Windows 10: Is there a limit to how much can be copy/pasted at one time?

I did a Ctrl+C, Ctrl+V from one external HDD to another, where I had about 570 GB of data to move. The progress bar that Window's File Explorer gave me seems to indicate it will only move 400GB that's what originally showed up following "Items remaining:". What happened to the other 170 GB of data? Will it still get copied? Or do I have to stop the copy process now, and start over by copying in chunks?

:)

 

Copy and past limitations

Hello!

I need to copy a large video file from a external USB hard drive to a network share. The file is 1.5TB in size. At 33% complete my system gave me a "not enough memory" error and I had to restart the operation. Is there a limitation or reason why this copy
and paste of a very large file will not work? Is there a formula to find out the limit on size that I can transfer? Any suggestions to complete this task? Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

 

COPY PASTE LIMIT

There seems to be quite a bit of confusion on how copy and paste works when copying files.

What you are copying to the clipboard is the list of files, not the contents of the files.

File Explorer goes through that list opening and copying them.

Now I will mention that xcopy tends to be faster than File Explorer, but that is mostly because File Explorer has to reassure the user. As in it has to draw a nice progress bar. To do that it needs to know exactly how many files it is transferring, and
their sizes. As it turns out that is is a "costly" operation with NTFS. In fact if you are talking about a small file, it can take just about the same amount of time to copy it, as it does to get its size.

Anyways, I would venture to say that if you are having copy problems, it is most likely not copy and paste that is the problem.

Notice the mention that is works one way and not the other. This really is a red flag to me that the problem has nothing to do with copy and paste.

 

Copy and past limitations

Hi,

Thank you for posting your concern. In copying or transferring a file, there is no limit that should be followed. In some cases, it turns out that the problem is the connector that we are using to transfer the files. We would like to know more about your
computer, please answer the following questions below:

• Which version of Windows are you using? To check it, type in winver on Search bar and hit
  Ok.
• Are you connected to a domain network?
• When did this issue occur?

Meanwhile, we suggest transferring the files again but make sure that you are using a different connector from your external drive to the computer.

We'll be waiting for your response.