Did you try fput solution too ?

Also, remove lcLine at all from your strtofile test (write directly without lcLine variable).

>Sergey, I have done some tests. Your suggestion is much slower (17.2 sec) compared to building a string (0.75 sec) or using TEXTMERGE (0.8 sec). It would seem that for the file size I am using that building the string is a good option.
>
>UPDATE: I am using 10,000 records and combining 3 fields.
>
>
>>It has been proven that writing to a file line by line could be faster than building string in a memory.
>>I would try
>>

>>lcFileName = "..."
>>ERASE(lcFileName) 
>>SCAN 
>>
>>lcLine = myTable.Field1 + CHR(9) + myTable.Field2 + CHR(9) + CHR(13)
>>
>>STRTOFILE(lcLine , lcFileName, .T.)
>>
>>ENDSCAN
>>cMyString = FILETOSTR(lcFileName)
>>

>>
>>>I need to add extra formatting text between fields and dependent on field contents. So simple COPY will not work. Do you think using SET TEXTMERGE TO VARIABLE will be faster?
>>>