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Can't move larger files to flash drives/SD cards

Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
edited March 2009 in Help / Advice Forum
So here's a weird one: I can't move any but the smallest files over USB/SD. The transfer will either stop in the middle and tell me the file has moved or the transfer will just stop moving. Not freeze or quit, but stop progressing. Then I can't access the flash drive/sd card in any way. If I right click it in My Computer to try to eject it, that window freezes. If I try to cancel the transfer, it says canceling but just stays like that. I've let it sit for over an hour. I can transfer anything less than 100 MB or so just fine but larger than that, it just breaks. I'm using Vista, if anyone thinks that's relevant. And I've tried multiple flash drives/SD cards that work just fine on other computers. So... any ideas? Because I'm stumped.

Vi Monks on
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Posts

  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Every single flash drive does this?

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    Every single flash drive does this?

    I've tried 3 flash drives and 2 SD cards. Same result every time.

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  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    What happens when you open up a dos window and do this:

    COPY c:\myLargeFile.iso z:\myLargeFile.iso [/CODE] Where c:\ and z:\ are your local file and the flash drive respectively.[CODE]
    COPY c:\myLargeFile.iso z:\myLargeFile.iso
    [/CODE]

    Where c:\ and z:\ are your local file and the flash drive respectively.

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    What happens when you open up a dos window and do this:

    COPY c:\myLargeFile.iso z:\myLargeFile.iso [/CODE] Where c:\ and z:\ are your local file and the flash drive respectively.[/QUOTE] I get the same message as when I try to copy it through explorer: "The system cannot find the file specified." Then when I refresh my flash drive, it appears empty. I tested copying a smaller file first and it worked just fine. The error message appeared six minutes after I started the transfer. Screenshot in the spoiler. [SPOILER][IMG]http://i88.photobucket.com/albums/k196/thurmanj/copyfail.jpg[/IMG][/SPOILER][CODE]
    COPY c:\myLargeFile.iso z:\myLargeFile.iso
    [/CODE]

    Where c:\ and z:\ are your local file and the flash drive respectively.

    I get the same message as when I try to copy it through explorer: "The system cannot find the file specified." Then when I refresh my flash drive, it appears empty. I tested copying a smaller file first and it worked just fine. The error message appeared six minutes after I started the transfer. Screenshot in the spoiler.
    Spoiler:

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  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Have you tried with anything besides the AVI? Also what's the size of the AVI specifically?

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    Have you tried with anything besides the AVI? Also what's the size of the AVI specifically?

    The AVI is 298 MB. I've tried with various other file types -- most of them video files but a few DVD images, texture files for various game mods, and some hi-res images. I haven't discerned a specific cut-off point but around 100 MB seems to be the rule of thumb.

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  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    I'm at a loss of ideas here. I'm guessing it's probably some software for the drive that loads up when you plug it in a la San Disk Cruz Micro drives, but you said all of them do it. And unless all of them are the same flash drive I find that unlikely.

    So it's either a piece of software acting like a cock block, windows, or just a fucked up virus playing games with you.

  • pacbowlpacbowl Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Yeah I'd say something is borked in Vista. You've ruled out the media as being bad, so it has to be something in Vista or some part of your hardware is bad, but I doubt that. Maybe a virus/malware scanner that's acting up?

    I know next to nothing about Vista (still an XP guy) so I got nothing except a reinstall.

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  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    pacbowl wrote: »
    Yeah I'd say something is borked in Vista. You've ruled out the media as being bad, so it has to be something in Vista or some part of your hardware is bad, but I doubt that. Maybe a virus/malware scanner that's acting up?

    I know next to nothing about Vista (still an XP guy) so I got nothing except a reinstall.

    I'd imagine a reinstall would fix it (after all, didn't have any problems back when I was on a fresh install) but the problem is that I can't get the stuff I want to keep off the computer in any reasonable way due to this very problem.

    I doubt it's a virus or malware, as I'm pretty safe about that kind of thing and my anti-virus/spyware turns up nothing (Avast for anti-virus, SuperAntiSpyware for spyware). But if it is a virus/malware or some other program messing with it, would trying the transfer in safe mode shed any light on the situation?

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  • DHS OdiumDHS Odium Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Have you tried using different formats for the flash drives? Try one with NTFS, FAT, FAT32, and exFat. See if that does anything.

  • ZeonZeon Registered User
    edited February 2009
    How much free space do you have on your C drive?

