copy and paste runs very slowly and never did before.

I had to copy and paste a very important file to my external backup hard drive. I do this at least once a month. Last month the file was 121GB and took 7 hours to transfer which is normal. Maximum amount of speed was in MB/s.

This month file size was 122GB and took 3 1/4 days to finish. Maximum amount of speed during transfer was about 710 KB/s.

Other than a recent MS update,I did nothing to the computer. What would cause such a drastic slowing of the transfer?
How would i go about trying to fix this problem? I have Win 10 64 bit, version: 1903 (OS Build 18362.535) . Thank you. Dave

thomaseg1
It's a USB 2.0 hub. The computer is an HP Presario P6716F with 12 GB RAM. Internal drive is 2TB. Total usage on the internal drive is 418.2GB. External 2TB drive is accessed thru the USB hub.I don't have a 3.0 interface. It may be slow, but that's the way it's been for as long as I can remember (except for the most recent transfer). I can live with 7 hours but not 3 1/4 days!

How would you check the drives for errors? Wouldn't the internal drive be the one most likely at fault if there is an error?
Thank you for your quick reply..

RolandJS
Powered through an ac adapter connected through a 4 port hub (to the external hard drive) and then into the PC's front USB port.

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thomaseg1
OK, i'll replace the cable and connect the external drive directly to another PC hub without using the 4 port hub.
I'll try that either this weekend or very early in the morning when i'm not busy.. DD

It's a good idea to turn write cache on external drives too. It can make a huge difference, specially when copying a lot of small files (not your case I know), but always safe eject media.

I used the old cable because I didn't have a new one. I connected the cable directly into a port on the front of my computer. I copy and pasted 122 GB yesterday and the speed was for me, the normal (7 hours) . At least it didn't take 3 days which may have just been an anomaly. Wish I knew how to get the speed down to 30 minutes time which thomaseg1 got on four times the amount of Gigs.

Deaf Dave said:

I used the old cable because I didn't have a new one. I connected the cable directly into a port on the front of my computer. I copy and pasted 122 GB yesterday and the speed was for me, the normal (7 hours) . At least it didn't take 3 days which may have just been an anomaly. Wish I knew how to get the speed down to 30 minutes time which thomaseg1 got on four times the amount of Gigs.

Hi there

definitely something wrong

I'm regularly getting 90 MB/s transfer rate over a fast wifi internet connection over a LAN . Check that USB3 ports enabled and if the external devices need power make sure power is supplied.

If you have access to another machine test the transfer rate on that -- it's (IMO) unlikely to be defective hardware --that type of hardware usually will work properly or not at all.

I've regularly copied around 2 -3 TB from NAS to backup external drive in around 4 hours -- approx 1.5 hrs per TB through USB 3 connection.

Cheers
jimbo