Is there a way to connect to my office server besides VPN?

PatrickGSR94 · 26 Jun 2013

Sometimes I work from home, and use a VPN connection to connect to the files on the server at the office. However performance is slow with the connection active. I checked Speedtest.net, and when VPN is connected, Speedtest sees my IP address as the static IP we use at work. Performance is pretty slow downloading, 6 to 7 Mbps, and 5-6 Mbps uploading.

As soon as I disconnect from the VPN, my download speed more then quintuples to 32 Mbps down, and upload is still in the 5-6 range.

Is there any other way I can connect to the server in my office besides using a VPN, or some other way I can configure the VPN connection so it doesn't get so slow?

As an aside, when I'm at the office on my workstation and check Speedtest from within the office, speeds are usually in the 25-35 range down, and 5+ up.

Shadowjk · 27 Jun 2013

The only other possible way in which I could think would be to upload the data you wanted to share via a cloud storage platform to be received by your home device. That being said it can split up the tasks that you do and may well be more cumbersome than what it's worth. You may want to look into your upload speed since whatever you do via a VPN is directly affected by the upload speed.

{My coursework} said:

Disadvantages

Unfortunately in the real world there can be major disadvantages regarding to the performance and stability of VPN connections. For example if an organisation only has a 756KB/s upload speed and a VPN client is trying to open a 100MB file then the speed at which this can happen is restricted to the organisations upload speed to the internet, since the VPN client is connecting via the internet rather than LAN. This can greatly reduce the performance of VPN connections and can potentially reduce the productivity of the user. To overcome this some organisations may have to purchase higher connection speeds from ISPs in order to receive optimal performance for VPN clients.

Another disadvantage is that the stability of VPN connections can be affected by the cable quality. As I stated earlier a VPN tunnel can shut down and re-create it self when it detects a hacker attack. Unfortunately a hacker attack needs to be defined in order for it to be added. An example of a hacker attack is normally defined when a certain number of packets are lost. If the VPN connection is being created through poor cable quality then some packets that are being transferred maybe lost. This could trigger the intrusion detection system and cause the VPN to shut down and reconnect. Therefore reducing the productivity of the user because of an unstable connection.

EDIT: May I ask, how are currently connecting to your office when using VPN? What software are you using?

Josh

PatrickGSR94 · 27 Jun 2013

I'm just using whatever VPN protocol that is built into Win7 x64 Pro at home. What I do is use architectural 3D design software (Autodesk Revit), and I open a project file that is stored on the office server, which is typically anywhere from 20 to 50 MB in size. As I open the file, a "local" copy of that file is created on my local machine (either my office workstation or my home machine). So the actual work I'm doing takes place in a locally-stored file. But it has to maintain a connection to the server and the "central" file to keep track of what I'm working on. This allows multiple people to work in the same file at the same time.

It's usually not a big deal, it's mainly just the opening and the saving (synchronizing) of the file that takes a long time and I would like to try to see if there's a way to get it to go faster.

Also if I'm working with the VPN connected, and I happen to do something else on the internet like watch a YT video or something, I pretty much can't even watch stuff in HD because the connection speed is choked down so far, 1/5 or even 1/6 of my usual download speed.