Counter Strike problems on logging into a server

[blade0007]

A friend of mine is having major problems getting CS 1.6 to work the way it should, but unlike the other problems I've read on the posts this is an in game problem.

He can start CS fine, and he can join a server fine, he's on a 56k modem dial up connection but it's not his ISP that disconnects nor is it an error cause by them. However it is a lag issue that doesn't seem normal to me.

He joins a server, joins a team, and then his ping goes from 170-300 all the way up and this only happens in CS. The odd thing is all his controls are still mapped and everything but he can't walk. He can however type and see his message pop up on screen in like 5 second delay which it was 3 when he used to play anyways so it's not that big of a deal. But no matter how long he tries he cannot get moving.

He's tried uninstalling and reinstalling, even spent 6 hours to download the CS steam files and stuff all over again just to try to see if his file was somehow messed up on download, but nothing seems to help him. I suggested trying Half Life to see if it worked fine in there but it was laggy as all hell there too. He said something about a flush packet but if he was getting a flush packet problem a reboot usually solves that if the ISP stayed connected durring the whole problem. I have no idea how to fix his CS so that he can play again. The kicker is it sometimes works fine and other times just goes all to hell like this....any ideas?

[Atomic Rooster]

Yup. Steam just plain sucks is all. I've heard of lot's of probs such as that running on the Steam servers.


Edit: Here's a site that has alot of info on tweaking CS.

http://www.icantlose.com/cs/tech.shtml