Transfer speeds very slow

jr8801

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May 24, 2011
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I have a Samsung spinpoint f3 and i am trying to transfer some stuff to a usb 3.0 Goflex 1.5tb drive. I started at 325 mb/s and quickly stumbled to 14 mb/s.... I transferred the same data to a usb 2.0 drive and got 30 mb/s constant.

I have a gigabyte GA-Z68A-D3H-B3 motherboard. which has two usb 3.0 inputs.

Anybody know why im getting so slow of transfer speeds to my usb 3.0 drive.
 
Solution
The usb 3.0 high bandwidth allows for really fast emptying of the fast disk cache in the initial moment (burst rate), and leave the mechanically slow hard disk platter to transfer small files, requiring constant stop to seek new file. In contrasts, in usb 2.0, the mechanical hard disk also transfer at 15MBps but since bandwidth bottleneck restrict the emptying of the cache in burst at the beginning, the data in the fast cache linger and is transfered at the same time as the platter data to saturate the 30MBps, giving it a more average speed. Now, if you have larger continuous file, like a any file over say 0.3GB. Because there is little seek for small file, hard disk platter will rotate without stopping. usb 3.0 will not be a bottleneck...


Ok that is the problem. 120 GB of music (comprise of thousands of 3-5MB small file as well as KB size album art) instead of one continuous 130 GB file. 15MBish is normal. How about the 20G you later send, is it also one continuous or comprise of many small files?
 

jr8801

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Yes it is...But why would i get 30. mb/s with a 2.0 usb and slower with a 3.0. even when i plug the 3.0 into a 2.0 slot it still have very low speeds. i was going to give my brother my 2tb usb 2.0 but its better than the 3.0.
 
The usb 3.0 high bandwidth allows for really fast emptying of the fast disk cache in the initial moment (burst rate), and leave the mechanically slow hard disk platter to transfer small files, requiring constant stop to seek new file. In contrasts, in usb 2.0, the mechanical hard disk also transfer at 15MBps but since bandwidth bottleneck restrict the emptying of the cache in burst at the beginning, the data in the fast cache linger and is transfered at the same time as the platter data to saturate the 30MBps, giving it a more average speed. Now, if you have larger continuous file, like a any file over say 0.3GB. Because there is little seek for small file, hard disk platter will rotate without stopping. usb 3.0 will not be a bottleneck because the interface bandwidth is greater than the hard disk output. On the other hand, usb 2.0 is bottlenecking the mechanical hard disk because of its limited bandwidth. In large file, usb 3.0 will be about 180 to 300% faster than usb 2.0. Find a continuous large file to transfer. I will be surprise if usb 3.0 is slower than usb 2.0.
 
Solution

jr8801

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May 24, 2011
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Ok back with results. I transferred a 18.7 gb MKV single file from my 2tb Usb 2.0 to my internal samsung spinpoint. this took 10 minutes at a constant 35 mb/s.

Then i transferred the same MKV from my internal samsung spinpoint to my goflex 3.0 1.5tb drive. This was taking well over 45 minutes. Very Very slow speed something like 9.84 mb/s. So i cancelled it.

So i transferred the Same MKV from my internal samsung to my external 2tb 2.0 drive. This took roughly 10 minutes at the same 30ish mb/s.

I decided to copy a 20 gb music folder from my usb 3.0 goflex drive and transferred it to my samsung internal and was getting an average of 90 mb/s....So i found that the only way to transfer fast is from the external to the internal. I would rather it be the other way around...


Also i have two internal harddrives both 1tb (spinpoint and wd cavi) is there a way to use one to speed up the other. I think its called Raid 0 but it seems that you need an ssd? Any help in this direction would be appreciated as well.
 

jr8801

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Ok defragged all three of my drives. all said about 3% fragmented before. Completed the defrag and tried my test again.

Transferred a 15 gb mkv movie file from 2tb Usb 2.0 drive to my Internal samsung spinpoint. This transferred at 34 mb/s a slight increase.

Then i tried to transfer the same file to my Goflex 3.0 usb drive from my internal. Started off fast for about 2gb, then same thing went down actually even further then before i defragged to 8-9 mb/s. Took little bit over an hour or two. i dont remember exactly.

Transferred the file of the Goflex back to my spinpoint at pretty good speed 60ish mb/s. didnt take more than 10 minutes.

Tried to transfer smaller but more complicated folder (as it has a bunch of Flac Files= 10mb total of about 10gb). Again started off amazing and by 2gb it was going way to slow.

I ended up transferring all my music (140ish gb) back to my external 2.0 2tb usb drive and had an average of about 35-40 mb/s.

This 3.0 drive is not all it is cracked up to be.

Also i was wondering about speeding my internal drives up. I have two 1 tb internal drives. Can i run these in Raid 0 and will it make a difference? and if so any kind of walkthroughs/tutorials to help me get my drives in this state that would be great.
 
So it was 1 internal drive and now you have a raid0, correct? Lets not complicates things further because if one of your drive have a problem, you raid0 is likely to suffer to. I will run S.M.A.R.T on single drive, the one that is slow. Go through the stats for issues. Also, since it is the internal drive that is slow, I also think you should put it on another port and update bios/driver (if available).
 

jr8801

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ok well i just disabled raid0, changed the drive to different sata port. and reinstalled windows 7. Its just about done. so when done i will install all motherboard drivers, graphics driver, and update windows. then how do i run S.M.A.R.T? is there a program to do this? or is it built into windows system? im on windows 7 ultimate x64