Hello there,

I see very slow disk access when checking files, that is comparing files on one drive to another drive. For very large files it's not too bad, but for small files it takes a very very very long time to compare bytes.
In win7 for example an operation that takes less than 2 minutes would take over 2 hours under win10.
Tried various things, nothing works. New Sata driver, no help for example.

 

If you do ctrl-alt-del key that will bring up task manager, pick performance tab, and then
resource monitor button. You can pick memory or disk or cpu and look at processes
and their usage rate to see what is hogging system performance.

Regards, Dana.

 

I vaguely recall that kind of huge delays in file related operations where the antivirus kept messing with them continuously. I recall changing a certain setting, "just in case". It worked a miraculous change.

 

Hello again,

Yes i had forgotten that anti virus could cause this problem. I had the same problem way way back when i was using XP.
I installed the virus protection and then the disk speeds slowed wayyyy down, so i complained to the company and htey fixed it.
This time it came built in, so i had no chance to know that there was a difference because of that this time.

The difference is so extreme though it's almost hard to believe that MS or any company for that matter would allow such a thing. The company i had long time ago at least fixed theirs once told. MS should do the same as the only way i know of right now is to turn it off. The difference i saw with this was 50 to 1, which means 50 times slower with the AV turned 'on'. That's nuts.

Thanks for the ideas and if anyone wants to post more ideas too that's good also. I read about countless other people having problems like this with Win 10.

 

It may not be relevant to this case but a failing drive can exhibit this kind of behavior. It will churn and churn as it struggles to get a proper read or a validation of a write.

A nearly full drive, if it's the startup drive, will slow down massively also.

 

Hello,

How old is the disk?
Do you know the status of the disk?
You could use smartmontools to have a look at the status:
https://www.smartmontools.org/
The tool can be downloaded here:
https://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/Download
https://sourceforge.net/projects/smartmontools/files/

The worst error I ever got on a harddisk was:
"immediately make a backup and replace the harddisk"

Bertus

 

Hello again,

Not sure if i made it clear or not but in this case it was the virus software.

I have see DVD and CD disks that do not read properly either, and it takes a long time to get the data off the disk, if possible at all. What a pain.

 

Hello,

Can you startup a live dvd like knoppix from the dvd drive?
http://knoppix.net/
http://knoppix.net/get.php
When that starts quickly, there is something wrong with the operating system.

Bertus

 

Hello there,

I see very slow disk access when checking files, that is comparing files on one drive to another drive. For very large files it's not too bad, but for small files it takes a very very very long time to compare bytes.
In win7 for example an operation that takes less than 2 minutes would take over 2 hours under win10.
Tried various things, nothing works. New Sata driver, no help for example.

This is a normal behaviour(small speed for small files, larger speed for larger files), but it does not account for the big difference.

The difference comes from the use of "Windows 10", on "Windows 10" the bad parameters are upped(it works slowly on purpose so you can buy the better version). This is the "Microsoft" strategy and the reason behind the creation of "Windows 10".

Currently "Windows 7" is the best "Windows" on the market, but it would be wise to reconsider the use of "Windows" and pass on "Linux"(a good suggestion for beginners is Linux Ubuntu). Try to use a virtual machine and perform the same operation(virtual box or vmware player).

 

Hello,

Can you startup a live dvd like knoppix from the dvd drive?
http://knoppix.net/
http://knoppix.net/get.php
When that starts quickly, there is something wrong with the operating system.

Bertus

Hi,

That sounds interesting even if nothing else was wrong
I havent used Linux in such a long time now. I had fun trying it out years ago.

The problem i face now is if i go to Linux i have to rewrite literally hundreds or even thousands of programs and include files that i created over the past 20 years that work on Windows. Not sure if i am up to that task in my later years now. I should have started with Linux way back when i tried to get a boxed version normally sold at places like Comp USA, but when i went one day to purchase they had NONE because they stopped selling it.
Do they even sell boxed versions anymore or do we not need that anymore anyway?

Thanks a bunch for this related info.

 

This is a normal behaviour(small speed for small files, larger speed for larger files), but it does not account for the big difference.

The difference comes from the use of "Windows 10", on "Windows 10" the bad parameters are upped(it works slowly on purpose so you can buy the better version). This is the "Microsoft" strategy and the reason behind the creation of "Windows 10".

