What is the best defragmenter?

[Frank W.]

I used Diskeeper 8 and it seemed to do a better job than the original defragmenter in Win2k. I read
someone using Perfect Disk. Any other recommendations?

And what are some other utilities to keep your hard drives working well? Does error checking in Windows
make any difference? Does it really fix anything? Is it better to use a DOS type utility to circumvent
the operating system entirely?

 

[Rod Speed]

I used Diskeeper 8 and it seemed to do a better job
than the original defragmenter in Win2k. I read someone
using Perfect Disk. Any other recommendations?

Dont bother defragging unless you are in some very unusual situation.

And what are some other utilities to keep your hard drives working well?

I just enable SMART. Thats not so much to keep it
working well as to get an early warning if its dying.

Tho I spose you could claim that monitoring the
drive temp with an alarm for that using SMART
is a ute to keep the hard drives working well.

You dont see too many hard drives go overtemp on a
fan failure tho, its usually seen with the cpu much earlier.

Does error checking in Windows make any difference?

Depends on how often your system sees a mains failure.

Does it really fix anything?

Yes, in that situation it does.

Is it better to use a DOS type utility to
circumvent the operating system entirely?

Nope, they're useless now.

 

[Ann Onimus]

Dont bother defragging unless you are in some very unusual situation.

Hmm
Why?

I understand defrag helps the system performance...

 

[Bob Willard]

I used Diskeeper 8 and it seemed to do a better job than the original defragmenter in Win2k. I read
someone using Perfect Disk. Any other recommendations?

And what are some other utilities to keep your hard drives working well? Does error checking in Windows
make any difference? Does it really fix anything? Is it better to use a DOS type utility to circumvent
the operating system entirely?

For most PC users, I recommend any defragger that is free -- which means the
one built into WinWhatever.

The most useful HD utility for any WinWhatever PC is backup IMHO.

 

[Rod Speed]

Hmm
Why?

Because its pointless with most modern systems.

I understand defrag helps the system performance...

You 'understand' wrong.

I bet you wouldnt be able to pick it in a proper
randomised double blind trial without being allowed
to use a ute that displays the fragmentation level.

And if you cant pick it, its a waste of time doing it.

 

[Ann Onimus]

Because its pointless with most modern systems.

You 'understand' wrong.

I bet you wouldnt be able to pick it in a proper
randomised double blind trial without being allowed
to use a ute that displays the fragmentation level.

And if you cant pick it, its a waste of time doing it.

Yeah, well, good point...or is it?

So, you are saying that defrag applications are built just to smoke
our understanding of modern systems?
That the only point in using them is to run them just for the hack of
it?

hmmmm.

 

[CJT]

Because its pointless with most modern systems.

Define "modern."

 

[Frank W.]

What exactly is degraggin supposed to do? Make it faster for the drive to access data? Make it faster
at moving data once accessed? Enquiring minds need to know.

 

[CJT]

What exactly is degraggin supposed to do? Make it faster for the drive to access data? Make it faster
at moving data once accessed? Enquiring minds need to know.

I've seen Windows machines crash when their drives became too
fragmented.

 

[Chuck U. Farley]

I understand defrag helps the system performance...

You 'understand' wrong.

Ah, no she understands perfectly. Maybe _you_ don't have a need to defrag
with the apps _you_ use, and that's fine... for _you_. However, you quite
obviously don't use the apps _I_ do because the difference is readily
discernible.

I bet you wouldn't be able to pick it in a proper
randomised double blind trial without being allowed
to use a ute that displays the fragmentation level.

Try rendering a conformed 50 gig avi fle with Premier Pro with a fragmented
drive and see how long it takes versus a disk that's just been defragged. No
display of fragmentation needed to see the difference.

And if you cant pick it, its a waste of time doing it.

Anyone with even the most basic of observation skills would easily recognize
the difference when doing the above mentioned task. Just because _you_ don't
need to defrag doesn't mean _everyone_ doesn't need to defrag.

 

[Kenneth]

What exactly is degraggin supposed to do? Make it faster for the drive to access data? Make it faster
at moving data once accessed? Enquiring minds need to know.

Howdy,

No expert I, but...

Yes, and yes.

Essentially, a fragmented drive is analogous to an office
that stores its multi-page documents by putting each page in
a different file.

When the document needs to be accessed, it takes a while to
find, then assemble, all the parts.

It is just the same for data that needs to be assembled for
use (or transfer) on your system, but is stored in many bits
and pieces in a variety of locations on your drive.

The defragging process just locates those pieces, and puts
'em together.

HTH,

 

[Timothy Daniels]

Ah, no she understands perfectly. Maybe _you_ don't have a need to defrag
with the apps _you_ use, and that's fine... for _you_. However, you quite
obviously don't use the apps _I_ do because the difference is readily
discernible.


Try rendering a conformed 50 gig avi fle with Premier Pro with a fragmented
drive and see how long it takes versus a disk that's just been defragged. No
display of fragmentation needed to see the difference.


