There is a possibility that it is not the traffic that is actually slowing down but the way the data is being transmitted by your vpn software.

I regularly use a variant of VNC from work to one of my two machines at home. One runs XP, the other runs Linux. The screen refresh on the linux machine is much slower than on the XP one, and that's through the same connection, yet when I connect to the linux box through an SSH terminal it's fine.

I freely admit to not knowing a quarter as much about linux as I know about XP (which I support at work), so I suspect that it's the way my VNC is configured on the linux box.

Sorry I can't offer much more that that, other than the suggestion that since you are using a graphical interface, a high resolution on the Windows PC will cause a high proportion of data to be transmitted in simply redrawing the screen.

Do you know how work is connected to the internet - specifically what upstream speed they have? If you were connecting using remote desktop to a high resolution (say 1280x1024) in full 32 bit colour I would expect it to chug somewhat if the office is on ADSL say. It would also be dependant on what other internet usage was going on inside the office.

When I'm using remote desktop I restrict the colours to 16 bit - the VPN I use gives me up to 1MB - the office link is much faster than that so I don't see slowdowns.

In reply to:

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Do you know how work is connected to the internet - specifically what upstream speed they have? If you were connecting using remote desktop to a high resolution (say 1280x1024) in full 32 bit colour I would expect it to chug somewhat if the office is on ADSL say. It would also be dependant on what other internet usage was going on inside the office.

When I'm using remote desktop I restrict the colours to 16 bit - the VPN I use gives me up to 1MB - the office link is much faster than that so I don't see slowdowns.

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Good point. If your work is also on an ADSL line, your download speed will be restricted to their upload speed, so to speak.

I would also check everything is working OK at work on and your PC/Laptop. Your works internet pipe may be heavily utilised, the VPN server under powered for the amount of traffic it recieves etc.

The traceroute would be handy as it shows where the slow down is.