Branch Cache

N2IT

Is this feature utilized in your environments? Does it really speed up data transfer over the WAN since it essentially cache's the data? I'm not even close on how this utility works? Do the remote users really notices a difference in data transfer rates?

Just curious.

KenC

I'm only aware of it in theory (so on that basis), I guess it's effectiveness will depend on how many LAN users you have requiring access to the same resource on the WAN and the speed of your WAN connection.

I think Professor Messer explains it well.

Mstavridis

It works well! Try it out you won't be disappointed

battlese

My co-workers tried setting this up. The fact that there is basically no information on this subject told us it wouldn't be easy. They even called Microsoft and they weren't much help. Just pulled up white papers from a couple years ago and were told "good luck with it". It kind of worked but it was a tremendous amount of work to set it up. Also they had to reintroduce WINS back to the network which they really didn't want to do but it was a requirement.

Bottom line it was no better than the Riverbed boxes they already had installed. The Riverbed boxes are pretty easy to set up and it was a no-brainer to ditch the Branch Cache trial.

N2IT

Thanks for the write up. I wasn't sure what to think of it.

RomBUS

It seems that there is so much you need to do to implement that...the fact you MUST have an all Windows 2008 R2/Windows 7 Pro shop, implement a CA, and then some for tweaking on the clients/server side most environments overlook it
Microsoft doesn't even advertise it that much, looks to be like one of the technologies to shut people up when their data access is slow across links like the cross-walk buttons you see at the intersections to magically make green light intervals shorter

Claymoore

I don't see it anywhere because I am at a lot of places that aren't full Win7 shops yet. It's a nice feature, but the benefits don't seem to outweigh the requirements for 7/R2 and all the configuration. That's a lot of work to speed up the downloading of a powerpoint at a remote office from sharepoint

System Center 2012 does take advantage of branch cache so I think we will see more interest in it. There are no more Branch DPs, just branche cache at remote locations. Branche cache will make a difference when everyone at a remote site is trying to download and install the 1.5 GB or so Office 2012 package.