Determines when registry policies are updated. This setting affects all policies in the Administrative Templates folder and ...

Determines when registry policies are updated.

This setting affects all policies in the Administrative Templates folder and any other policies that store values in the registry.

It overrides customized settings that the program implementing a registry policy set when it was installed.

If you enable this setting, you can use the check boxes provided to change the options. If you disable this setting or do not configure it, it has no effect on the system.

The "Do not apply during periodic background processing" option prevents the system from updating affected policies in the background while the computer is in use. When background updates are disabled, policy changes will not take effect until the next user logon or system restart.

The "Process even if the Group Policy objects have not changed" option updates and reapplies the policies even if the policies have not changed. Many policy implementations specify that they are updated only when changed. However, you might want to update unchanged policies, such as reapplying a desired setting in case a user has changed it.