Speeding up WAN access

[KnoxIan]

I have a pretty standard FMSA9 installation running on a:

Dell Dimension 4600

Windows Server 2003 Standard SP2

Dual Pentium 4 @ 3.2 GHz (or one hyperthreaded P4, which I'm told shows up as two CPUs in the Device Manager; I'm not really clear on this)

1.5 GB RAM

80 GB Maxtor 7200 RPM DMA/ATA-133 drive

A single 100baseT Ethernet port

...and our Internet connection is a T1 at 1.5 mbps. We have ten phone lines on that T, so voice traffic can pull up to 640 kbps if everyone's yakking at the same time.

This works okay on the LAN in the office. This sucks donkeys when accessed remotely, to quote one of my users.

Bandwidth is obviously an issue - what would you recommend? Another T1 dedicated purely to remote FM access (is that even possible)? Adding a DSL line and getting a load-balancing router?

Also, how much effect might a server upgrade have? Based on those specs above, which components would make the most difference? Bear in mind it works acceptably well (most days) in the office on LAN access; I'm mostly concerned with improving performance for our folks out there in the field (and I know that available bandwidth on their end will be a factor, but that can't be helped from this end).

Grateful thanks in advance to anyone who can lend me insight.

[grubber]

Rather than adding bandwidth it may be worth investigatating a Citrix / MS Terminal services solution.

some info here

more info from the horses mouth here

Edited February 26, 2009 by Guest

[Steven H. Blackwell]

1.5 GB RAM

80 GB Maxtor 7200 RPM DMA/ATA-133 drive

Subpar specs. Go to 4 GB RAM and get at least a 10K rpm SCSI or SAS drive. 15K rpm UW SCSI would be better.

Steven

[KnoxIan]

Hi, Grubber; thanks for the advice. We do have a terminal server, but my Mac-centric users hate the thing, and it's none too speedy for my XP guys as well.

OAM: Thanks for the hardware input - that'll help in pitching for an upgrade.