100% Fragmented free space

[Guest]

Hi,
I have ADSL broadband on a Celeron 1.2. After an hour or so I get the
disk cleanup mngr telling me I need to create more space on C:
When I go to disk defragmenter is says 0% free space on C:
If I reboot and check again, it will be 51%, or thereabouts, free space.
What gives?
This happens every time whether I am moving files around or the comp is
standing idle!!!!
My 20G HDD is split into 3 partions
C: = 5G with 2.5G free (WinXP pro)
D: = 11G with 7G free (My Docs etc)
E: = 3G with 2G free (Driver backups etc)
I've transfered pagefile, IE temp cache, to E: so as not to clutter up C:
I use ZoneAlarm as a firewall, I check for spy/adware regularly and keep/run
Norton up to date regularly.
Is this a known problem or am I doing something wrong?
TIA

 

[Paul Smith]

Hi,
I have ADSL broadband on a Celeron 1.2. After an hour or so I get the
disk cleanup mngr telling me I need to create more space on C:
When I go to disk defragmenter is says 0% free space on C:
If I reboot and check again, it will be 51%, or thereabouts, free space.
What gives?
This happens every time whether I am moving files around or the comp is
standing idle!!!!
My 20G HDD is split into 3 partions
C: = 5G with 2.5G free (WinXP pro)
D: = 11G with 7G free (My Docs etc)
E: = 3G with 2G free (Driver backups etc)
I've transfered pagefile, IE temp cache, to E: so as not to clutter up C:
I use ZoneAlarm as a firewall, I check for spy/adware regularly and
keep/run
Norton up to date regularly.
Is this a known problem or am I doing something wrong?

Tried running Checkdisk? System Restore / Recycle Bin could all be using
space too.

5GB for a system partition is *really* small, may be you should look at
merging them all together.

--
Paul Smith,
Yeovil, UK.
http://windows.dasmirnov.net/ Windows XP Resource Site.

*Replace nospam with smirnov to reply by e-mail*

 

[Guest]

Hi Paul,
Sys Restore is turned off and I empty the 'bin' regularly.
I've had the comp set up like this for over 18 months now but this prob only
started recently, I can't remember if it was before or after SP2 was
downloaded. Checkdisk finds all OK.
J.J.

 

[R. McCarty]

The Windows XP defragmenter does not consolidate Free space.
It also doesn't handle $MFT, Pagefile and other system files. All
it does do is defrag as many files as possible. This leaves "Blank"
or free space dispersed throughout the drive. Re-fragmentation is
going to occur because new data will have to locate a free space
area large enough to hold the file.
If you want to investigate a very good & comprehensive Defrag
program - Check out Raxco's Perfect Disk 2000, Version 6.0. It
handles all files and offers a Boot time and GUI based defrag. It
fully integrates with Prefetch/Layout and can take over the task of
laying out those files.
Raxco offers a 30-Day fully functional trial. Read the instructions
as there are settings/options to get the best results.
The initial GUI pass will take some time. However, once PDisk
has been run it limits re-fragmentation and future passes will take
a very short amount of time. My XP partition can be defragged in
less than 30-seconds. Product sells for ~$45.00.
http://www.raxco.com/products/downloadit/

 

[Guest]

Thanks R. Mc,
I just got rid of Diskeeper 8, which was supposed to be
a comprehensive defrag prog ("Set it and forget it, et al!) because I thought
it was the problem. But no, I still have to reboot every couple of hours as
the comp visibly slows down!