Currently "Windows 7" is the best "Windows" on the market, but it would be wise to reconsider the use of "Windows" and pass on "Linux"(a good suggestion for beginners is Linux Ubuntu). Try to use a virtual machine and perform the same operation(virtual box or vmware player).

Hi again,

Well i noted that the "slow speed with small file sizes" when there are a large group of files has been even with Win7 where i noticed extreme slowdown for a large group of files that have smallish sizes.
For a quick comparison, take these two examples that both have the same total number of bytes:
[1] 5000 files each 50k to 300k in size totaling 1GB total bytes (average 200k per file).
[2] 10 files each 100MB in size also totaling 1GB total bytes.

The first one [1] above will take much much longer to copy or to compare to files on another drive that are the same (for backups) and to compare files it could take 2 to 5 minutes.
The second one [2] will take maybe 1 second per file for a total of 10 seconds, but could go as fast as 300MB per second which would finish in under 10 seconds.
The difference is so extreme.

I had read about this in the past and thought that there was a way to improve this but it required Win10. Now that i have Win10 to experiment with, i cant remember what the fix was and if it really works anyway.

On the SSD i can see astonishingly fast speeds like i've never seen before, but for a large group of small files it still slows down.

 

Install "Ubuntu Linux" and compare with it, then you will see the difference in the copying. Ubuntu is free(just download it from google).

I understand that you do not want to to change your environment, so I offer 2 options:

1. Install Ubuntu on a virtual machine and keep using Windows.
2. Install Ubuntu as a dual boot on 1 of your hard drives(it is recommended to use the whole hard drive and let ubuntu make its own swap partitions and set the partitions on certain places for higher efficiency). After installing Ubuntu on 1 of your hard drives, install a virual machine and load Windows as the guest in the virtual machine (Windows 7 would do).

 

Hello,

There are MANY more linux flavours.
On distrowatch you can find a description of the linux flavours:
https://distrowatch.com/

There are also many live linux cd/dvd available:
http://livecdlist.com/
A live cd/dvd can be used without installing the linux.

Bertus

 

Hi,

Thanks for the ideas i'll have to look into this again. It's been a long time since i played with Linux.

 

You could use smartmontools to have a look at the status:
https://www.smartmontools.org/
The tool can be downloaded here:
https://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/Download
https://sourceforge.net/projects/smartmontools/files/
Bertus

Hola @bertus

Just downloaded smartmontools, but the cryptic help does not help me!

While MrAl gets up to speed with Linux, could you guide me with the command line for smartctl?

The disk of interest is an old IDE HDD (connected via an USB interface) that I see listed as disk F. I would like smartctl to tell me how good or bad it is.

If this is considered a derail, I will ask it moved to a new thread. Gracias Bertus and MrAl.

 

Hello,

There is also a GUI available for smartmontools to make life easier:
https://gsmartcontrol.sourceforge.io/home/index.php/Downloads

Bertus

 

Hello,

There is also a GUI available for smartmontools to make life easier:
https://gsmartcontrol.sourceforge.io/home/index.php/Downloads

Bertus

Sure it did!
Gracias bertus.

 

Hola @bertus

Just downloaded smartmontools, but the cryptic help does not help me!

While MrAl gets up to speed with Linux, could you guide me with the command line for smartctl?

The disk of interest is an old IDE HDD (connected via an USB interface) that I see it listed as disk F. I would like smartctl to tell me how good or bad it is.

If this is considered a derail, I will ask it moved to a new thread. Gracias Bertus and MrAl.

Hi,

Actually the main point has changed a little anyway and this is interesting new information too that is related.
The smartmon looks interesting too, and i wonder if there is a version for Win10, 64 bit.

 

Hola @bertus

Just downloaded smartmontools, but the cryptic help does not help me!

While MrAl gets up to speed with Linux, could you guide me with the command line for smartctl?

The disk of interest is an old IDE HDD (connected via an USB interface) that I see it listed as disk F. I would like smartctl to tell me how good or bad it is.

If this is considered a derail, I will ask it moved to a new thread. Gracias Bertus and MrAl.

I do not mean to offend you or break your happy clicking, but I think threads should be as short as possible, because later it becomes a pain for whoever is reading them. If necessary please create a new thread.

 

Hi,

Actually the main point has changed a little anyway and this is interesting new information too that is related.
The smartmon looks interesting too, and i wonder if there is a version for Win10, 64 bit.

The install file does mention Win 10 as suitable with no further details.