How long should a mixdown take?

All,

I have the following 2 track mono session for my podcast, that seems to take forever to mix down:

Track one: No effects. Contains about 5 short wav clips at various points in the duration of the podcast.
Track two: Has 3 effects: Ambience reverb plugin, dynamic processing, Amplification. Contains the intro, interview & ending wav clips.
Master: Has one effect: Hard limiting.

My podcast episodes are all about 30-40 minutes in duration and they take about 25 minutes to mix down to an MP3 file. To a newby like me, this seems excessively long. Am I just expecting too much? Your experience with this is appreciated.

Cornelius,
It will depend also on the processing power of your pc.
Remember also that you're mixing direct to a compressed lossy format (MP3) and if you've got that set to a low bitrate (like <96kbps), then that's quite a lot of number crunching for your pc to perform.... so, yeah, 25 mins may be a reasonable time requirement given the circumstances.

Cornelius, one of my weekly syndicated productions involves doing a bouncedown of around 20 tracks, total duration 55 mins. The bouncedown takes about 4 mins (four). On my previous machine it would take around 13 mins. My new machine is more powerful: 4GB RAM, dual CPU @ 1.86Ghz and 250GB hard drive...the hard drive size is not only about storage space but about how well intensive processing works btw. So as noddy said, if you want faster bouncedowns the only solution is to get a more powerful machine.