Defraggers for XP

[Plato]

I have seen this point [are third party defragmentation tools
significantly better than XP's built in tool] (are they worth the money
spent for them) discussed in many different forums. This entire

For the standard user there is NO NEED for a third party defrag tool.

 

[Plato]

junk! Went through several motherboards, etc.... In the end I learned that
PC Mag reviews are based on advertising investment by the vendors - if you

Correct. Also, please note that many different magazines may be owned by
the same firm.

So, an add in one of the companies mags may result in a "good" review in
one of their other publications, ie even if you see no adds in that
particular rag. ie the one with the "good" review.

 

[Plato]

don't buy Ad's you don't get a review or a good review, but if you buy 6
or 8 large Ad's you get in the top 5 always.

Before I knew what a pc was, I was in the environmental consulting
business.

As with any industry you had a dozen or so industry specific trade
journals aka monthly magazines touting the latest trends etc.

There was a page in the back of every magazine where one could pay for a
business card ad, costs about $180/month to start. Generally you'd see
perhaps 9 or a dozen ads there.

Using that leverage, tho not talked about in the open, the magazines
were open to review and publish articles I wrote addressing current
issues and solutions, of course the solutions were done by the firm I
was working for.

I'm know there were many other firms that did the same equally quality
work, but I had my articles published.

 

[Alex Nichol]

there is no benefit to defragging the pagefile if it's in it's own
partition, however if it's on the same drive as the os, there is a hit
putting the pagefile on anything but c

And that is mainly not really a defrag matter, but one of reducing seek
time getting to the other partition - much the slowest aspect of any
disk access

in addition, it is not a constantly changing file, it is a container
file, and the physical attributes remain constant...once the pagefile
is contiguous, it remains contiguous on a healthy drive

And the VM system knows where clusters are, so does not have to search
it every time it needs to read - the other slow aspect of having a file
fragmented in the ordinary way

this includes page files that are "dynamic" even when they become
"expanded", since the expanded extent is released on reboot, the
pagefile MUST return to it's original condition on a healthy drive...if
it was contiguous before expansion, it remains contiguous after
expansion on reboot

What appears to happen in XP, is that if the file *does* need expansion,
when the item that caused it (at the end of the file) is released, the
file can contract again; but if an item in the middle does, the file is
*not* compacted. Win95 used to do that - and a serious lost of
performance resulted

in addition, the pagefile will only expand if you have the initial
minimum too small, it does not expand if the initial minimum is
correct

Yes

 

[Alex Nichol]

This type of post is exactly what prompted my original question in this
thread. Yes, PerfectDisk moves files around (e.g. pagefile, MTF zone) in
order to place them in what it terms the "optimal" position on the disk.
That's great, but what is the tangible, transparent, objectively verifiable
or measurable result for the end user like me?

Not much as far as page file goes. The important thing to me in Perfect
disk is its consolidating free space. Without that the space becomes
highly fragmented, to the point that any sizable file can start out
fragmented from the beginning. Not good news for program installs
(though of course put right later by *any* defragger)

 

[Leythos]

I have seen this point [are third party defragmentation tools
significantly better than XP's built in tool] (are they worth the money
spent for them) discussed in many different forums. This entire

For the standard user there is NO NEED for a third party defrag tool.

Define "Standard User" in order to properly qualify that statement.

 

[R. McCarty]

Windows XP is a "Platform". It's up to each individual user to
make a judgment on what extensions/apps they wish to employ.

Maybe your terminology was a little off - instead of standard,
perhaps "Average User" might be more appropriate.

I have seen this point [are third party defragmentation tools
significantly better than XP's built in tool] (are they worth the money
spent for them) discussed in many different forums. This entire

For the standard user there is NO NEED for a third party defrag tool.

Define "Standard User" in order to properly qualify that statement.

 

[Leythos]

Windows XP is a "Platform". It's up to each individual user to
make a judgment on what extensions/apps they wish to employ.

Maybe your terminology was a little off - instead of standard,
perhaps "Average User" might be more appropriate.

As long as the average user only used the computer for email and browsing
the web I might agree, but many average users also do digital camera work,
flyer's for their clubs, etc... All of these can take up some large space
and get moved/deleted, and while the "web/mail" user would benefit from
the native defragger, after a years use, the club/audio/video user would
benefit from a full defragger.

 

[Guest]

Not much as far as page file goes. The important thing to me in Perfect
disk is its consolidating free space. Without that the space becomes
highly fragmented, to the point that any sizable file can start out
fragmented from the beginning. Not good news for program installs
(though of course put right later by *any* defragger)

Let me see if I understand you correctly. PerfectDisk does the best job of
consolidating free space, meaning that newly added files to a hard drive
previously defragged by PerfectDisk are likely to be less fragmented than
they would have been with the built-in defragger. However, the problem of
newly added fragmented files exists only until the next defrag anyway,
meaning that it is at best temporary (and easily solved by running the
built-in defragger after adding or deleting the files). Do I have it right?

TIA
Ken

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Would it depend on how the files are organised on disk?

--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
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Using invalid email address

Stourport, Worcs, England
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Leythos]

Would it depend on how the files are organised on disk?

What? since you didn't bottom post it's a little hard to follow what
you're asking.

Since you, a user, has little control over file layout on disk, then no.

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Would you not agree that placing particular folders / files in
particular partitions is exercising significant control over file
layout! In this situation the user has more than "little control over
file layout". This goes toward making the benefits of a third party Disk
Defragmenter far less than claimed.

The great majority of persons posting to Microsoft newsgroups top post!
However, that's another debate for another day.

--


Regards.

