Defrag Won't Compact Files

[Mark O'Hearn]

Sorry if this question has already been discussed in the
past. I use Windows XP Home and regularly use
defragmenter.

Up until recently it always defragmented files AND
compacted them together. However, for the last couple of
weeks, even though I have ran it a "million" times, I can
get my files defragmented by there is a large free space
stuck in between my files. This isn't unmoveable green
space representing my Page File.

Is there a way to force defragmenter to compact the
files. Like I said, I have been trying for a couple of
weeks to get rid of this "white" space between my files
with no luck

 

[Tom Swift]

It is not necessary for your hard disk to be "compacted", and XP's
defragmenter does not seek to do this. Why do you feel that this is so
important?

Tom Swift

 

[Mark O'Hearn]

As my wife would tell you Tom, I'm a neat freak lol!

I doubt that it is important technically, I have just
always been able to compact my files together near the
front of the harddisk. The "milli-of-a-sec" difference
is probably no difference, I agree.

So, putting aside my "issues," I take it there is no
option to "force" the file compaction?

 

[Tom Swift]

I doubt that you're more of a neat freak than I am!

The NTFS file system makes compaction quite unnecessary, and there really is
nothing to be gained. Thus, there is no setting in Windows XP to do this.
There might be third-party software that can do this, and it might be
something that is important if you're running a server, but I have no
experience with either, so I really can't offer advice.

Tom Swift

 

[Greg Hayes/Raxco Software]

Mark,

By "compacting" are you referring to consolidation of free space?

- 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.