Copying large files consumes too much memory

[Pecarosh]

Hi,
I have problem.
When I'm copying large files from from C disc to D disc (two phisical hdd drives) it consumer all my free memory. First it starts really fast, transfer rate is cca. 80-90MB/s, and when it fills all avaliable memory (I'm monitoring task manager) then it starts to slow, to 10-20MB/s till copying is finished. During that time working anything else in windows is almost impossible as everything is very slow. Strange thing is, when I'm copying reverse from D disc to C disk everything is as it should be, during copying transfer rate stays at 80-90MB/s, it consumes some 200-300MB of memory, and windows response is statisfying. I have a fresh installed Windows 7, before that I have XP.
My hardware: MBO Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-DS4H, CPU AMD 940, RAM 2x2GB kingston, HDD 2xWD green 10EADS
Software: Windows 7 ultimate N

Thanks

 

[ISVDevelopers]

What is the file system of the C and D drives?

Where is your temp directory?

How much free space on both drives?

What command are you using to copy the file?

How are the drives attached? (IDE, SCSI, USB, etc)

Regards,
Greg Oliver
ISV Architect Evangelist
Microsoft Corporation

 

[richc46]

Try the memory diagnostic test, in search type windows memory dia... See what happens.

 

[Pecarosh]

What is the file system of the C and D drives?

Where is your temp directory?

How much free space on both drives?

What command are you using to copy the file?

How are the drives attached? (IDE, SCSI, USB, etc)

Regards,
Greg Oliver
ISV Architect Evangelist
Microsoft Corporation

File system: NTFS on both drives
Temp dir: od D disc set to 2048MB (also tried default settings)
Free space: C drive=700GB, D drive=200GB
Total commander 7.50a (but tried also with windows explorer, same thing happens)
Drives attached via SATA controller on board

All windows updates applied,
Antivirus sw: ESET NOD32 4.0.474.0

 

[Pecarosh]

Try the memory diagnostic test, in search type windows memory dia... See what happens.

Thanks for suggestion, test runned, diagnostic tool said everything is OK with memory

 

[richc46]

Next time it happens type event viewer in search. Find out if you can spot anything. Take a look at your perfomance montior when the problem happens.

 

[GrandPaFred]

I'd think Nod32 Antivirus is scanning those xfering file thus slowing everything down.

Try disabling Nod32 [r-click icon near clock - turn off 'antivirus/antispyware']

transfer big file and once completed remember to restart Nod32 protection

 

[Qdos]

Using a synchronisation program will not rely on the same memory intensive processes and will drastically improve performance from your system when you need to transfer files between drives

 

[Pecarosh]

Next time it happens type event viewer in search. Find out if you can spot anything. Take a look at your perfomance montior when the problem happens.

Huh, in event viewer is a large amount of data that I don't know how to interpret. Same goes for performance monitor, nothing there that catch my eye.

I'd think Nod32 Antivirus is scanning those xfering file thus slowing everything down.

Try disabling Nod32 [r-click icon near clock - turn off 'antivirus/antispyware']

transfer big file and once completed remember to restart Nod32 protection

Already tried disabling file protection in NOD32, that's not the problem. Or maybe should I try to uninstall NOD32?

 

[Dzomlija]

Does using Microsoft SyncToy 2.1 also produce this memory usage problem?

 

[computersplus]

Bios Setings

Have a look at the bios and see if the SATA controller is set to ACHI if so try IDE mode for both SATA chanels for the two drives ACHI mode has issues on a lot of boards.

Also are you running with no swap file?

 

[Pecarosh]

Have a look at the bios and see if the SATA controller is set to ACHI if so try IDE mode for both SATA chanels for the two drives ACHI mode has issues on a lot of boards.

Also are you running with no swap file?

Swap file is set to 2GB (2048MB) on disc D manually.
SATA controller is set to IDE in BIOS (other options are raid and achi, but never used them).

 

[Dzomlija]

Have a look at the bios and see if the SATA controller is set to ACHI if so try IDE mode for both SATA chanels for the two drives ACHI mode has issues on a lot of boards.

Also are you running with no swap file?

Swap file is set to 2GB (2048MB) on disc D manually.
SATA controller is set to IDE in BIOS (other options are raid and achi, but never used them).

Try resetting your swap file to "System Managed". I've found that anything else has a tendency to slow performance, as the swap file cannot be dynamically adjusted according to demand.

 

[computersplus]

Swap File

So your swap file is on the second drive I have done that on XP and Vista without issue but I have not tried in 7... I would put the swap file back on C and system managed as mentioned and see if that helps.

 

[Dzomlija]

So your swap file is on the second drive I have done that on XP and Vista without issue but I have not tried in 7... I would put the swap file back on C and system managed as mentioned and see if that helps.

It doesn't really matter where the swap file is located, as long as it is set to System Managed...

 

[computersplus]

Swap File

The swap usually performs better on the beginning track of a second physical drive I have always had my system setup that way but I did not do it when I installed Windows 7 so for the sake of trying to figure this out I would just go with what we know should not be a problem.

 

[Pecarosh]

So your swap file is on the second drive I have done that on XP and Vista without issue but I have not tried in 7... I would put the swap file back on C and system managed as mentioned and see if that helps.

The swap usually performs better on the beginning track of a second physical drive I have always had my system setup that way but I did not do it when I installed Windows 7 so for the sake of trying to figure this out I would just go with what we know should not be a problem.

Swap file was set to D drive yesterday, until then it was windows managed as default. I change it to D drive only to find out is there a problem with copying files which I first time discovered some 5 days ago. I will set it to default setting again.

@Dzomlija: I will try Microsoft SyncToy 2.1 later and give feedback here

 

[computersplus]

Cables

Try swapping the SATA cables and see if it causes the reverse of the issue you are having or even try to replace them if you have spares

 

[computersplus]

Diagnostics

run the diagnostic tools for those drive makes and see what they report also

 

[Filip]

I'd think Nod32 Antivirus is scanning those xfering file thus slowing everything down.

Try disabling Nod32 [r-click icon near clock - turn off 'antivirus/antispyware']

transfer big file and once completed remember to restart Nod32 protection

Already tried disabling file protection in NOD32, that's not the problem. Or maybe should I try to uninstall NOD32?

Try turning off Advanced Heuristics in NOD32, I also had this problem, but on my old PC with XP, and turning this off solved the problem completely.