Troubleshooting Slow reponse, from Local machines to the Virtual Server

Question

We are in the process of implementing Delmia Works (aka IQMS) and decided to get with an Azure virtual server instead of an on site server. We have the connections made and everything appears to work. The issue is that my local machine users have slow response when running the IQMS program. The IQMS utilises SQL for its database and the program itself is run from the local machine. Access to the databases is via a mapped network drive. When I access the server directly through a Remote desktop connection, I have full speed and no slowdown what so ever. The issue comes when I (or anyone else) access the program from a local machine.

Please note that I am not an IT expert. I have been thrust into this admin role since I have most technical computer knowledge of the folks here.

Any help would greatly appreciated

Thanks

Richard

Answer 1

Thanks for the clarification, @richard wells . Based on what you’ve shared, the root cause of the slow performance when running IQMS locally is likely due to how your local machines are accessing data across the network to Azure.

Mapped network drives over the internet (especially without a high-speed, low-latency connection) are not designed for performance. SMB (the protocol behind mapped drives) is chatty — it makes many back-and-forth round trips, which becomes a big performance issue when latency is involved.

For best performance and supportability, avoid running database-intensive apps like IQMS across mapped drives over the internet. Instead, centralize access through RDP or Azure Virtual Desktop.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-desktop/publish-applications-stream-remoteapp?tabs=portal

If my answer helped you resolve your issue, please consider marking it as the correct answer. This helps others in the community find solutions more easily. Thanks!

Answer 2

Hello Richard Wells,

Jose Benjamin Solis Nolasco is absolutely correct. The issue you're experiencing is rooted in how the IQMS (Delmia Works) client accesses the Azure-hosted server. Specifically, when the client is installed and run on local machines, it accesses the application data via a mapped network drive using the SMB protocol over the internet. SMB is inherently chatty and not optimized for high-latency or long-distance connections, which leads to frequent round trips between the client and server. This results in poor performance, particularly for applications like IQMS that are data-intensive and rely on constant file access.

However, when you access the application through Remote Desktop directly on the Azure VM, all operations remain within Azure's internal network, which is low-latency and high-bandwidth. This explains why performance is fast and consistent when working within an RDP session, but slow when running the client from a local machine over a mapped drive.

My recommended workaround would be to stop running the IQMS client from local desktops over mapped network drives. Instead, publish the application inside Azure and let users access it using Remote Desktop or Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD). With Azure Virtual Desktop, you can either provide users with full desktop sessions or stream only the IQMS application interface using RemoteApp. This ensures all application logic and data access happens inside Azure, delivering optimal performance, reliability, and security.

Microsoft officially supports this approach and provides guidance here: Publish applications with Azure Virtual Desktop (RemoteApp). This method avoids the performance limitations of SMB over WAN and centralizes your workload in a way that is scalable and manageable. Hope this clears your query. Thanks