I've been using a development server for about 9 years and the best thing I ever did was move to a machine with a low-power Xeon D for a time. It made development painful enough that I quickly fixed the performance issues I was able to overlook on more powerful hardware. I recommend it, even just as an exercise.
For similar reasons, in the Google office I worked in you had the option to connect to a really intentionally crappy wifi that was simulating a 2G connection.
