How can I throttle down aptitude?

[Dennis Wicks <wix@mgssub.com>]

Greetings;

When aptitude is downloading packages it loads the network 
down so much that I can't do much of anything else that 
wants to get to the internet, either on the machine running 
aptitude or any other machine on the lan. Is there anyway 
that I can slow aptitude down so it doesn't monopolize the 
entire bandwidth?

I have already tried using ionice but it didn't make any 
noticeable difference.

I am running lenny on a P4 2.x GHz, 100 mps lan to Shorewall 
and a 768kbs link to the Inet.

Any help greatly appreciated!

Thanks,
Dennis