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  • pacbowlpacbowl Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Vi Monks wrote: »
    pacbowl wrote: »
    Yeah I'd say something is borked in Vista. You've ruled out the media as being bad, so it has to be something in Vista or some part of your hardware is bad, but I doubt that. Maybe a virus/malware scanner that's acting up?

    I know next to nothing about Vista (still an XP guy) so I got nothing except a reinstall.

    I'd imagine a reinstall would fix it (after all, didn't have any problems back when I was on a fresh install) but the problem is that I can't get the stuff I want to keep off the computer in any reasonable way due to this very problem.

    I doubt it's a virus or malware, as I'm pretty safe about that kind of thing and my anti-virus/spyware turns up nothing (Avast for anti-virus, SuperAntiSpyware for spyware). But if it is a virus/malware or some other program messing with it, would trying the transfer in safe mode shed any light on the situation?

    It probably isn't a virus on the computer itself, but some antivirus and/or malware suites can cause issues with USB devices. Maybe norton/mcafee/whatever is causing an issue with the usb drives? Safemode might work if you can get it to recognize the drive.

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  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    DHS Odium wrote: »
    Have you tried using different formats for the flash drives? Try one with NTFS, FAT, FAT32, and exFat. See if that does anything.

    The one I usually try is FAT. Reformatting it now to NTFS to see if it helps.
    Zeon wrote: »
    How much free space do you have on your C drive?

    72 out of 1000 gig.
    pacbowl wrote: »
    It probably isn't a virus on the computer itself, but some antivirus and/or malware suites can cause issues with USB devices. Maybe norton/mcafee/whatever is causing an issue with the usb drives? Safemode might work if you can get it to recognize the drive.

    I'll try safe mode after the formatting and such and see if that works.

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  • EdilithEdilith Registered User
    edited February 2009
    Have you tried zipping the file to see if it makes any difference?

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Safe mode doesn't work, formatting the flash drive doesn't work, zipping the file doesn't work. Same problem on all three. This is really mind-boggling.

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  • wunderbarwunderbar Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    can you try the cards in a different computer?

    honestly have your HDD at 90%+ capacity is never a good thing. I'd look at getting a second drive anyway.

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    wunderbar wrote: »
    can you try the cards in a different computer?

    honestly have your HDD at 90%+ capacity is never a good thing. I'd look at getting a second drive anyway.

    The cards all work fine on another computer. Could having a nearly full hard drive be causing this problem? Or rather, why is having the hard drive at 90%+ not such a good thing?

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  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    With a drive that large it won't.

    The fact that it starts happening around a certain point makes me question if there's some sort of local caching mechanism trying to do it's job but is FUBAR. But it could just be some malware that you can't quite point your finger at. But I bet a windows reinstall will fix it.

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    With a drive that large it won't.

    The fact that it starts happening around a certain point makes me question if there's some sort of local caching mechanism trying to do it's job but is FUBAR. But it could just be some malware that you can't quite point your finger at. But I bet a windows reinstall will fix it.

    Yeah, I agree with the last point. The problem is getting the stuff off that I need to keep. Might just have to burn a bunch of DVDs.

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  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Why not a network connection?

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    Why not a network connection?

    That might be possible if my roommate's computer has enough hard drive space on it.

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  • DHS OdiumDHS Odium Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Download and burn a linux live cd, like Ubuntu. You can boot with that, and access all of your windows files, and then put them on the flash drives. If the flash drives still don't work after this, then it's probably hardware related.

  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Yes I can't believe I didn't think of that. That'll help you determine what it is.

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    DHS Odium wrote: »
    Download and burn a linux live cd, like Ubuntu. You can boot with that, and access all of your windows files, and then put them on the flash drives. If the flash drives still don't work after this, then it's probably hardware related.

    Excellent. Though I have no experience whatsoever with Linux. Is it simple enough to figure out?

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  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Burn the iso, keep flash drive attached to PC, reboot PC with CD in the drive, boot into linux, you should even see a Windows folder on the desktop. Go in there and try to copy stuff to the flash drive (there'll probably even be an icon for that too).

  • wunderbarwunderbar Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    Yes I can't believe I didn't think of that. That'll help you determine what it is.

    yea, I think we fail at everything for not thinking of that.

    And as for why having the HDD's too full is a bad thing, I've just found over the years that windows does some really weird things if the hard drive gets too full.

  • bowenbowen Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    If you're dangerously low, but 10% of a 1TB drive isn't exactly low.

