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You might need to set the write cache mode. Open Windows Explorer and find the flash drive in the left
pane. Right-click on it, then choose "Properties". Then click the "Hardware" tab, and click the "Properties"
button there.
At the bottom of this screen, click the "Change Settings" button. Click the "Policies" tab. Now click the
"Better Performance" radio button and click "OK".
This enables write caching on the thumb drive, but you MUST use Windows "Safely Remove Hardware"
option (click the icon on the taskbar) whenever you take the thumb drive out or else you might lose data.
"the folder does contain over 1000 files, but that shouldn't matter right?"
It probably takes more time to copy more files than it does to copy fewer, but that alone doesn't account for
the difference you're seeing, if it's the same flash drive.
....
USB 2.0 has a maximum theoretical bandwidth of 480 MBit/s = 60 MBytes/s (8 bits per byte), or 48
MBytes/s (10 bits per byte; 8 for data, 2 for "overhead" - all SATA hard drives use 10 bits per byte when
transferring data) but you never get that in the real world.
You're fortunate if you get 3x MBytes/s.
.....
"The System always reserves some USB bandwidth for it's use. For Windows look here:
Device Manager (devmgmt.msc)
Universal Serial Bus Controllers, untree this (click the plus sign)
Select any of the "Blah blah blah USB Universal Host Controller / USB2 Enhanced Host Controller"
Right Click > Properties
Advanced Tab (at the top)
Most..." operating "...systems today reserve 10% of the bandwidth "
.....
NOTE - the "Enhanced" Host Controllers listed there are the USB 2.0 (or USB 3.0) host controllers. If you
don't see any "Enhanced" Host Controllers there, the built in support Windows has for USB 2.0 (or USB
3.0 ?) has NOT been installed in Windows.
If you have installed Windows from scratch, after Setup has finished, it has only USB 1.1 support installed in
Windows.
The USB 2.0 (or USB 3.0) support is NOT installed in Windows until AFTER you have loaded the main chipset
drivers for your mboard.
.....
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...
Excerpt:
Though USB 2.0 supports data transfer rates of slightly better than 30 MB/sec, modern Flash memory chips
can't yet match those speeds.
.....
The max data transfer rate of a flash drive varies greatly depending on which circuitry (chip or chips) it has.
The faster the circuitry can run at, the better result you'll get.
Older flash drive models have lower data transfer rates.
E.g. A comparison of recent and fairly recent flash drive models
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...
.....
The data transfer rate you get also depends on what else the operating system is doing at the time. You
can't compare data transfer rates unless that's the same.
.....
If the hard drive partition Windows itself was installed on is too full, that will slow down everything in
Windows. That partition should have about 10% free space or more.
There are many other reasons for Windows running slower than it once did, and if it's runnig slower that will
affect max data transfer speeds.
pane. Right-click on it, then choose "Properties". Then click the "Hardware" tab, and click the "Properties"
button there.
At the bottom of this screen, click the "Change Settings" button. Click the "Policies" tab. Now click the
"Better Performance" radio button and click "OK".
This enables write caching on the thumb drive, but you MUST use Windows "Safely Remove Hardware"
option (click the icon on the taskbar) whenever you take the thumb drive out or else you might lose data.
"the folder does contain over 1000 files, but that shouldn't matter right?"
It probably takes more time to copy more files than it does to copy fewer, but that alone doesn't account for
the difference you're seeing, if it's the same flash drive.
....
USB 2.0 has a maximum theoretical bandwidth of 480 MBit/s = 60 MBytes/s (8 bits per byte), or 48
MBytes/s (10 bits per byte; 8 for data, 2 for "overhead" - all SATA hard drives use 10 bits per byte when
transferring data) but you never get that in the real world.
You're fortunate if you get 3x MBytes/s.
.....
"The System always reserves some USB bandwidth for it's use. For Windows look here:
Device Manager (devmgmt.msc)
Universal Serial Bus Controllers, untree this (click the plus sign)
Select any of the "Blah blah blah USB Universal Host Controller / USB2 Enhanced Host Controller"
Right Click > Properties
Advanced Tab (at the top)
Most..." operating "...systems today reserve 10% of the bandwidth "
.....
NOTE - the "Enhanced" Host Controllers listed there are the USB 2.0 (or USB 3.0) host controllers. If you
don't see any "Enhanced" Host Controllers there, the built in support Windows has for USB 2.0 (or USB
3.0 ?) has NOT been installed in Windows.
If you have installed Windows from scratch, after Setup has finished, it has only USB 1.1 support installed in
Windows.
The USB 2.0 (or USB 3.0) support is NOT installed in Windows until AFTER you have loaded the main chipset
drivers for your mboard.
.....
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...
Excerpt:
Though USB 2.0 supports data transfer rates of slightly better than 30 MB/sec, modern Flash memory chips
can't yet match those speeds.
.....
The max data transfer rate of a flash drive varies greatly depending on which circuitry (chip or chips) it has.
The faster the circuitry can run at, the better result you'll get.
Older flash drive models have lower data transfer rates.
E.g. A comparison of recent and fairly recent flash drive models
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews...
.....
The data transfer rate you get also depends on what else the operating system is doing at the time. You
can't compare data transfer rates unless that's the same.
.....
If the hard drive partition Windows itself was installed on is too full, that will slow down everything in
Windows. That partition should have about 10% free space or more.
There are many other reasons for Windows running slower than it once did, and if it's runnig slower that will
affect max data transfer speeds.
