Fix the damn "Calculating Time Remaining" problem already!

I bought this computer with Vista Business pre-isntalled back in April, and
I'm still wasting huge amounts of my time while I wait for Vista to calculate
the time remaining before even starting to transfer files.

I'm just absolutely flabergasted that this hasn't been dealt with in a patch
or service pack release. I don't want to go out and download/install some
third party software to do something that the OS should do.

Honestly...This is outrageous.

----------------
This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to the
suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion, click the "I
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http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/com....vista.general

I may be wrong, but it seems to me the transfer is commencing at the
start but the estimated time takes a while after the process has
started before it is active.

--
Jupiter Jones [MVP]
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar
http://www.dts-l.org


"IWantXPBack" <IWantXPBack@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:5E8687FD-214E-4332-B9CA-4A9184A9AD6B@microsoft.com...
>I bought this computer with Vista Business pre-isntalled back in
>April, and
> I'm still wasting huge amounts of my time while I wait for Vista to
> calculate
> the time remaining before even starting to transfer files.
>
> I'm just absolutely flabergasted that this hasn't been dealt with in
> a patch
> or service pack release. I don't want to go out and download/install
> some
> third party software to do something that the OS should do.
>
> Honestly...This is outrageous.
>
> ----------------
> This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to
> the
> suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion, click
> the "I
> Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see the button,
> follow this
> link to open the suggestion in the Microsoft Web-based Newsreader
> and then
> click "I Agree" in the message pane.
>
> http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/com....vista.general

"IWantXPBack" <IWantXPBack@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:5E8687FD-214E-4332-B9CA-4A9184A9AD6B@microsoft.com...
>I bought this computer with Vista Business pre-isntalled back in April, and
> I'm still wasting huge amounts of my time while I wait for Vista to
> calculate
> the time remaining before even starting to transfer files.
>
> I'm just absolutely flabergasted that this hasn't been dealt with in a
> patch
> or service pack release. I don't want to go out and download/install some
> third party software to do something that the OS should do.
>
> Honestly...This is outrageous.
>
> ----------------
> This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to the
> suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion, click the "I
> Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see the button, follow
> this
> link to open the suggestion in the Microsoft Web-based Newsreader and then
> click "I Agree" in the message pane.
>
> http://windowshelp.microsoft.com/com....vista.general


Are these local copies or network copies?

Lang

"Jupiter Jones [MVP]" <jones_jupiter@hotnomail.com> wrote in message
news:%23udeWSExHHA.1164@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
>I may be wrong, but it seems to me the transfer is commencing at the start
>but the estimated time takes a while after the process has started before
>it is active.
>

What on earth is that sentence supposed to mean?

Have you really not noticed that Vista has a major problem in this area?
Luckily it is one of the things that they promise to fix with SP1.

ss.

Perhaps I worded it poorly.
The transfer starts immediately and does not wait for the calculations
to finish.
It may appear the transfer has not started, but it has.

--
Jupiter Jones [MVP]
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar
http://www.dts-l.org


"Synapse Syndrome" <synapse@NOSPAMgomez404.elitemail.org> wrote in
message news:OdweyPFxHHA.4548@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
> "Jupiter Jones [MVP]" <jones_jupiter@hotnomail.com> wrote in message
> news:%23udeWSExHHA.1164@TK2MSFTNGP02.phx.gbl...
>>I may be wrong, but it seems to me the transfer is commencing at the
>>start but the estimated time takes a while after the process has
>>started before it is active.
>>
>
> What on earth is that sentence supposed to mean?
>
> Have you really not noticed that Vista has a major problem in this
> area? Luckily it is one of the things that they promise to fix with
> SP1.
>
> ss.
>

"Jupiter Jones [MVP]" <jones_jupiter@hotnomail.com> wrote in message
news:OIlLp8FxHHA.3536@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
> Perhaps I worded it poorly.
> The transfer starts immediately and does not wait for the calculations to
> finish.
> It may appear the transfer has not started, but it has.


It still takes ages for the transfer though. Even deleting a load of files
can take a long time. I hope this SP1 fix will bring things back to XP
speeds at least.

ss.

