diff --git a/run.py b/run.py
index 3ee5708f..a48e16a9 100644
--- a/run.py
+++ b/run.py
@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ import sys
 from dotenv import load_dotenv
 # Load the .env file if it exists
 load_dotenv()
-os.environ["HF_HUB_ENABLE_HF_TRANSFER"] = os.getenv("HF_HUB_ENABLE_HF_TRANSFER", "1")
+os.environ["HF_XET_HIGH_PERFORMANCE"] = os.getenv("HF_XET_HIGH_PERFORMANCE", "1")
 os.environ["HF_HUB_DISABLE_XET"] = os.getenv("HF_HUB_DISABLE_XET", "0")
 os.environ["NO_ALBUMENTATIONS_UPDATE"] = "1"
 seed = None
diff --git a/toolkit/data_loader.py b/toolkit/data_loader.py
index 884a6bda..b0737601 100644
--- a/toolkit/data_loader.py
+++ b/toolkit/data_loader.py
@@ -607,6 +607,14 @@ class AiToolkitDataset(LatentCachingMixin, ControlCachingMixin, CLIPCachingMixin
                 self.setup_controls()
         self.epoch_num += 1
 
+    def __getstate__(self):
+        # on Windows/macOS dataloader workers are spawned, which pickles the dataset.
+        # sd (the model) is not picklable (weakrefs, cuda tensors) and is only needed
+        # for caching, which runs in the main process before iteration starts.
+        state = self.__dict__.copy()
+        state['sd'] = None
+        return state
+
     def __len__(self):
         if self.dataset_config.buckets:
             return len(self.batch_indices)
@@ -653,6 +661,13 @@ class AiToolkitDataset(LatentCachingMixin, ControlCachingMixin, CLIPCachingMixin
             return self._get_single_item(item)
 
 
+def dto_collation(batch: List['FileItemDTO']):
+    # must be a module level function so spawned dataloader workers can pickle it
+    return DataLoaderBatchDTO(
+        file_items=batch
+    )
+
+
 def get_dataloader_from_datasets(
         dataset_options,
         batch_size=1,
@@ -693,22 +708,26 @@ def get_dataloader_from_datasets(
     # todo build scheduler that can get buckets from all datasets that match
     # todo and evenly distribute reg images
 
-    def dto_collation(batch: List['FileItemDTO']):
-        # create DTO batch
-        batch = DataLoaderBatchDTO(
-            file_items=batch
-        )
-        return batch
-
     # check if is caching latents
 
     dataloader_kwargs = {}
-    
-    if is_native_windows() or is_macos():
-        dataloader_kwargs['num_workers'] = 0
-    else:
-        dataloader_kwargs['num_workers'] = dataset_config_list[0].num_workers
+
+    dataloader_kwargs['num_workers'] = dataset_config_list[0].num_workers
+    if dataloader_kwargs['num_workers'] > 0:
         dataloader_kwargs['prefetch_factor'] = dataset_config_list[0].prefetch_factor
+        # keep workers alive across epochs. Without this, spawn platforms (Windows/macOS)
+        # boot new worker processes every epoch, which can take longer than the epoch
+        # itself on small datasets. The dataset is static after epoch 0 (setup_epoch only
+        # does work on the first call) and per-epoch shuffling happens in the main process
+        # sampler, so workers never hold stale state.
+        dataloader_kwargs['persistent_workers'] = True
+        # spawned workers re-import the full stack at boot and would repeat every
+        # import-time warning the parent already printed. Children inherit these env
+        # vars; the parent is unaffected since its imports already happened.
+        os.environ.setdefault('PYTHONWARNINGS', 'ignore::FutureWarning')
+        os.environ.setdefault('TORCH_LOGS', '-torch.utils._pytree')
+        os.environ.setdefault('DIFFUSERS_VERBOSITY', 'error')
+        os.environ.setdefault('NO_ALBUMENTATIONS_UPDATE', '1')
 
     if has_buckets:
         # make sure they all have buckets