SwiftCopy

Safe file recovery from failing and unreliable drives — a fault-tolerant robocopy GUI for Windows.

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The problem this solves

When a hard drive starts failing, Windows Explorer freezes — or the entire system crashes — the moment you try to copy files off it. Explorer retries every read error indefinitely, stalling the I/O queue until the OS locks up. By the time you reboot, the drive may be worse than before.

SwiftCopy was built to fix exactly this. It wraps Windows' built-in robocopy utility with a clean dual-pane GUI and applies fault-tolerant settings: zero retries, skip locked files, restartable copy mode. Instead of hanging, it skips problem files and keeps going — getting your data out before the drive deteriorates further.

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Features

• Failing drive presets — one-click configuration for safe or fast recovery from dying drives
• Dual-pane file browser — navigate source and destination side by side, Total Commander-style
• Fault-tolerant by default — skip locked files and zero-retry mode prevent system freezes
• F5 to copy, F6 to move — familiar keyboard shortcuts for power users
• Drag-and-drop — drag files between panes with copy or move prompt
• Job queue — queue multiple operations and process them in sequence
• Real-time progress — per-file progress, byte counts, transfer speed, status bar
• Full robocopy control — ACLs, timestamps, backup mode, mirror vs copy, retry tuning
• Color-coded log — live output with error/warning/info filtering
• Built-in help — press F1 for a full user guide and options reference

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Download

Download SwiftCopy.exe — standalone, no Python required.

Requires Windows 10/11. robocopy is built into Windows and available by default.

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Quick start for failing drive recovery

1. Launch SwiftCopy
2. Select Failing drive (safe) from the Preset dropdown
3. Navigate to the failing drive in the Left pane
4. Navigate to your recovery destination in the Right pane
5. Press F5 — SwiftCopy starts copying immediately, skipping problem files instead of hanging
6. When done, run a second pass to pick up any files that were busy the first time

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Screenshots

(Screenshots coming soon — star the repo to get notified)

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Build from Source

# 1. Clone
git clone https://github.com/Cybul3000/SwiftCopy.git
cd SwiftCopy

# 2. Set up virtual environment
python -m venv .venv
.venv\Scripts\activate

# 3. Install dependencies
pip install -r requirements.txt

# 4. Run
python main.py

Build standalone .exe

pip install -r requirements-dev.txt
build.bat
# Output: dist\SwiftCopy.exe

Windows note: If python is not on PATH, use the full path from Get-Command python. If python3 fails, disable the python3.exe App Execution Alias in Windows Settings → App Execution Aliases.

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Keyboard Shortcuts

Key	Action
F5	Copy left → right
F6	Move left → right
F1	Open User Guide
Escape	Stop current job
Backspace	Go up one directory
Enter (path bar)	Navigate to typed path
Double-click	Open folder

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Robocopy Options

Option	Flag	Description
Preserve timestamps/permissions	/COPY:DATS /DCOPY:DAT	Copy ACLs and timestamps
Conservative mode	/COPY:DAT	Data and timestamps only, no ACLs
Include auditing info	/COPYALL	Copy audit ACEs (requires admin)
Skip locked files	/R:0 /W:0	Never hang on busy or unreadable files
Backup mode	/ZB	Read files even without normal permission
Mirror	/MIR	Exact sync — deletes extras at destination
Copy (append)	/E	Copy without deleting anything at destination

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Why not just use robocopy directly?

You can — and SwiftCopy does exactly that under the hood. But getting the right flags for a failing drive requires knowing /R:0 /W:0 /Z /XJ /COPY:DATS and more. SwiftCopy puts the right combination one click away, adds a visual file browser so you don't have to type paths, and shows live progress without reading dense terminal output.

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License

MIT © Maciej — maciej@tyaudio.eu

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Built with PySide6 (Qt 6)