Rain
Rain said:
I have Norton System Works with System Doctor monitoring the fragmentation
of
my hard drive. For months now, I get a warning every two or three days
that
the drive is too fragmented. I run the Windows Defrag and then System
Doctor
says it is back to 100%, but two days later I get a warning again.
You need to rely either on the Disk Defragmenter or Norton Speed Disk.
They do not work the same way. The one works against the other.
It's not
just the warning that concerns me because I can see that the system is
slowing down considerably.
I have recently dumped Norton Anti-Virus in favour of AVG 7 ( freeware )
and Norton Personal Firewall for the Windows Firewall. A change would
definitely help with your system performance. Lower overheads.
http://free.grisoft.com/doc/FAQ
To increase your free space on your C partition select Start, All Programs,
Accessories, System Tools, Disk CleanUp, More Options, System Restore and
remove all but the latest System Restore points? Restore points can be quite
large.
You should use Disk CleanUp regularly to Empty your Recycle Bin and
Remove Temporary Internet Files.
How much RAM memory?
Please check Event Viewer for Warning / Error Report in the System and
Application for the 48 hours and post copies. No Information Reports please.
It is not a virus or spyware or adware issue. I run NAV, Ad-Aware and Spy
Sweeper all the time.
It could quite easily be a spyware if the sum of your anti-spyware measures
are Ad-Aware and Spy Sweeper.
http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/unwanted.htm
Win Doctor keeps telling me that
C:\Windows\system32\icardagt.exe cannot access a missing file
"msvcp80.dll."
I downloaded this file from some site recommended by an MVP here but my
computer can't seem to find it.
Please post a copy of the Error Report from Event Viewer.
You can access Event Viewer by selecting Start, Administrative Tools, and
Event Viewer. When researching the meaning of the error, information
regarding Event ID, Source and Description are important.
HOW TO: View and Manage Event Logs in Event Viewer in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;308427&sd=tech
Part of the Description of the error will include a link, which you should
double click for further information. You can copy using copy and paste.
Often the link will, however, say there is no further information.
http://go.microsoft.com/fw.link/events.asp
(Please note the hyperlink above is for illustration purposes only)
A tip for posting copies of Error Reports! Run Event Viewer and double click
on the error you want to copy. In the window, which appears is a button
resembling two pages. Double click the button and close Event Viewer. Now
start your message (email) and do a paste into the body of the message. This
will paste the info from the Event Viewer Error Report complete with links
into the message. Make sure this is the first paste after exiting from Event
Viewer.
My HD is a year old, 40 GB, partitoned into three drives. The C drive is
about 20 GB with 4.5 GB free space. I have 512 MB RAM.
I cannot defrag the E drive at all and I get a message telling me that
there
isn't enough free space to perform the defrag. It has 8 GB with 1 GB free
space. The D drive has 9 GB, all free space.
You need 15% free space on a hard drive to run Windows Disk Defragmenter.
Your E drive only has 12.5%
By the way, Norton System Works comes with a defrag program called Speed
Disk. All of a sudden it won't work and Norton's explanation is that my
software is out of date (it's 2003) and I need to buy 2006! WHAT??!
Please provide an exact copy of the error message.
So... is the amount of free space the problem? Are there other reasons
why
a HD would not stay defragmented?
The amount of free space is very important when running Disk Defragmenter. A
minimum of 15% is required but sometimes 20% is desirable if the drive /
partition
contains one or more large files. You can run Disk Defragmenter a second and
third
time if files are still fragmented after the first run. You can put files
more prone to
fragment in their own partitions.
If you use Outlook Express regularly compacting Outlook Express before
running
Disk Defragmenter is helpful.
Disk Defragmenter provides a "Most fragmented files" list. When a fragmented
file is
larger than the largest pocket of free space available then the files is not
fragmented.
Running Disk Defragmenter a second or third time does move files around and
can
reduce / eliminate the contents of the "Most fragmented files" list. The
more free
space on the drive / partition, the more likely it is that all fragments
will be
eliminated.
Free space cannot be defragmented with the Windows XP Disk Defragmenter.
Neither can your pagefile cannot be defragmented because the file is in use
whilst
Disk Defragmenter is running. You can purchase other Defragmenting Utilities
e.g.
Perfect Disk, which will defragment your pagefile and free space. Another
option is to
place your pagefile in it's own partition. A pagefile partition is best
located as the first
partition on a second hard drive. You should leave a small page file at the
original
location.
http://www.raxco.com/
Is it a good idea to buy a defrag program?
Not really necessary.
If free space is the problem, I do not know how to rearrange the partiton
of
the HD and would need detailed instructions.
Do you have files / folders that might be moved to the other partitions?
To move programmes use Add / Remove Programs in Start, Control Panel, Add /
Remove Programs to uninstall programmes. Create a Programs Directory on
your other partition and reinstall there.
Some other notes you may find useful.
Create a My Documents folder in another partition and copy ( not move ) the
contents of My Documents to your new folder. Then delete the files in your
My Documents folder ( if you encounter problems deleting use Shift + Delete
to bypass the Recycle Bin ). You will also need to change Default File
locations in the Microsoft Office programmes you use. For Word go to Tools,
Options, File Locations, highlight Documents, click on Modify and change
file path. For Excel go to Tools, Options, General and change default file
path.
For Temporary Internet Files select Start, Control Panel, Internet Options,
Temporary Internet Files. Settings, Move Folder.
To move the Outlook Express Store Folder select in Outlook Express Tools,
Options, Maintenance, Store Folder, Change.
http://www.tomsterdam.com/insideoe/files/store.htm
Do you use Norton Utilities and Norton Protected Storage
Norton Protected Storage?
http://snipurl.com/j8g4
I need to do it myself as I
have paid my friendly tech guy too much money and have to learn to be
self-sufficient.
Thanks for your time and help,
Rain
--
Hope this helps.
Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
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