Windows Server 2003 automatically refreshes GPOs every 90 minutes by default, although it applies a randomized 30-minute offset interval to the refresh period to ensure that large groups of users don’t refresh their GPOs at the same time. Refreshing the GPOs ensures that changes to group policies are implemented in a timely manner.

You can tailor the refresh rate to your network’s needs. Increasing the refresh interval can help reduce network traffic if you seldom change policies. Decreasing the refresh interval causes group policy changes to be applied more quickly and is desirable whenever you expect to change policies more frequently or want to make sure that changes apply in a timely fashion. Decreasing the refresh interval also causes more network traffic, however, this is a factor you should consider when deciding on the refresh interval.

You can specify an interval as low as seven seconds or as high as 45 days. Obviously, high intervals such as the maximum are relatively useless, since changes should be applied much more quickly in almost all situations. Very short durations are also undesirable in most situations because of the excessive network traffic they create.

You specify the GPO refresh interval through the Default Domain Controllers GPO. To do so, open the Active Directory Users And Computers console. Right-click the domain and choose Properties. Choose Default Domain Policy and click Edit. Expand the Computer Configuration/Administrative Templates/System/Group Policy branch. Next, double-click the Group Policy Refresh Interval For Computers policy, click Enabled, and then set the interval and the offset range. Finally, click OK and close the Group Policy console.