Slow Link Detection

Group Policy uses a built-in mechanism called Slow Link Detection , which causes some policies, software pushes being one of them, not to be applied if the link between the workstation and the domain controller does not meet certain minimum requirements.

By default, a slow link is defined as an average ping time of greater than 32ms using 2048 byte packets. To manually test whether a workstation is on a slow link, open a command prompt from that machine and type ping “l 2048 serverDC (where serverDC is your closest domain controller).

Rather than displaying ping times in Group Policy, Microsoft uses a formula to convert ping times to a Kbps rating. That formula is

 16,000 / ping (ms) = Kbps 

If the ping times are slower than 32ms you should lower the value of the Group Policy Slow Link Detection policy. Use the formula to figure out the required value.

For more details on slow link detection, see the section titled "Slow Link Detection" in Chapter 6, "Implementing Group Policies."