ibase_connect and ibase_pconnect

Hi, we have an application, which connects to a database of type interbase. We can see, that the times of the connects go very high, if more people call our site at the same time. Per default we use the function ibase_connect and at the end of the script we make an ibase_close. If three users go to our site at the same page, the connect times are so: User 1: 0.180948s User 2: 1.104926s User 3: 2.055006s The times go very very high, if more users go to the site. The times go up to more than one or two minutes, only for a connect(!). We tried it with a ibase_pconnect, a persistent connection, too. But the times are the same like with ibase_connect. At the php.ini we have maked the following settings: a) no entry for ibase.allow_persistent b) ibase.allow_persistent = On c) ibase.allow_persistent = 1 For the number of connects we tried it with ibase.max_persistent = -1 ibase.max_links = -1 and with ibase.max_persistent = 100 ibase.max_links = 100 too. It makes no diffence. The parameter of the connects are always the same, the same database, the same user and so on. Know anybody, why the connect times go so high? Know anybody, does the persistent connect work like described? I hope, that anybody can help me and: thanks. Best regards, Ira