Windows 7, Deleting Large files is extremely slow. (Not going to recycle bin, permanent delete)

Anonymous
2009-12-13T14:37:28+00:00

It is taking a huge amount of time to delete files.

The files are not going to recycle bin (I am hold shift while hitting the Delete key)

Also I have even tried shutting off the recycle bin

I have timed a few of these

Single file delete, 2.6 gb, 2 minutes 14 seconds

Single file delete, 1.9 gb, 1 minutes 44 seconds

Single file delete, 230 mb, 0 minutes 24 seconds

Most of the time the dialog window that pops up says "Calculating..."

Judging by the times, This has something to do with file size.

I get similar time when I delete from the command prompt.

Windows XP would do permanent deletes and moves (on the same drive) in a split second, especially since we are talking about one file.

I work with large image files regularly. I can't wait 2 plus minutes every time I delete one of these files when I may have to move or delete a few hundred at a time.

I am getting very frustrated with Windows 7.

So far...

I have disabled Remote Differential Compression (RDC)

I have disabled TCP AutoTuning and Receive Side Scaling

                netsh interface tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled (AND)

                netsh interface tcp set global rss=disabled  (And rebooted)

There are no removable drives, USB devices, or other attached devices other that the keyboard and mouse.

I have disabled

Windows Search and Indexing

I am viewing "Details" only in windows explorer (No Thumbnails)

I have shut off IPv6 support (I read about it somewhere but I believe it was to do with network operations, but I tried it anyway)

Teredo Tunneling Pseudo-Interface is disabled

All Drivers are up to date.

I have completely wiped the drive and reloaded the OS.

This is on a 1tb storage drive, no RAID, 3gb SATA drive (Seagate 7200.12)

Windows 7 64bit (Windows experience is listed as 6.1)

Intel i5 processor with 4gig memory

Fresh install, fast hard drive (OS).

Avast AV

Not much else running

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Files, folders, and storage

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  1. Anonymous
    2012-05-04T13:38:49+00:00

    I had forgotten about RMDIR!  I've taken the long way around to solve the problem but I'm going to try some directory pruning on a couple of other systems using RMDIR.

    Thanks!

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  2. Anonymous
    2012-05-04T07:47:31+00:00

    I've tried everything in this thread and the problem still exests (Windows 7 x64).  Specifically, I'm trying to cleanup an uninstall of the Chrome browser and I'm trying to delete  a directory within the INDEXEDDB directory.  The problem is that it has over 92,000,000 (YES, 92 MILLION) freaking files!

     

    No, it's not a corrupt directory or a trashed drive.  Several tests including CHKDSK and everything is fine hardware wise.  The files are a "known operating feature" of the browser.

     

    The problem is that the pre-processing takes forever, we're talking about millions of files here.

     

    Gosh, I miss the old DELTREE command...

    Well, the DELTREE command still exists, but its now RD or RMDIR.

    To use it in W7 open up the Windows Explorer and go to the left pane, Shift_Right_Click on the directory above the tree you want to remove.  Select "Open a Command Window Here".

    When the command window opens do "RMDIR /S <directory name>" - the /S deletes all files and subdirectories of <directory name>

    It will then say "are you sure <Y/N>" type "y"

    It will then say "The directory is not empty" - don't worry, it is now!

    Repeat RMDIR <directory name>

    Gone!

    FYI in the command window if you want to see the tree structure of the directory you're in, type TREE and it shows all the directories in a nice tree so you can make sure you're in the right spot.

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  3. Anonymous
    2012-05-04T07:03:19+00:00

    Good call, I was way ahead of you and was going to use DSL to do a quick and dirty directory removal.  Then I thought, "that would be too damn easy and still doesn't address the real problem with Windows 7."

    I ended up doing something slightly similar.  I booted into Window's Safe Mode/Command Prompt to see how long it would take doing a basic delete command.

    After running for 7 hours (yes seven), the operation completed.  I restarted and all is well.  I plan on sending a note to the OS channel.

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  4. Anonymous
    2012-05-04T02:52:19+00:00

    If this is a one time thing, you could create an Ubuntu Linux CD/DVD, live boot with it, then you can go to your drive and delete those files/dirs using Linux.

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  5. Anonymous
    2012-05-04T00:47:13+00:00

    Thanks for the response but as was posted early on in the thread:

    "... the calculation time depends on not only the file size but the file number of its folder."

    I have over 92 million files in the directory and a total size of ONLY 3.6 kilobytes!

    Again, there's nothing wrong with the drive, the MFT or anything else.  The directory and the files (.SST) are created by design by Chrome but is not removed when he browser is uninstalled.  There are just millions of 0 byte files which Windows 7, by design, insists on pre-processing prior to deletion.

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