Oh, yeah, your connection speed affects the performance. Anything less than 56k on both ends will be extremely noticable... think back to the first telephones and "Are you there? We're here... can you hear us?"
Netmeeting is a simple thing to use provided you're not behind a firewall. If you are, then you need to get a little bit fancy with it... in fact, fancier than I've ever wanted to try
I just left it well enough alone.