[Logician]

Considering the file number you have in that table yes it can be the access requests to that table that slows down your board. It's always the best apporach to get rid of SQL connection whenever it's possible so it might be better to save the files directly in server instead of saving them in db but we must also accept that vb is a message board not a file management utility so having so much files in db might be considered "not likely".

Also keeping them inside db has its own advantages like more easily tracking their access, applying better access-security standarts to files, easily backup/manage the entire site (together with files) etc. So developers might choose to save them in db..