Network File Access Performance [Archive] - SpeedGuide.net Broadband Community

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Bolt11
03-10-07, 10:10 AM
I am running a small network, with 3 desktop computers, printer, DVR, and 2 wireless Axim's. Network consists of Cat5e hardwired everywhere, coupled by a Netgear VPN router/firewall. The "wimpiest" PC is a 2.0 GHz with .75GB RAM. All machines are running XP Pro, SP2.
I have one of the PC's hard drive with a portion partitioned for data storage, mostly Excel, Word, images, PDF's, etc. It works great as far as accessing data from different computers. But it is slow to access the folder initially. Once you are browsing the folder, performance is fine. But to get the folder open, or save a file after being idle for a while, it takes a bit (10+ seconds) to process the task.
What can I do to tweak the performance? Is there something I can adjust as far as settings or caching or something to get it a bit faster? I am not expecting instant reaction time from it like the folder were local, but a bit faster would sure be nice sometimes.

Thanks!

ErikD
03-10-07, 10:15 AM
Domain or workgroup?

Bolt11
03-10-07, 11:52 AM
Workgroup. No SBS, no dedicated server. Just the cheap way, using a hard drive on one of the PC's to store data for the others.

ErikD
03-10-07, 01:07 PM
Probably the best you can do then. Workgroups don't keep track of everything like when a domain is setup, so browsing will be slower.