IWantXPBack wrote:
> I bought this computer with Vista Business pre-isntalled back in
> April, and I'm still wasting huge amounts of my time while I wait for
> Vista to calculate the time remaining before even starting to
> transfer files.
>
> I'm just absolutely flabergasted that this hasn't been dealt with in
> a patch or service pack release. I don't want to go out and
> download/install some third party software to do something that the
> OS should do.
>
> Honestly...This is outrageous.

The transfer starts immediately but Windows cannot know how long it will
take.

Windows knows, of course, how big the file is, but does not know the
transfer rate. So, Windows starts timing the bytes transferred. After a
representative sample passes, Windows displays the estimated time. Windows
refines this estimate as the download progresses.

"IWantXPBack" <IWantXPBack@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:
>I bought this computer with Vista Business pre-isntalled back in April, and
> I'm still wasting huge amounts of my time while I wait for Vista to
> calculate
> the time remaining before even starting to transfer files.

Maybe this could help:
http://mytechweblog.blogspot.com/200...ere-is_05.html .

Also if it is network copy try disabling IPv6.

ThePro

"Synapse Syndrome" <synapse@NOSPAMgomez404.elitemail.org> wrote in message
news:eJXTqZGxHHA.1208@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
>
> It still takes ages for the transfer though. Even deleting a load of
> files can take a long time. I hope this SP1 fix will bring things back to
> XP speeds at least.
>

Yeah, it does appear to be slower copying files under some circumstances.
And yes, I heard that it *may* be addressed in SP1 (Q4 2007).

You can click on the More Information (down arrow) to view the actual progress
and speed of the transfer. Some times the "Calculating Time Remaining" remains
while the actual transfer is happening.

--
I Bleed Blue and Gold
GO BEARS!


"CJM" <cjmnews04@newsgroup.nospam> wrote in message
news:ue$9t2JxHHA.4800@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
>
> "Synapse Syndrome" <synapse@NOSPAMgomez404.elitemail.org> wrote in message
> news:eJXTqZGxHHA.1208@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
>>
>> It still takes ages for the transfer though. Even deleting a load of files
>> can take a long time. I hope this SP1 fix will bring things back to XP
>> speeds at least.
>>
>
> Yeah, it does appear to be slower copying files under some circumstances. And
> yes, I heard that it *may* be addressed in SP1 (Q4 2007).
>

On Thu, 12 Jul 2007 08:46:28 -0500, "HeyBub" <heybub@gmail.com> wrote:

>IWantXPBack wrote:
>> I bought this computer with Vista Business pre-isntalled back in
>> April, and I'm still wasting huge amounts of my time while I wait for
>> Vista to calculate the time remaining before even starting to
>> transfer files.
>>
>> I'm just absolutely flabergasted that this hasn't been dealt with in
>> a patch or service pack release. I don't want to go out and
>> download/install some third party software to do something that the
>> OS should do.
>>
>> Honestly...This is outrageous.
>
>The transfer starts immediately but Windows cannot know how long it will
>take.
>
>Windows knows, of course, how big the file is, but does not know the
>transfer rate. So, Windows starts timing the bytes transferred. After a
>representative sample passes, Windows displays the estimated time. Windows
>refines this estimate as the download progresses.

That is what is suppose to happen and did under XP. Thus the purpose
of the progress bar which is to roughly show the transfer process and
time remaining. Now the knuckleheads in Redmond have so bungled the
file copy/move/delete routine you get the moronic "calculating time
remaining" message which often hangs on the screen, with nothing
apparently happening (is though) then in the last couple seconds the
status bar sometimes zooms left to right, obviously not reflecting
anything but legendary Microsoft stupidity from their inept
programmers.

Two NEW things happen in Vista. It check permissions and I suspect
sniffs for DRM (Digital Rights Management) violations at the behest of
the Hollywood crowd. Add in that it can open an absurd number of
handles to process the task, no wonder it often bogs down. That
something is seriously wrong can be confirmed by moving a few files
totaling 1 GB or so, then trying to copy/move a few hundred files
totally the same amount. Generally it will take MUCH longer in the
second example. This confirms the routine is poorly written and is
wading through needless layers of bloated code.