Gerry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FCA

Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Alex Nichol]

Let me see if I understand you correctly. PerfectDisk does the best job of
consolidating free space, meaning that newly added files to a hard drive
previously defragged by PerfectDisk are likely to be less fragmented than
they would have been with the built-in defragger. However, the problem of
newly added fragmented files exists only until the next defrag anyway,

Not entirely. If free spaces really gets cut up, it may be impossible
to do a proper defrag of big ones. I was really referring more to
program files, than big data ones (which are the real problem children
for fragmentation because so often they get re-read repeatedly from the
start to find content)

 

[Alex Nichol]

regardles of this, on reboot, a file "in the middle" doesn't affect the
original extent...the added extents are released on reboot...on a
healthy drive, the original pagefile must be in exactly the same
condition as it was before expansion was invoked when you reboot if
expansion is not again invoked.

It gets restarted from scratch (unless there is serious corruption in
the file system), making a new file of the size set by 'initial'. So
content and its placement do not then arise

 

[Leythos]

Would you not agree that placing particular folders / files in
particular partitions is exercising significant control over file
layout! In this situation the user has more than "little control over
file layout". This goes toward making the benefits of a third party Disk
Defragmenter far less than claimed.

No, you have no control over the file placement, only that you can put
files on partitions. The layout on Disk, which is what's relevant to
Defragging, is completely up to the OS or disk management tools.

You can attempt to lessen fragmentation by choosing an lesser used
partition, but you can't pick where the land on the media.

The great majority of persons posting to Microsoft newsgroups top post!
However, that's another debate for another day.

Yea, and if just one is converted per day, that means two the next day,
and it grows, some day they may all post properly

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Your statement that "you have no control over the file placement" is
illogical when placed in the context of placing files / folders in
particular partition. True you cannot place them in a particular place
in a particular partition but that is not what your statement was
saying. You were maintaining the user had absolutely no control on
placement and this is demonstrably not proven by you.

Whether the partition is little or greatly used is not relevant in
determining whether the user is exercising control.

Which Defragmenter you use is not a major factor affecting fragmentation
of files. Factors are the frequency files are rewritten. The size of
files being written and the contiguous space available at the time the
file is written. Fragmentation is exacerbated if there is limited free
space.

--


Regards.

Gerry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FCA

Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Alex

What you say can be taken as an argument to get a bigger or extra hard
drive so that there is adequate free space just as you use it to promote
a particular third party Disk Defragmenter. Equally it is arguable that
you should run whichever Disk Defragmenter before adding large data file
to reduce fragmentation.

--


Regards.

Gerry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
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[Guest]

Alex, I agree with Gerry here as well. It isn't a problem for me -- my
primary hard drive is 250GB, far more than I will ever need -- and I have a
second external 80GB USB hard drive as well. Also, regardless of what
defragger I use, I always use Disk Cleanup and a defrag program before adding
or deleting lots of files, e.g. when adding or uninstalling new software or
large files such as video or music files. I would think that free space
consolidation is more of a problem for people with much less free disk space
and/or who do not regularly defragment their drives.

Ken

Alex

What you say can be taken as an argument to get a bigger or extra hard
drive so that there is adequate free space just as you use it to promote
a particular third party Disk Defragmenter. Equally it is arguable that
you should run whichever Disk Defragmenter before adding large data file
to reduce fragmentation.

--


Regards.

Gerry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FCA

Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Ken

If a user has limited free space, 15% or less, then the third party Disk
Defragmenter with ability to work properly where there is less than 15
% and which is able to defragment free space will prove to be
beneficial. However, I think we are in agreement on this point.

--


Regards.

Gerry

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
FCA

Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Alex, I agree with Gerry here as well. It isn't a problem for me --
my
primary hard drive is 250GB, far more than I will ever need -- and I
have a
second external 80GB USB hard drive as well. Also, regardless of what
defragger I use, I always use Disk Cleanup and a defrag program before
adding
or deleting lots of files, e.g. when adding or uninstalling new
software or
large files such as video or music files. I would think that free
space
consolidation is more of a problem for people with much less free disk
space
and/or who do not regularly defragment their drives.

Ken

 

[Leythos]

Your statement that "you have no control over the file placement" is
illogical when placed in the context of placing files / folders in
particular partition. True you cannot place them in a particular place
in a particular partition but that is not what your statement was
saying. You were maintaining the user had absolutely no control on
placement and this is demonstrably not proven by you.

You really need to get out more, when it comes to defragging a drive or to
fragmentation, the only that that really matters IS placement in the
physical drive in relation to the partition the data is stored on.

You can't control where the file goes on the physical drive even with
partitions, you can guess where it MIGHT come close to if you understand
the partition and the actual platter layout and geometry on the drive, but
I suspect you don't have a clue.

So, tell me, since your typical user can't place a file on a drive without
a partition being created, at least one partition, how exactly is the user
going to control the placement of that file on the physical drive?

Whether the partition is little or greatly used is not relevant in
determining whether the user is exercising control.

As is anything else about the user controlling where the file goes - the
user has no control over where the data goes on the drive, they just have
the appearance of some control.

Prove otherwise if you're so dang sure - I'll be waiting for your proof.

Which Defragmenter you use is not a major factor affecting fragmentation
of files. Factors are the frequency files are rewritten. The size of
files being written and the contiguous space available at the time the
file is written. Fragmentation is exacerbated if there is limited free
space.

You need to understand a couple things - Defraggers come in different
flavors, each has it's strengths and weaknesses, some are better than
others. Unless running in real-time, all the time, a defragger only
impacts files when it's run, once it stops fragmentation starts growing
again.

Your stating the obvious has nothing to do with the fact that files will
fragment on empty drives, almost full drives, and that users have no real
control over the placement of file on the drive.