Hacking USB Loader GX taking long to populate game list

[elmnt61]

Hi guys.

Wondering how long I should be waiting for USB Loader to populate my game list of about 125 Gamecube iso/gcm files? (and a couple emulators)
It currently takes over 10 seconds each time I boot or come back from playing something. It previously was loading quickly when i only had 2 or 3 games on there.

Here's some relevant info:

Guide i used to hack Wii U and vwii:

HDD: Segate portable USB3 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07CRG7BBH/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
SD card: 64 GB EVO samsung 100MB/s https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B06XX29S9Q/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o02_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

HDD formatted to FAT32 with Disk Utility on Mac OS X, i believe my cluster size is 512 kb as i don't know how to change it.
I haven't changed any major settings in USB Loader like where things are saved/loaded etc.

all my games were manually copied over by me... created the parent folder then changed the name to game.iso, etc. I tried adding the [GAMEID] to about half of my games' parent folders to see if it would make a difference, but it has not appeared to.

Thank you!