I have a system configuration with n servers. The configuration utilizes invalidation and custom cache loaders (1.4.1). The configuration utilizes the preload option. It takes along time to populate the cache. When the cache is initialized, does the preload operation operate synchronously with the startService() invocation? Or does it kick off a thread which populates the cache and returns. View the original post : http://www.jboss.org/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4226233#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.org/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...