Two things can help:

1. Apply the hotfix I wrote about months ago. KB 931770
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/931770

There are several web sites you can download it from
without begging Microsoft.

2. Be sure all your non root drives have the right permissions,
which in general means you the user (as you logged in) have
full rights.

My experience and I move 50-80 GB worth of files around daily is this
helps get past the bottleneck. While not always for reasons unknown, I
average between 20-35 MB a second transfers which is on a par with XP.
Without the above two steps the speed was often an absurd 1.5 MB or
less. You can see how fast the files transfer by clicking on the
little arrow in the copy/move window that pops up once you start the
process.

On Thu, 12 Jul 2007 02:31:40 -0600, "Jupiter Jones [MVP]"
<jones_jupiter@hotnomail.com> wrote:

>Perhaps I worded it poorly.
>The transfer starts immediately and does not wait for the calculations
>to finish.
>It may appear the transfer has not started, but it has.

That's nice Mr. Jones, but it still sucks

Then give it up.


<thetruthhurts @homail.com> wrote in message
news:1f0e93tb3pn30cs64guvlof4et4s0l6u6b@4ax.com...
> On Thu, 12 Jul 2007 02:31:40 -0600, "Jupiter Jones [MVP]"
> <jones_jupiter@hotnomail.com> wrote:
>
>>Perhaps I worded it poorly.
>>The transfer starts immediately and does not wait for the calculations
>>to finish.
>>It may appear the transfer has not started, but it has.
>
> That's nice Mr. Jones, but it still sucks
>

"ThePro" wrote:


>
> Maybe this could help:
> http://mytechweblog.blogspot.com/200...ere-is_05.html .
>
> Also if it is network copy try disabling IPv6.
>
> ThePro
>

I've tried switching off differential compression and indexing, with no
effect. I regularly copy a single Word file of less than 5 megabytes between
a hard drive and a flash drive. The "calculating time" dialog then appears
for several minutes, on one occasion nearly 10 minutes. An attempt to copy
the file over a network connection took so long that I just gave up. The
"Cancel" dialog then sat there until i rebooted the machine.

I've tried command line copy and FreeCommander - same results, so whatever
this is is deep down in the OS, it's not some simple Explorer problem.

Unfortunately Vista came with my new laptop and I doubt if drivers are
available for XP. Otherwise I wouldn't have thought twice about installing XP
instead. I've even started to install Linux on a new flash drive to see if I
can run Word under Wine, all because copying files is taking such an
incredibly long time.

On Thu, 19 Jul 2007 06:22:02 -0700, intheory
<intheory@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:

>
>
>"ThePro" wrote:
>
>
>>
>> Maybe this could help:
>> http://mytechweblog.blogspot.com/200...ere-is_05.html .
>>
>> Also if it is network copy try disabling IPv6.
>>
>> ThePro
>>
>
>I've tried switching off differential compression and indexing, with no
>effect. I regularly copy a single Word file of less than 5 megabytes between
>a hard drive and a flash drive. The "calculating time" dialog then appears
>for several minutes, on one occasion nearly 10 minutes. An attempt to copy
>the file over a network connection took so long that I just gave up. The
>"Cancel" dialog then sat there until i rebooted the machine.
>
>I've tried command line copy and FreeCommander - same results, so whatever
>this is is deep down in the OS, it's not some simple Explorer problem.
>
>Unfortunately Vista came with my new laptop and I doubt if drivers are
>available for XP. Otherwise I wouldn't have thought twice about installing XP
>instead. I've even started to install Linux on a new flash drive to see if I
>can run Word under Wine, all because copying files is taking such an
>incredibly long time.

My take is while the symptoms are the same there are actually multiple
problems causing painfully slow file transfers for countless people.
If you get poor results copying from the command prompt or a third
party shell something obviously is seriously wrong more than just
known issues with Explorer.

Since you bought a named box, Dell, HP, whatever, you should look in
their forums to see if people have similar issues or on the vendor's
web site for BIOS updates and patches. Since you mentioned Flash
drive, it could be the source of the problem with it's memory being
corrupted. Since they are now so cheap with little effort you can find
all kinds of brands selling USB flash for $20 or so, I would try that
if see if it makes a difference.