I can imagine a setup where there might be a difference... Lets say the server uses several "virtual webservers" on the same ip. then it looks at the headers of the http request, and say something like: "Ahaa, a request for codeproject.com, that's for web05. And now one for codetools, that's for web06" You know what I mean? (I dont remember the technically terms right now ;) ) Now, if web05 and web06 points to the same path on the disk, but web05 runs as "in process IIS process" and web06 runs as "protected IIS process", web05 would be a lot faster... - Anders Money talks, but all mine ever says is "Goodbye!"