defrag big problems

[luca]

Hallo, I can't defrag my hard disk, but I have to,
since my laptop has become unbearably slow.

I start the defragger. Everything seems normal, but after 40-60 minutes
the program stops without complaining that anything was wrong,
yet the disk is not defragmented.

The picture below says it all. Yet I have almonst 50% of the disk free:

http://168.144.107.58/defrag.gif

I have also run a checkdisk, which took a looong time, but completed
with no error msg.

Any idea about what I am doing wrong?

thanks

Luca

 

[Greg Hayes/Raxco Software]

What statistics is the built-in defragmenter providing about this drive?

The built-in defragmenter isn't exactly known for doing a good job. I would
suggest booting into Safe Mode and try defragmenting from there and see if
it helps. If it doesn't, I'd suggest looking into a a more rebust 3rd party
defragmenter.

- Greg/Raxco Software
Microsoft MVP - Windows File System

Disclaimer: I work for Raxco Software, the maker of PerfectDisk - a
commercial defrag utility, as a systems engineer in the support department.

Want to email me? Delete ntloader.

 

[luca]

What statistics is the built-in defragmenter providing about this drive?

here are the statistics. Does it tell you anything?

thanks

Luca

Volume OPENWAVE (C:
Volume size = 19,069 MB
Cluster size = 512 bytes
Used space = 9,867 MB
Free space = 9,201 MB
Percent free space = 48 %

Volume fragmentation
Total fragmentation = 14 %
File fragmentation = 28 %
Free space fragmentation = 0 %

File fragmentation
Total files = 78,641
Average file size = 165 KB
Total fragmented files = 39
Total excess fragments = 54,124
Average fragments per file = 1.68

Pagefile fragmentation
Pagefile size = 384 MB
Total fragments = 2

Directory fragmentation
Total directories = 7,318
Fragmented directories = 1
Excess directory fragments = 2

Master File Table (MFT) fragmentation
Total MFT size = 90,120 KB
MFT record count = 87,180
Percent MFT in use = 96 %
Total MFT fragments = 2

Luca

 

[Pat [MSFT]]

This isn't a very fragmented disk. You only have 39 files that are
fragmented (though, they appear to be very, very fragmented).

So you have a few problems:
1) The cluster size of 512bytes virtually guarantees that you will fragment
a lot. Basically any file >512 bytes has the potential to fragment. This
could also be the source of some of your perf issues since a given seek may
only result in a 512byte read instead of 4k (which is the normal default).
Unfortunately, there isn't a lot you can do at this point, since you would
need to re-format the partition to get a larger cluster size. If you ever
decide to recreate the partition, keep this in mind.

2) From the statistics, I would guess that the files that are fragmented are
very large. The page file isn't fragmented to any noticeable degree, nor is
the MFT so that's good news. I would recommend reviewing the defrag report
and looking at the files that are fragmented. There are defrag apps out
(some are free) that will defrag a single file/directory at a time. That
may work better for you.

The bundled defrag utility basically only defrags a file if there is enough
contiguous space to do so. If there isn't then it skips the file. That is
probably why it just stops after a while.


Pat

 

[luca]

Greg, I downloaded the evaluation copy of diskperfect and
it did the job. Thanks a lot. I now realize what piece of s*#%
the standard win2k defragmenter is.
I am writing an email to the IT guys in my company recommending them
to take a serious look at this tool to manage PCs in the whole company.

Best

Luca