Slow File Copying on SBS?

If you have slow file copying on SBS you might want to check a couple of things.

1. Your NIC settings or...
2. SMB Signing Fix as reported by smallbizserver.net.

Today I was working with a client that had exactly this issue. An architectural firm that had 30-40mb files in Coreldraw was taking 5-6 minutes to open. They had built their own server and now needed some SBS help.

SMB signing problems have been less and less as of late especially with XP service pack 2 and Windows Small Business Server hotfixes and security patches applied. So....I started down the path of looking at the Network Interface Cards (NICS).
The client was using the onboard gig ethernet card for access to the internal network. Usually when we either quote a server or sell one we try and standardize on Intel or 3Com Server NICs to alleviate any issues.

This was a different breed so we started to possibly take a look at installing another card. But before I did that I wanted to make sure and check the revision of the NIC driver. Sure enough it was waaayyyy behind. Installed was a version 6 driver and the current revision was over 8. Time to update!

Update done in 10 minutes and sure enough the file copy and load problems went away! Happy client and on to the next. Definitely check for current versions of hardware drivers when you run into problems such as these.