hardware based VPN vs win2k server

newbie question.
I have setup RAS on our office server. It works fine and we can all connect
from home and all that. One thing though... it's slow, almost so slow that
I don't want to use it.

Obviously a faster internet connection, dedicated T1 or something would
help, but I was curious if having a router w/ VPN would be faster than using
RAS? It may make no difference at all, I just thought I would ask because I
barely understand how all this works. I thought I remembered reading that
the encryption can take some time(processor) which would indicate that a
dual p4 would be faster than whatever they throw into the small business
linksys stuff, but like I said.. newbie, thought I should ask.

Looking forward to your opinions, ideas.
Thanks,
Steve




sklett

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>From: "sklett" <(E-Mail Removed)>
>Subject: hardware based VPN vs win2k server
>Date: Thu, 8 Apr 2004 11:22:23 -0700
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>newbie question.
>I have setup RAS on our office server. It works fine and we can all connect
>from home and all that. One thing though... it's slow, almost so slow that
>I don't want to use it.
>
>Obviously a faster internet connection, dedicated T1 or something would
>help, but I was curious if having a router w/ VPN would be faster than using
>RAS? It may make no difference at all, I just thought I would ask because I
>barely understand how all this works. I thought I remembered reading that
>the encryption can take some time(processor) which would indicate that a
>dual p4 would be faster than whatever they throw into the small business
>linksys stuff, but like I said.. newbie, thought I should ask.
>
>Looking forward to your opinions, ideas.
>Thanks,
>Steve
>
>
>
Steve,

What you read could be right based on the context. If you are passing encrypted traffic through a Stateful Packet Inspecting firewall then there will be
CPU cost incurred on the firewall to examine the packets as the come in. In any situation where the is encryption there will be a CPU cost to de-crypt the
information, weather it be the system processor or special hardware that offloads this task.

How slow are we talking? How many users are connecting at the same time? Have you performed any Performance testing on the server to see if there
is a particular bottleneck that is being exposed on the system?

The way that i see it there are 4 major limiting factors that can be involved here:

1. What is the connection of the end user to the internet?
2. What is the connection speed of the RRAS Server to the internet?
3. Could the Linksys router be overloaded by the amount of traffic hitting it? I.e., how many users does it take to produce the slow behavior?
4. Can you collect some additional information regarding this system's performance using the build in System (Performance) Monitor?

248345 How to Create a Log Using System Monitor in Windows 2000
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=248345

246758 How to Monitor Performance of a Remote Computer Without Logging on to It
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=246758

If you suspect the system is the bottleneck, try connecting to it from the LAN. Simply create a connection object from a client machine on the LAN and
establish a VPN connection to this system. Is this connection slow? If so the issue is more than likely your server and performance monitor will be the
best road to identifying what can be done to speed this system up.

T.J. Campana [MSFT]
Microsoft EPS Networking
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T.J. Campana [MSFT]
Microsoft EPS Networking
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This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights. Use of included script samples are subject to the terms specified at
http://www.microsoft.com/info/cpyright.htm

Note: For the benefit of the community-at-large, all responses to this message are best directed to the newsgroup/thread from which they originated.