Slow file transfer from HD to USB HD

So I have a USB HD (I/O Magic 320 GB) and when I copy a file from any of my internal HD's (A Western Digital 320 GB SATA II and another one IDE with 120GB) it takes too long (it takes like 20 minutes to copy 1GB) but if I copy from the USB HD to an internal HD it works just fine.

All USB ports are 2.0 and so is the USB HD's.

If it helps, I have 2 years with it and I've never formated nor defragmented it. (Perhaps any of those is the solution? I'll try to defrag it tonight)

Thanks in advance.

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/828012
Check your Service Pack, "This problem was first corrected in Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 ". Try the Workaround.

Try updating your motherboard/chipset drivers.

Matt

 

Thanks for responding.

I have SP3, latest drivers and everything.
I also tried the other solution but it didn't work either.
I "chkdsk /f "ed the HD and the problem was still there so I decided it was time for a format.

So 1 format later and, while the transfer is faster, it stops every 10 seconds of transfer for about 10 seconds or more (pass some junk ... halt ... pass some junk ... halt ...) and its annoying.

I know it's not the USB ports, I've tried different ports and my USB of 2GB works just fine.

So what could be the problem? (Damaged HD, damaged cable...)

Thanks in advanced!

 

Test the drive by connecting it to another computer and transferring a GB or so of data. That should tell you if the problem is with the drive or the PC system.

Run CHKDSK /r on the drive.

Do you have a fair amount of free space on your internal drives?

Were you able to check for updated chipset drivers? I always go to the motherboard/system manufacturer's website and get any updated drivers before installing a new Service Pack.

I don't know I/O Magic, did it come with any utilities? I might be inclined to remove and remake the partition.

Check that your antivirus is not trying to scan the drive while you write to it (disable the AV while writing).

The drive model should be listed in Device Manager under USB Controllers. I would go to the drive manufacturer's website and look for FAQs (maybe I/O Magic has some).

Is it formatted as NTFS or FAT32? Some external drive manufacturer's only support FAT32. If it has any software, like for backups or a "one touch" button, look at uninstalling that. Only reinstall it if you need to use it.

Matt

 

Hi

I already tried it in another computer, same issue.
chkdsk /r didn't fixed the problem.
I do have a fair amount of free space on my internal HDs (IDE 30%, SATA 1%, 3%, and 30%[3 partitions])
I have the most recent motherboard drivers from the manufacturers website.
I didn't find any FAQ's in the I/O Magic website, and there is no software for the USB HD.
Remake partition? I formated it and made 2 partitions out of it...
The antivirus I have its BitDefender Free Edition (No real-time protection)
The USB HD's filesystem is NTFS

PS: At the moment I was writing this message I was copying a 300MB file into it in the other computer and its taking a lot, it stopped at like 15% and the estimated time just keeps changing ranging from 5 to 48 minutes...

 

That's good feedback, but I am not sure I can offer much else.

In My Computer, you can right-click on the drive, select Properties -> Hardware tab, highlight the external drive, select Properties -> Policies tab and change the setting for Optimize for quick removal/Optimise for performance.

Look in the Indexing Service (see Help and Support), open the Console Tree and turn off indexing if it is enabled.

Those are very low in my opinion. That may affect "caching ". For internal drives go to the polices tab and you will see "Enable write caching on the disk ", but I expect it won't improve the speed unless you make more space.

Matt

 

Thanks for all your support matt.

Unfortunately I've done that too, I guess my HD is actually damaged or perhaps the USB cable (yea right... I'm in denial).

Anyway, thanks again for all your help.
Cya

 

I had a similar experience the other day. I needed to get a 6GB file from one computer, it took 45 minutes to write the file to the external drive, it took 4 minutes to read the file to another computer. The first computer had little space left on the HDD, so I wondered if that was the reason. The external drive has very loose connections for the power and USB cables though, so maybe it was a bad connection. You could be right, see if you can borrow another USB cable to try.

The stop/start sounds like caching the data. It may be waiting for data or having trouble trying to cache it somewhere.

The drive model should be listed there. Do a websearch on the model number. Get the drive manufacturer's testing utilities:
http://tacktech.com/display.cfm?ttid=287

Good luck with it.
Matt