Guest Anthony R. Gold Posted July 6, 2008 Posted July 6, 2008 I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit more memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one behaviour is mystifying me - deleting very large files is very slow. By very large I mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 minutes. No error messages, nothing locked AFAICT, just mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same type of deletion is instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the same behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached drives. * I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ DriveImage or Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make space for newer ones. Anyone got any ideas? Tony
Guest Pegasus \(MVP\) Posted July 6, 2008 Posted July 6, 2008 Re: Slow file deletion "Anthony R. Gold" <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> wrote in message news:mid274dd90hk07ftjqdhlr66utuj7off11@4ax.com... > I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit more > memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one behaviour is > mystifying me - deleting very large files is very slow. By very large I > mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 minutes. No error messages, > nothing locked AFAICT, just mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same > type > of deletion is instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the > same behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether > deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached > drives. > > * I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ DriveImage or > Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make space for newer ones. > > Anyone got any ideas? > > Tony You need to determine the cause by the usual process of elimination: Launch msconfig.exe, then disable all tasks under the Startup tab. Disconnect your machine from the Internet while the virus scanner is disabled. You can now reactivat the disabled tasks in pairs until you have found the culprit. Use this command from the Command Prompt to create a 10 GByte test file quickly: fsutil.exe file createnew d:\big.bin 10000000000
Guest Philip Herlihy Posted July 6, 2008 Posted July 6, 2008 Re: Slow file deletion Anthony R. Gold wrote: > I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit more > memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one behaviour is > mystifying me - deleting very large files is very slow. By very large I > mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 minutes. No error messages, > nothing locked AFAICT, just mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same type > of deletion is instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the > same behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether > deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached drives. > > * I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ DriveImage or > Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make space for newer ones. > > Anyone got any ideas? > > Tony Not running a search facility (eg Google desktop) are you? Phil, London
Guest Anthony R. Gold Posted July 6, 2008 Posted July 6, 2008 Re: Slow file deletion On Mon, 07 Jul 2008 00:14:57 +0100, Philip Herlihy <thiswillbounceback@you.com> wrote: > Anthony R. Gold wrote: >> I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit more >> memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one behaviour is >> mystifying me - deleting very large files is very slow. By very large I >> mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 minutes. No error messages, >> nothing locked AFAICT, just mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same type >> of deletion is instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the >> same behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether >> deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached drives. >> >> * I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ DriveImage or >> Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make space for newer ones. >> >> Anyone got any ideas? >> >> Tony > > Not running a search facility (eg Google desktop) are you? No, indeed not even XP's Indexing Service. Tony
Guest jasee Posted July 7, 2008 Posted July 7, 2008 Re: Slow file deletion Anthony R. Gold wrote: > On Mon, 07 Jul 2008 00:14:57 +0100, Philip Herlihy > <thiswillbounceback@you.com> wrote: > >> Anthony R. Gold wrote: >>> I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit >>> more memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one >>> behaviour is mystifying me - deleting very large files is very >>> slow. By very large I mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 >>> minutes. No error messages, nothing locked AFAICT, just >>> mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same type of deletion is >>> instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the same >>> behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether >>> deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached >>> drives. >>> >>> * I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ >>> DriveImage or Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make >>> space for newer ones. >>> >>> Anyone got any ideas? >>> >> >> Not running a search facility (eg Google desktop) are you? > > No, indeed not even XP's Indexing Service. I would have thought framentation might be a peoblem as it sounds as though the drives/partitions are pretty full. Byt it's quick in safe mode you say. Any error messages in Event log? Saying for instance that the drive controller wasn't responding quickly enough? What make? Dells for instance are preloaded with so much software.
Guest Invalid Posted July 7, 2008 Posted July 7, 2008 Re: Slow file deletion In message <mid274dd90hk07ftjqdhlr66utuj7off11@4ax.com>, Anthony R. Gold <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> writes >I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit more >memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one behaviour is >mystifying me - deleting very large files is very slow. By very large I >mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 minutes. No error messages, >nothing locked AFAICT, just mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same type >of deletion is instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the >same behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether >deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached drives. > >* I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ DriveImage or >Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make space for newer ones. > >Anyone got any ideas? > >Tony Is it similarly slow moving them? Could be your virus checker being over enthusiastic and scanning the file. Depending on how XP does a deletion, it could be scanning multiple times. Can you tell it to ignore files with whatever extension Ghost uses for its archives? -- Peter R Cook
Guest Anthony R. Gold Posted July 7, 2008 Posted July 7, 2008 Re: Slow file deletion On Mon, 7 Jul 2008 10:39:07 +0100, Invalid <news@wisty.plus.com.invalid> wrote: > In message <mid274dd90hk07ftjqdhlr66utuj7off11@4ax.com>, Anthony R. Gold > <not-for-mail@ahjg.co.uk> writes >> I've just started with a new laptop - much like others except a bit more >> memory (2GB) and faster HDD (7.2k SATA) under XP and one behaviour is >> mystifying me - deleting very large files is very slow. By very large I >> mean over 10GB(*) and by slow I mean over 15 minutes. No error messages, >> nothing locked AFAICT, just mysteriously very very slow. BTW the same type >> of deletion is instantaneous when done in safe mode. And also I get the >> same behaviours (fast under safe mode and slow under normal XP) whether >> deleting large files from the local SATA drive or from USB attached drives. >> >> * I need to do this as I make successive backups using PQ DriveImage or >> Ghost 10 and old archives need to be removed to make space for newer ones. >> >> Anyone got any ideas? >> >> Tony > Is it similarly slow moving them? As I just want rid of old archives I've never tried that. And anyway I'm not sure what it would prove. > Could be your virus checker being over enthusiastic and scanning the > file. Depending on how XP does a deletion, it could be scanning > multiple times. Closing down Norton makes no different. Deleting using cmd.exe and the del command is equally slow. No other processes are showing any activity during the deletions. > Can you tell it to ignore files with whatever extension Ghost uses for > its archives? Renaming the files from .v2i used by DriveImage and Ghost 10 to something different does not speed their deletion. Tony
Recommended Posts