Make Outlook 2000 Respond Faster over a Dial-up Connection 
If you use Microsoft Outlook® 2000 with a dial-up connection to connect
to a mailbox on an Exchange server, you can improve response time by
minimizing how much information Outlook transfers over the connection and
how often these transfers occur. The best way to accomplish this is by
working offline instead of online. If you already work offline and Outlook
still seems slow, you may need to specify settings that optimize offline
performance, as explained later.
Note If you also connect to an Exchange server over a
wide area network (WAN), working offline may improve Outlook performance
in that situation, too.
Why Working Online Is Slower
When you work online, Outlook maintains a "live" connection to the
server during the entire working session. This means that each time you
start Outlook, open an item, or synchronize folders, Outlook transfers
items over the connection. If the items are small, this might not take a
long time. However, if items are large or have attachments, you'll
experience longer delays. If you reopen an item later, Outlook must again
transfer the message over the slow connection. Excess traffic on the
network or a lost connection further contribute to the delays you might
experience. Therefore, it's recommended that you limit your online
sessions to only those situations that require them, such as creating and
editing rules, using the Out of Office Assistant, and editing offline
settings.
To get the best response time during these online sessions, see Best Practices When Working Online. For everyday e-mail, scheduling, and
other Outlook tasks, work offline instead.
Why Working Offline Is Faster
Offline is a more efficient way to work in dial-up situations. Working
offline, you can take a single folder or subset of folders from a server
location and work with the contents of those folders without being
connected to the network. When you're ready to update the folders on the
Exchange server with changes you've made in the offline folders, you
"synchronize" the two locations to make the contents of both sets of
folders identical. When you synchronize, Outlook connects to the server
just long enough to copy the changes made in each folder to the other
folder, and then it disconnects. Only the changes that you've made are
copied to the server. All changes on the server, such as new e-mail
messages you've received, download to your computer at one time. If you
then open one of these items in an offline folder, Outlook won't download
it again. Any item that's deleted from either the offline folder or the
corresponding server folder is deleted from both folders. Once
synchronization is completed, Outlook disconnects from the server, and you
work with the information in the offline folders on your computer. To get
the best response time while working offline, see Best Practices When Setting Up and Using Offline Folders.
Note If you regularly use Outlook over a very low
bandwidth connection, such as from an airplane or from a very remote site
with a 9600 baud or less modem, consider using Microsoft Terminal Server.
When you use Terminal Server, both Outlook and the server software are
stored on the server. You connect to the server using a small client
program on your computer, and then work with Outlook the same as usual.
Performance is fast because only images of the Outlook program and of the
contents of your mailbox are transferred to your computer. No actual items
are downloaded. For more information, see your system administrator.
