How hard is it to set AD permissions? Just install your users applications once, Install printers once, map network drives once... on the TS etc. (and give your users appropriate permissions from the program's Installation directory....once) the only time I have ever had trouble doing anything "technical" over TS/remote desktop was trying to remotely flash update a Watchguard Firebox X500's firewall settings. FYI when I was describing TS as "Silky Smooth" I was mostly referring to the quick responsiveness of the mouse and crisp and clearly drawn desktop. Of course it is going to take a halfway experienced MS techie.

The OP did not mention exactly how many remote branches or computers need to access the documents at once, however, windows Terminal Server licenses aren't too expensive and the remote desktop experience is silky smooth. Also the documents would all reside on a central server raid array or NAS device and never need to travel over the internet to remote sites. This would also free up massive amounts of bandwidth over the VPN, considering TS just needs an internet connection and uses SSL encryption. (although I don't know what you would even need a VPN for after making this conversion)

thanks for this I had no idea. works great