Team Fortress 2: Connection Errors & Lag Spikes

[Infusions]

I've owned the game Team Fortress 2 for over a year now and as far as I can remember, I have always gotten a connection error in-game.

Whenever I get a connection error, the game freezes up for a couple of seconds with red text appearing at the top right side telling me I've lost connection and will disconnect in 30 seconds. Once it reaches 25 or so, it goes back to normal and I usually never get another connection error after that until the map changes or I join another server.

However, recently (Literally recently, like, yesterday), I've been getting more than one connection error on account and even worse, lag spikes. The lag spikes are only a month old.

I've asked some friends as well as the person in my family who runs all our router and computer stuff what to do, and so far, I've done the following:

1.) Fowarded the game ports directly to my computer.
2.) Defragged both my game and my harddrive.
3.) Ran my computer in safe mode and ran virus scan and SpySweeper to make sure nothing was eating the bandwith.
4.) Turned off as many programs as I possibly could before playing.

I was told that it's possibly my computer could be outdated and can no longer handle running my game as much as it used to, however, over the months, I've upgraded both the processor and video cards. I'm now running:

Microsoft Windows XP Professional
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 3800+
2.06 GHz Performance Rated at 5.70 GHz
NVIDIA GeForce 8600 GT (GeForce 8600 GT)

And for internet, I'm running on a wired connection using the NVIDIA nForce Networking Controller. I'm not using a shared computer.

I've ran my computer on that "Can you Run It?" website and I got a full check on the Recommended report.

I'm pretty much a dunce when it comes to figuring out computer problems, so I tried googling related problems and was told cleaning out my registry would make my computer run faster, but if you had no idea what you were doing, to leave it alone, so I did. I also heard cleaning your registry doesn't fix some problems, so I didn't read up much about how to do it.

I'm also not the one in charge of my router and stuff in my family, so I won't be able to immediately change anything if told to do so.

[Cdx]

Hello Infusions, and welcome to TSF.

Team Fortress 2 is ran in the gaming platform known as Steam.

When you join servers, normally when you get that red connection error, it is either because the server has crashed, or your connection has been interrupted.

Have you tried playing on different servers?

What kind of internet do you have? DSL/Cable/Dial-up?

[Aus_Karlos]

If you have any Nvidia Network Management software installed on your PC you will need to remove it. Its very strict when it comes to online gaming.

These are the applications that are known to conflict with online gaming with steam. Many programs can just be disabled while others (with "*") will need to be completely removed

The following applications have been known to cause issues with Steam and playing games:

Anti-Virus Applications

    * Avast!
    * AVG Anti-virus       *
    * Kaspersky Anti-virus
    * McAfee Anti-virus
    * Nod32 Anti-virus       *
    * Norton/Symantec Anti-virus
    * Trend Micro
    * VIGuard Anti-virus

Anti-Spyware Applications

    * Ad Aware
    * CA Pest Patrol
    * Spycatcher Express
    * Webroot Spy Sweeper       *

Firewall/Security Applications

    * Comodo
    * CYBERsitter
    * ESET Smart Security
    * Netlimiter
    * McAfee Personal Firewall
    * Nvidia Network Access Manager/Firewall       *
    * Nvidia ForceWare Intelligent Application Manager
    * Peer Guardian
    * Tiny Personal Firewall
    * Verizon Internet Security Suite
    * Zone Alarm

Other Applications

    * Alcohol 120%
    * ATI Hotkey Poller
    * BitTorrent/UTorrent (all clients)
    * Catalyst AI
    * Daemon Tools
    * Download Accelerators (all clients)
    * GhostSurf 2007
    * Google Toolbar, Google Updater
    * K-Lite Codec Pack
    * LimeWire, BearShare or other Peer 2 Peer applications
    * nProtect GameGuard       *
    * Skype
    * Slysoft AnyDVD
    * TeamSpeak (can lead to mic issues)
    * Total Recorder
    * Tuneup WinStyler Theme Service
    * UPEK Protector Suite
    * Ventrilo (can lead to mic issues)
    * VirtuaGirl 2
    * WindowBlinds
    * Xfire

* We recommend that applications listed in bold with a (       * ) symbol are fully uninstalled from your system if disabling them does not resolve the issue