    When you start going below 100meg, windows begins to have lots of issues.

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    Burn the iso, keep flash drive attached to PC, reboot PC with CD in the drive, boot into linux, you should even see a Windows folder on the desktop. Go in there and try to copy stuff to the flash drive (there'll probably even be an icon for that too).

    Righto. Downloading now (slowly). Hopefully this will at least shed some light on things.

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  • wunderbarwunderbar Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    bowen wrote: »
    If you're dangerously low, but 10% of a 1TB drive isn't exactly low.

    When you start going below 100meg, windows begins to have lots of issues.

    Sure, if you get below X MB, it has a fit, but I've seen many times windows really complain when the drive is higher than 90% capacity, no matter what the capacity is. It just doesn't like such a high percentage.

  • CrashtardCrashtard Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    wunderbar wrote: »
    bowen wrote: »
    If you're dangerously low, but 10% of a 1TB drive isn't exactly low.

    When you start going below 100meg, windows begins to have lots of issues.

    Sure, if you get below X MB, it has a fit, but I've seen many times windows really complain when the drive is higher than 90% capacity, no matter what the capacity is. It just doesn't like such a high percentage.

    I've seen this too, but I've also seen it where it's fine till it gets down to around 150MB or so. I think windows is just weird that way. Seems like it's always different for different people.

    As far as the OP's problem, I'd echo the caching being borked. I'd just reinstall windows if it were me.

    I pinky swear that we will not screw you.

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  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited February 2009
    Well I tried in Linux and had some odd results, though none too promising. Perhaps I should have mentioned it earlier, but whenever I try to transfer a file and it fails, when I take out the flash disc and put it back in, the file is there, but corrupted. It takes up the same amount of space as the original, same name, same extension -- it just doesn't work. So when I booted up Linux, I couldn't find my Windows file structure but the flash drive was available. So I copied one of my previous attempts from the flash drive (a 128 MB zip file) to some random folder in Linux. No problems. I then deleted it from the flash drive and copied it back. Again, no problems. But I wasn't totally satisfied with this so I deleted the .zip from the flash drive and found some random 650 MB file in one of the Linux folders and tried to copy that. It failed about 160 MB in -- said it was an input/output error. So that pretty much means it's a hardware problem, doesn't it? D:

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  • DHS OdiumDHS Odium Registered User regular
    edited March 2009
    I think it might be. How many USB ports are there on your computer? Have you tried them all?

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited March 2009
    DHS Odium wrote: »
    I think it might be. How many USB ports are there on your computer? Have you tried them all?

    I can't say for sure that I've tried all of them but I've tried quite a few. I have seven ports on my computer and four in my keyboard and I've tried at least half of all of those at various points.

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  • exoplasmexoplasm Registered User
    edited March 2009
    Have you tried USB ports directly attached to the motherboard (i.e. in the back)?

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  • FeralFeral Who needs a medical license when you've got style? Registered User regular
    edited March 2009
    My guess is that your USB controller is probably borked.

    It's a rare problem, but it can happen.

    If that's the case, a $20 PCI USB card would fix the problem.

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  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited March 2009
    exoplasm wrote: »
    Have you tried USB ports directly attached to the motherboard (i.e. in the back)?

    I have. Same results.
    Feral wrote: »
    My guess is that your USB controller is probably borked.

    It's a rare problem, but it can happen.

    If that's the case, a $20 PCI USB card would fix the problem.

    If that's the case, that's excellent. When you guys said "hardware problem," I heard "buy a new motherboard" so if I only have to get a PCI USB, I'll be a happy man.

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  • DHS OdiumDHS Odium Registered User regular
    edited March 2009
    Don't even need to spend $20.
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815124008

    One last thing I might try, is to have all other USB device unplugged. I honestly don't know enough about this, but it could work. Could something somehow be drawing too much power,or disrupting the other ports? Do you have any PS/2 keyboards and mice to try this with?

  • Vi MonksVi Monks Registered User regular
    edited March 2009
    DHS Odium wrote: »
    Don't even need to spend $20.
    http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815124008

    One last thing I might try, is to have all other USB device unplugged. I honestly don't know enough about this, but it could work. Could something somehow be drawing too much power,or disrupting the other ports? Do you have any PS/2 keyboards and mice to try this with?

    I have a PS/2 mouse around here somewhere....

    I'll give it a shot. Thanks for all the help/link -- and that goes for everyone.

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