You should be able to get all kinds of help with connects. There are some pretty sharp guys here on that.
For info only, I was saying how smooth the MA is not too long ago. Turns out I wasn't mentioning I play after Midnight PST almost all the time.
When i did try some primetime MA this last week with huge numbers on, I for the first time really noticed the lag. I think that is going to be fixed by new servers, but it's there now.