From: Gary Britt 

I have always found that the cursor speed and key repeat rate in Windows XP
was not nearly fast enough.  Even when the repeat rate was set to maximum
speed through the control panel.  The key repeat rate in XP is measurably
slower at maximum than the maximum repeat rate under Win2K.  I have tried
to find a way to make the cursor speed up, and did find a program called
Keyboard King that works very well and very customizable, but alas its
implementation is somehow flawed because it doesn't play well with other
keyboard hotkey/macro programs and doesn't get along at all with DOS
programs running in a window.

I have finally found a solution, that at least allows the cursor and key
repeat rate to be set as high or higher than in Win2K.

The solution is you can trick the accessibility tool "FilterKeys"
to SPEEDUP the repeat rate instead of slowing it down.  To implement this
solution just add the following to your XP registry and then reboot.  Upon
rebooting Filterkeys should be loaded and your key repeat rate will be
about 66 characters per second.  Twice as fast as the maximum XP repeat
rate.  The repeat rate can be adjusted just by changing the appropriate
entry in the following reg entry, if 66 cps is too fast or too slow for
your tastes.

Here's the reg entry:

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Accessibility\Keyboard Response]
"AutoRepeatDelay"="200"
"AutoRepeatRate"="15"
"BounceTime"="0"
"DelayBeforeAcceptance"="8"
"Flags"="59"
"Last BounceKey Setting"=dword:00000000 "Last Valid
Delay"=dword:000000c8
"Last Valid Repeat"=dword:0000000f
"Last Valid Wait"=dword:00000008



The settings are in milliseconds.  The AutoRepeatRate is the interval
between each repeat so a setting of 15 ms = 1,000/15 = 66.67 cps key repeat
rate.  The DelayBeforeAcceptance is the milliseconds the key must be
depressed to be recognized.  My Northgate Omnikey keyboards and probably
most keyboards call this a Key Validation time and the default for my
Omnikeys is 8 milliseconds.  So that's what I would recommend for everyone.
  BounceTime should always be 0 for this configuration.  The AutoRepeatDelay
setting of 200 milliseconds (.20 seconds) is the default and minimum
setting for my Omnikey keyboards.  Windows may use a setting of 250, in
effect.  So this setting is a bit less of delay before repeats start than
under the smallest delay setting windows otherwise allows. 
AutoRepeatDelays that are set two low will result in serious key bounce
(i.e., unintended key repeats).  The Flags key is what tells windows to
load the filterkeys driver/options and tells it what options and settings
have been selected.

NOTE:  Don't use the control panel applet for accessibility/Filterkeys to
make changes or try to adjust keyboard settings because if you do the above
entries will be overwritten by the very slow default filterkeys settings.
If you want to adjust the keyrepeat rate or something, you have to do it by
editing the registry entries above and then rebooting.

I don't know if anybody else needs a faster key repeat rate, but I sure did.
  I've been used to a very speedy cursor since the days of MS/PC-dos and old
utilities like "Cruise Control".  Based on my google searches for
a solution that somebody else might have come up with, it appears neither
faster key repeat rates or a mouse with a decent acceleration curve under
XP aren't in much demand.  So I may be the only one who needed/wanted a
solution to these nagging problems.  I've now found registry hacks to solve
both of these XP problems.

Enjoy if you so desire.

Gary

--- BBBS/NT v4.01 Flag-5