Why is there a Disk Defragmenter utility included in the OS?

[randwill]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter. (For
those who don't know this can be found like this: Start>All
Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When you ask it to
analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it needs to be defraged,
which in my case it said it did.

I've tried using a couple of recovery tools, Acronis Drive Recovery and
Restoration Version 2.5.14 and believe the files are completely trashed.

My question is; why does XP include a tool that destroys a drives contents?
It SAYS that it will improve the performance of the drive. Does that mean
it will improve the performance by wiping out the contents? Shouildn't
there be a warning message that says something like, "You are about to
destroy the contents of this drive. Yes or No?"

Please help me understand the thinking of including such a tool as part of
the operating system.

 

[Alias]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter. (For
those who don't know this can be found like this: Start>All
Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When you ask it to
analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it needs to be defraged,
which in my case it said it did.

I've tried using a couple of recovery tools, Acronis Drive Recovery and
Restoration Version 2.5.14 and believe the files are completely trashed.

My question is; why does XP include a tool that destroys a drives contents?
It SAYS that it will improve the performance of the drive. Does that mean
it will improve the performance by wiping out the contents? Shouildn't
there be a warning message that says something like, "You are about to
destroy the contents of this drive. Yes or No?"

Please help me understand the thinking of including such a tool as part of
the operating system.

Did you do a clean up first and disable your anti virus auto scan before
defragging the drive?

Back up is a computer user's best friend because, no matter what you do,
sh*t happens.

Alias

 

[Gordon]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter.

Never, NEVER heard of this in twenty years, from W95 through 98, W2K to
XP.......

 

[Rock]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter.
(For those who don't know this can be found like this: Start>All
Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When you ask it to
analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it needs to be defraged,
which in my case it said it did.

I've tried using a couple of recovery tools, Acronis Drive Recovery and
Restoration Version 2.5.14 and believe the files are completely trashed.

My question is; why does XP include a tool that destroys a drives
contents? It SAYS that it will improve the performance of the drive. Does
that mean it will improve the performance by wiping out the contents?
Shouildn't there be a warning message that says something like, "You are
about to destroy the contents of this drive. Yes or No?"

Please help me understand the thinking of including such a tool as part of
the operating system.

No utility is safe. With computers things happen. Just because this
happened during a defrag operation doesn't mean the defrag utility was the
sole cause for it. There could have been problems with the drive or some
read/write errors caused by the controller during the defrag. The built
in defrag is generally safe, as are the good 3rd party tools but even those
good tools recommend you have a full and complete backup before doing a
defrag.

And that is the key point. With computers data loss is an issue of when,
not if - running a utility, drive hardware failure, power outages, software
installs gone haywire, etc. The best way to guard against these things is
to always have a full and complete backup of important data. It is the
cornerstone of smart computing. A drive imaging program such as Acronis
True Image, tested for functionality, and used to save compressed images of
the drive(s) on a regular basis to an external hard drive is low cost
insurance. There should also be redundancy in backups being stored on
different media such as more than one external disk or DVD. Any backup
solution should be tried and tested. Once that's in place you can easily
recover from the inevitable disasters.

I'm sorry you lost data, but you might not be blaming the right source; take
this opportunity to put a reliable backup solution in place.

 

[Ghostrider]

Never, NEVER heard of this in twenty years, from W95 through 98, W2K to
XP.......

Actually, I have known it to happen. The cause: Backup files are large.
Should a power failure or interruption occur during the defragmentation
process and if the reserve space on the drive is less than 20-25%, the
backup file being defragged is corrupted. It also loses its checksum in
the process, making it unrecoverable. This problem with compressed backup
files is more common than one might think.

 

[Bob I]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter. (For
those who don't know this can be found like this: Start>All
Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When you ask it to
analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it needs to be defraged,
which in my case it said it did.

I've tried using a couple of recovery tools, Acronis Drive Recovery and
Restoration Version 2.5.14 and believe the files are completely trashed.

My question is; why does XP include a tool that destroys a drives contents?
It SAYS that it will improve the performance of the drive. Does that mean
it will improve the performance by wiping out the contents? Shouildn't
there be a warning message that says something like, "You are about to
destroy the contents of this drive. Yes or No?"

Please help me understand the thinking of including such a tool as part of
the operating system.

As the others comment, in the world did you manage to corrupt your drive
so badly? Millions upon millions use that utility without a problem year
after year. Believe me, the corruption wasn't "caused" by defrag, it was
just the last thing you did before the drive crashed.

 

[Shaun]

Never heard of such a thing.

 

[Richard]

That's why you always have more than one backup.

 

[Harry Ohrn]

this smacks of a typical troll post.

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

Never, NEVER heard of this in twenty years, from W95 through 98, W2K to
XP.......

I have seen it reported several times in this newsgroup and in others.

 

[randwill]

Original poster here.

I reformatted the D drive and it is working fine.

I'll never defrag another drive though.

I guess the only thing I can do is move everything off it and re-format
every few months.

I am worried about my C drive. I won't be stupid enough to ever defrag it,
but I don't know about moving the operating system and all the applications
in order to re-format it. Sounds like a pain, but that's PCs I guess.

Any tips from knowledgable users?

