"Out of memory" when copying files

I'm trying to copy files from a smaller external hard drive into a larger one. I first tried just highlighting the biggest file, selecting copy, going to the new drive and selecting paste. The copying process started but after a few minutes I got the error message "out of memory". So I've been trying to copy smaller sections of files to try and get around this problem. Sometimes it works but sometimes I still get the out of memory message.

How do I fix this? When trying to copy 1.8TB of files being able to do it all at one time would really help. Having to go down to 10gb or so each time would really drag this process out.

Start File Explorer, arrange it so that the files or folders to be copied are in the right window and the destination folder is in the left window. Right-click the files or folders to be copied and, while holding the right-click, drag them to the destination folder in the left window, release and select "Copy here".

Ben

Are both drives formatted as NTFS? You can get that misleading error message if the destination drive is formatted as FAT32.

If you have an AV/antimalware product in use, have you tried temporarily disabling it during file copying?

If the destination drive is an HDD, could it be that the destination drive's onboard cache is being swamped temporarily? (I've noticed that with some makes, copying speed can plummet after a minute or so.)

RickC said:

Are both drives formatted as NTFS? You can get that misleading error message if the destination drive is formatted as FAT32.

If you have an AV/antimalware product in use, have you tried temporarily disabling it during file copying?

If the destination drive is an HDD, could it be that the destination drive's onboard cache is being swamped temporarily? (I've noticed that with some makes, copying speed can plummet after a minute or so.)

Yes both drives are formatted as NTFS.

I haven't tried disabling McAfee during copying.

How much memory do you have installed? Have you tried to install more memory?

Drag and drop isn't as hard as it might seem. Don't use left-click and drag, it moves the files instead of copying. Right-click gives you the option to move, copy or even cancel. Copy and paste may seem easier, but copy tries to put all the files and folders into the clipboard, which resides in memory and if you're expecting to put 1.8 TB worth of files into memory, it can't really be done.

Ben

File explorer is absolutely the worst method of copying a large amount of data. I recommend using Freefilesync:
FreeFileSync: Open Source File Synchronization Backup Software

I copy off whole volumes routinely with File Explorer. I use right click copy then right click paste as opposed to right click drag and drop, though either should work equivalently. Copy and paste does not swap the whole of the files in and out of the clipboard, that makes no sense as it would be the most inefficient use of resources. File Explorer does the data transfer in either case through DMA as anyone would expect.

Never had a problem using File Explorer for large volume transfers unless there was a hardware issue with the drive, which I've experienced with USB thumb drives on occasion, not always the most reliable things. For backups and disk mirroring I mainly use portable SSD units on USB SuperSpeed+ which are much faster and more reliable. Though thumb drives are more convenient and cost effective for smaller volumes.

With respect to the OP's issue, I don't have much to offer in terms of troubleshooting, but I would look for a hardware problem first before suspecting a software problem.

ricardobohner said:

How much memory do you have installed? Have you tried to install more memory?

8GB. I haven't tried to install more memory. It takes memory just to make copies of files?