I have a relatively large project (about 8GB) and it is constantly reimporting itself over and over, to the point that I spend 80% of my time waiting for Unity to:

• Reimport everything
• Stop hanging.

Even for the smallest of changes (ie. removal of a comment on one line in a script), or changing import settings on an asset can cause these long hangs and reimports.

To make matters worse, this project is also synced over UnityCollab^BETA, which throws manual/selective import (auto-refresh is forced on) out the window.

I've also read up that other programs locking asset files (to read them) can also cause Unity to reimport everything as opposed to simply doing a selective import (only reimporting things that has been changed).

I've tried creating blacklists for my auto-backup programs, anti-viruses and anything that would snoop around and/or mess with the Unity Project folders. However, despite those programs not accessing anything, Unity still reimports the whole project every time I alt-tab out.

The only workaround I've found so far is to just kill Unity every time it does it and relaunch it as for some reason it processes the actual changed files first, then hangs itself by going through everything else.

It is also worth noting that I/O is maxed up by Unity (due to the sheer size of the project) and CPU/GPU usage are relatively low (does not exceed 20-30%, assuming nothing else is running in the background).

Note: This has persisted through installs and computers.

#Question

How do I stop Unity from reimporting everything without constantly killing Unity?

I have a relatively large project (about 8GB) and it is constantly reimporting itself over and over, to the point that I spend 80% of my time waiting for Unity to:

• Reimport everything
• Stop hanging.

Even for the smallest of changes (ie. removal of a comment on one line in a script), or changing import settings on an asset can cause these long hangs and reimports.

To make matters worse, this project is also synced over UnityCollab^BETA, which throws manual/selective import (auto-refresh is forced on) out the window.

I've also read up that other programs locking asset files (to read them) can also cause Unity to reimport everything as opposed to simply doing a selective import (only reimporting things that has been changed).

I've tried creating blacklists for my auto-backup programs, anti-viruses and anything that would snoop around and/or mess with the Unity Project folders. However, despite those programs not accessing anything, Unity still reimports the whole project every time I alt-tab out.

The only workaround I've found so far is to just kill Unity every time it does it and relaunch it as for some reason it processes the actual changed files first, then hangs itself by going through everything else.

It is also worth noting that I/O is maxed up by Unity (due to the sheer size of the project) and CPU/GPU usage are relatively low (does not exceed 20-30%, assuming nothing else is running in the background).

Note: This has persisted through installs and computers.

Question

How do I stop Unity from reimporting everything without constantly killing Unity?