Anyone with even the most basic of observation skills would easily recognize
the difference when doing the above mentioned task. Just because _you_ don't
need to defrag doesn't mean _everyone_ doesn't need to defrag.

You may be correct about the dependence on specific apps, but
one of the 2 big PC mags published an article on defragging
utilities 12 to 14 months ago, and their conclusion regarding
Windows XP was that they could see no speed difference between
the fragged and de-fragged OS. Their conclusion was that for
WinXP, defragging isn't needed. Of course, they didn't test *your*
system, and it could be that WinXP defrags in the background.
I notice that after about 10 or 15 minutes of inactivity, my hard drive
starts chattering quietly. Maybe it's defragging?

*TimDaniels*

 

[Rod Speed]

Yeah, well, good point...or is it?

So, you are saying that defrag applications are built
just to smoke our understanding of modern systems?

Nope, fragmentation did have a noticeable effect with older
slower hard drives which took more time to move the heads
from fragment to fragment and they were generally run with
much less free space and with cruder space allocation
algorithms so fragmented rather more quickly.

Many got into the habit of obsessively defragging and just
keep mindlessly defragging with modern systems that dont
see any benefit they could pick in a proper double blind trial.

 

[Rod Speed]

Rod Speed wrote

Define "modern."

Bought or assembled in the last few years.

 

[Rod Speed]

What exactly is degraggin supposed to do?

Ensure that all files are contiguous, all the sectors used for
a particular file have no bits of other files between them.

Make it faster for the drive to access data?
Yes.

Make it faster at moving data once accessed?
Nope.

Enquiring minds need to know.

Well they cant. That would be spilling the beans.

 

[Rod Speed]

Frank W. wrote:

I've seen Windows machines crash when their drives became too fragmented.

Oh bullshit. You were hallucinating.

Have fun explaining why none of mine have ever crashed
due to fragmentation when I never defrag at all.

 

[Rod Speed]

Howdy,

No expert I, but...

Yes, and yes.

Essentially, a fragmented drive is analogous to an office
that stores its multi-page documents by putting each page in
a different file.

When the document needs to be accessed, it takes a while to
find, then assemble, all the parts.

It is just the same for data that needs to be assembled for
use (or transfer) on your system, but is stored in many bits
and pieces in a variety of locations on your drive.

The defragging process just locates those pieces, and puts
'em together.

And the modern reality is that it takes very little time for the
heads to move from one fragment to another, and the heads
are moving around all over the drive for various reasons like
the internet temporary cache etc etc etc and very few apps
read much continuously anymore, and those that do can still
get access to the data plenty fast enough with fragments
when say playing a DVD file or music anyway.

 

[Rod Speed]

Ah, no she understands perfectly.
Nope.

Maybe _you_ don't have a need to defrag with
the apps _you_ use, and that's fine... for _you_.
However, you quite obviously don't use the apps
_I_ do because the difference is readily discernible.

I said MOST modern systems for a reason.

Try rendering a conformed 50 gig avi fle with Premier Pro
with a fragmented drive and see how long it takes versus
a disk that's just been defragged. No display of fragmentation
needed to see the difference.

The difference is trivial in the total time it takes.

And most dont do that sort of thing much anyway.

Anyone with even the most basic of observation skills would easily recognize
the difference when doing the above mentioned task. Just because _you_ don't
need to defrag doesn't mean _everyone_ doesn't need to defrag.

I said MOST modern systems for a reason.

 

[Rod Speed]

You may be correct about the dependence on specific apps, but
one of the 2 big PC mags published an article on defragging
utilities 12 to 14 months ago, and their conclusion regarding
Windows XP was that they could see no speed difference between
the fragged and de-fragged OS. Their conclusion was that for
WinXP, defragging isn't needed.

And they are right with most modern systems.

Of course, they didn't test *your* system, and it could be that WinXP
defrags in the background.

Nope, it doesnt.

I notice that after about 10 or 15 minutes of inactivity, my hard drive
starts chattering quietly. Maybe it's defragging?

Nope, its keeping track of what has changed to speed access.

It also periodically reorganises the system drive to speed
access, but that isnt defragging and the system files dont
fragment much on most modern systems anyway.

 

[shawn]

Because its pointless with most modern systems.

It can depending upon the system and how it is used.


Sorry, but it can and does make a difference in some situations. I
have a partition that I use for downloads so it becomes highly
fragmented after a while. When trying to watch a video on that
partition there can often be problems due to delays in getting data
off the disk. Taking the time to defragment the drive (or copying the
file to another non-fragmented partition) will resolve the issues.

Now for normal use by someone that doesn't download binary files from
the internet, I agree that defragmenting is something that will
probably won't be needed. It might be helpful to defragment a normal
users system on occasion , but probably no more than every few months
and the process shouldn't take long since their system probably won't
be that fragmented.