of the Reader FAQ.

Other Stuff

If you have an idea for improving VROC, please check out the To Do list to make sure we haven't already thought of it.

The Link Graphics are handy if you wish to put a link to VROC on your Web site.

Visit Stuart Boyle's GPL Links Page for links to many other GPL-related sites.