hi i've installed windows 2003 server and i;m using it as a file server and share it among 10 computers with different OS (win95, win98, winXP). the problem is the file sharing performance is pretty slow and vary(some are normal speed, some arent) among those computers. even after i installed 2 NIC on the server to create 2 subnet with 2 switch it's still slow. does anyone know whats the problem? should i change the network using Novell Netware?? really need some help. note: all computers are using TCP/IP. the old file server was a computer with win9x but it somehow share files better than win2003 server.

There are a number of things that could be affecting your performance. Is everything running at full duplex and at what speeds? You have quite a mix of OS's - do you have a lot of broadcast traffic? In a network often less is better - one good quality switch instead of multiple cheapies. What sort of hardware is your server running on? Does it have good quality HDD's? Or are you trying to run server software on a cheap desktop? Because if so then adding extra NIC's will just slow it down more. Design and plan you network before you build it and don't go budget on the core components. Start at the bottom of the OSI model and work your way up until you find your problem.

hi thanks for the quick response. actually the application that i;m running is not a server application. it;s just a MS-DOS based built on clipper which i can share with others and run it together while sharing the same data. so the cheap server that i;m running is pure just as a file server. i;m really a novice at this networking things so is there any tutorial or tools that can help to tell me what is the real problem? i;m also wonder why was it running faster when i was using win98 as file server than windows 2003 server standard edition. thanks

Have a google for networking basics or something similar. There are plenty of helpful sites around. If you've only got 10 PC's then you don't need multiple subnets, you also want to be careful that you don't create loops in your network. As far as the Win98 and Win2k3 - it's kinda like comparing cars and shoes. Win2k3 uses alot more resources than Win98 ever did. If your not using Win2k3 as a server then why not just use an old 98 box to run your program?