 

[Uncle Grumpy]

Original poster here.

I reformatted the D drive and it is working fine.

I'll never defrag another drive though.

WHY NOT????

I guess the only thing I can do is move everything off it and re-format
every few months.

Stupid. Stupid. STUPID.

In case you missed my point: I think you'd be STUPID if you did that.

I am worried about my C drive. I won't be stupid enough to ever defrag it,

You've already qualified yourself as "stupid" so why quit now?

Any tips from knowledgable users?

You might be too stupid to take advantage of those tips.

 

[randwill]

this smacks of a typical troll post.

--


Harry Ohrn MS MVP [Shell\User]
www.webtree.ca/windowsxp

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter.
(For those who don't know this can be found like this: Start>All
Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When you ask it to
analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it needs to be defraged,
which in my case it said it did.

I've tried using a couple of recovery tools, Acronis Drive Recovery and
Restoration Version 2.5.14 and believe the files are completely trashed.

My question is; why does XP include a tool that destroys a drives
contents? It SAYS that it will improve the performance of the drive.
Does that mean it will improve the performance by wiping out the
contents? Shouildn't there be a warning message that says something like,
"You are about to destroy the contents of this drive. Yes or No?"

Please help me understand the thinking of including such a tool as part
of the operating system.

You would be wrong about that. This happened to me.

 

[Rock]

Original poster here.

I reformatted the D drive and it is working fine.

I'll never defrag another drive though.

I guess the only thing I can do is move everything off it and re-format
every few months.

I am worried about my C drive. I won't be stupid enough to ever defrag
it, but I don't know about moving the operating system and all the
applications in order to re-format it. Sounds like a pain, but that's PCs
I guess.

Any tips from knowledgable users?

Sorry but your solution makes no sense. I gave you a suggestion in my
original post. Backup the data, use a drive imaging program.

 

[Alias]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk Defragmenter. (For
those who don't know this can be found like this: Start>All
Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When you ask it to
analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it needs to be defraged,
which in my case it said it did.

It must have been severely fragmented, then, because XP LIES and you
should defrag much more often than what the program recommends. You
should also close all programs and disable your AV auto scan so it isn't
scanning each file as the defrag is moving them.

That said, I agree with the other posters who maintain that the timing
of the defrag and the data loss was a mere coincidence and something
else caused it.

Alias

 

[HeyBub]

I recently lost an entire back-up drive after using Disk
Defragmenter. (For those who don't know this can be found like this:
Start>All Programs>Accessories>System Tools>Disk Defragmentor.) When
you ask it to analyze a disc it will recommend whether or not it
needs to be defraged, which in my case it said it did.

I've tried using a couple of recovery tools, Acronis Drive Recovery
and Restoration Version 2.5.14 and believe the files are completely
trashed.
My question is; why does XP include a tool that destroys a drives
contents? It SAYS that it will improve the performance of the drive. Does
that mean it will improve the performance by wiping out the
contents? Shouildn't there be a warning message that says something
like, "You are about to destroy the contents of this drive. Yes or
No?"
Please help me understand the thinking of including such a tool as
part of the operating system.

All non-trivial de-fragmenting programs have extensive logic to prevent such
silliness as you report. For example, they de-fragment a file by assembling
all the pieces into a contiguous section before they delete the original.
Even then, they build in roll-back links. For a defragmenting program to
cause a catastrophe is well nigh improbable. To cause a problem on more than
one file has about the same odds as an asteroid striking the hard drive.

 

[randwill]

WHY NOT????


Stupid. Stupid. STUPID.

In case you missed my point: I think you'd be STUPID if you did that.


You've already qualified yourself as "stupid" so why quit now?


You might be too stupid to take advantage of those tips.

Thanks to those of you with helpful suggestions.

 

[randwill]

All non-trivial de-fragmenting programs have extensive logic to prevent
such silliness as you report. For example, they de-fragment a file by
assembling all the pieces into a contiguous section before they delete the
original. Even then, they build in roll-back links. For a defragmenting
program to cause a catastrophe is well nigh improbable. To cause a problem
on more than one file has about the same odds as an asteroid striking the
hard drive.

Never-the-less, after defraging the drive, it lost its name (reverting to
"Local Disk (D" from "2ND Hard Drive (D" and it's contents were
inaccessible and every time I tried to get into it, it gave the error;
"Drive is not formatted do you wish to format it now?" The recovery tools I
tried could not get anything off of it.

 

[Noncompliant]

If its a hard drive for storing image files, shame on you. Image files
should never be defragmented. The source partition should be defragmented,
then imaged. The actual image file should be left alone. This has been
standard procedure for image files for sometime. Not a MS problem.

The imaging program should have an asset for exporting an image file within
windows. Never directly copy an image file with windows explorer.

 

[Noncompliant]

Never-the-less, after defraging the drive, it lost its name (reverting to
"Local Disk (D" from "2ND Hard Drive (D" and it's contents were
inaccessible and every time I tried to get into it, it gave the error;
"Drive is not formatted do you wish to format it now?" The recovery tools
I tried could not get anything off of it.

Sounds like the file allocation table broke to me.
A previous reply from another indicated a potential trollpost.
Don't you think the information divulged in your reply is important
information?