The Red Map of Logoff

Whilst sitting in a casino (camping, what else), I see a chap next to me with a certain sum of accumulated earnings, large enough to dismay and to remain in my memory (non-volatile). Then, suddenly, looking up at the minimap, I see that it has turned red or is turning red. I check my avi and discover that he has entered a state of suspended animation. I log off and come back to the same chair only to discover that the chap's wallet remains fat with Lindens and I recognize other familiar faces from my previous stint in the chair.

So, I know that we're hostages of the SL servers but I wonder if, in addition, I'm a victim of my ISP's server or of some other server in the hop journey. I have a cable modem with a speed that surpasses the average in California as well as in the nation of the US (if I'm to believe online speed testers). So, again, what is affecting my tenure in SL? the number of neighbors logged on to the cable node I share? my ISP (san.rr.com)? etc.

Thanks for any enlightenment I may receive on this issue!

Why do intelligent people camp?

Is it an addiction to gambling that reduces them to a camping blob?

From what I've heard and seen, those who camp at casinos tend to spend more than they make camping... Go figure

Staying on topic here, I have to say that this happens to me all the time. No i don't camp. Today there was a instance where i was talking to my friends on skype, who are also in SL with me. My friend rezzed something and couldn't see it. So i told her i would check it and return it. By the time i found it i noticed my mini-map had turned red. So i said on skype "um did the sim crash?" her responce was "no I'm still here. look i can shove your avatar around weeee.....".

So i log out, and log back in. The login screen refused to let me back in the first time, so i tried again and got back in to see that my friend was still standing there. Skype didn't have any connection problems. It was odd.. So if it wasn't on my end, and the server was still up, what the heck is it about? o.o This has been a problem even when i first came to SL. You can tell how long ago that was by looking over to the left. All i can guess is packet loss has something to do with it but i duno.

Random DCs seem to be far more common of late. I'll be be building and wondering why I can't do anything, then I see the map. It probably isn't something on your end, it seems to be happening to most people lately.

A red map like that is more of a client losing the communication with the grid rather then the sim going down. I have noticed that it seems to be on the rise as of late. I don't know what causes it, but you are not alone.

It's good to know that I'm not the only one who has experienced this phenomenon ... thanks for the insight!

And, to those of you who took the opportunity to enhance your self esteem, I say that it's nice to engage in mindless diversion after tiring from too much building ... at least I wasn't out with a weapon shooting up things and letting my particles increase the lag ...

My husband and I play on the same ISP connection, behind a router.

The problems each of us has is almost completely independent of each other. Therefore, I don't blame our ISP for our SL problems, which both of us experience quite frequently.

This is most curious. I believe most of my problems are simply lag whether packet loss or PC memory stacking up with info. The latter may account for some of your discrepancy.
My big worry at present is I loaded First Look client on Saturday and seemed to run just fine. The last two days now it takes a full 5 minutes on the 'starting secondlife' box with an incredible amount of hard drive thrashing before continuing to load.
The old client works just fine. My worry? I was told yesterday here that the First Look client becomes the main one tomorrow!
Are we in for longer start times?