Microsoft Windows XP provides the flexibility to adjust the cache-validation time. The kernel will not validate the user credentials during this cache period. This has the net effect of faster access to encrypted files that may be opened several times during a given time period. The number of seconds the kernel will cache the session key for a user for a given file.

Cached session keys are stored in nonpaged pool memory. Increasing the value of EFSKCACHEPERIOD will result in higher usage of nonpaged pool memory. This increased nonpaged pool usage might cause problems for some machines, especially machines that are trusted for delegation for remote encryption.

Hive: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
Key: System\CurrentControlSet\Services\NTFS\EFS\Parameters
Name: EFSKCACHEPERIOD
Type: REG_DWORD
Value: 5 secs default value; 2 sec min, 20 sec max

Adjusting the user mode cache validation time upwards will improve the performance of systems that use EFS operations frequently. When EFS operations are in use, processing time is needed for the system to obtain and validate the certificates and keys. This will significantly slow system performance if the user mode cache validation time is set too low. The higher the user mode cache validation setting, the less often the system validates; the lower the setting, the more often the system validates. If EFS security is a priority in your system, then you will want appropriate EFS credentials to be validated more frequently. For maximum security, the lowest setting will provide the most frequent validation.

Hive: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
Key: Software\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\EFS
Name: KeyCacheValidationPeriod
Type: REG_DWORD
Value: 3600 secs default value; 60 min, 86400 (1 day) max '

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Keywords: Windows XP registry tip, EFSKCACHEPERIOD, KeyCacheValidationPeriod, cache validation time, kernel, encrypted files, session keys, cached, nonpaged pool, validation, efs