Fastest way to copy files?

Question

Hello I have 4 folders. In folders 1 2 and 3 I have average 300 MP3 files. A third party application will play the MP3 files from the Main directory. When a button is clicked I want all the contents of the corresponding folder to be copied to the Main directory. Main 1 2 3 At the moment I am using System.IO.File.Copy() and System.IO.Directory.GetFiles() to copy all the files from the specified directory to the Main directory. Before I copy the files over I delete the existing files in the Main directory. My current way of accomplishing this task is taking up to 10 minutes because of the need to copy large quantities of files. Now I have two questions (in order of priority): Is there a FASTER means of copying these files? During the copying of the files is there a way to prevent my UI from freezing (waiting for the file transfers to complete)?

Sam Hobbs · Answer

Note that you probably cannot make the actual copies faster since a physical hard drive must move it's heads to copy data. You might be able to make it fast by moving the data instead of copying but I am only guessing and the explanation of why I think that is a bit long for here.

Felipe Ramos · Answer

If you don't want your form to get become unresponsive I would say to use a background worker to move your files. http://www.c-sharpcorner.com/UploadFile/LivMic/BGWorker07032007000515AM/BGWorker.aspx To be honest I have always done it like using the same method but instead of recopying all the files--maybe you can change your algorithm to track createddates or another property of the FileInfo and only copy files not already existing in Main folder.

Sam Hobbs · Answer

Good then it was worth suggesting that a move could help.

Noah NU · Answer

Thanks what I ended up doing was moving the files instead of copying since 300MB of files can be moved instantly. When my program exits the songs are moved back to the original folder. A text file with in the main folder tells my program which folder to move it back to. Also I used a background worker / worker thread to prevent the freeze up of the UI.