system files and disk defragmenter

[Chris Popescu]

Hi,

I really need help with a production server that is in a very bad
fragmentation shape.

When I try to run Disk Defragmenter is saying that volume D have 14% free
space but only 0% is available for use by Disk Defragmenter. Formatting and
restoring is not an option - so I am looking for an utility that can help me
to make some free space for Disk Defrag to be run.

The other question is why Disk Defrag show me as system files (green color)
80% (14GB) of data file from this D volume.

D is not the System or boot partition. This are just plain data files from
IIS home folders. Because of this Disk Defrag will not consider for
defragmentation 80% of the files. Any hint?


Thank you,

Chris Popescu

 

[Pat [MSFT]]

Did you check to see if there is a PageFile that has been created on that
drive? If there is, it may have been expanded to the point where it is
causing you problems. You can change the size (which will require a re-boot
to take effect) then try again.

Pat

 

[Pat [MSFT]]

I took a look.

The 'system files' label is a little misleading. It can designate either/or
a system file or a file that has been locked and cannot be moved. In fact
on WinXP and later, the label is changed to be 'unmovable files'. I am
pretty sure that the reason for the large amount of green is for 2 reasons:

1) The MFT is highly fragmented.
2) The display doesn't actually show every single cluster. It is scaled
based on the number of clusters (i.e. one 'stripe' may represent one or more
clusters depending on space). Since the MFT is so highly fragmented, a lot
of aggregated clusters look green.

Aside from the MFT, you have 5 files (large .tif files) that make up the
lions share of your fragmentation. If these files are no longer being used,
I would recommend deleting them (or otherwise moving them off the disk
temporarily), which would free up additional space(s) and increase the
likelihood of a successful defrag for the other files.

Also, diskdefrag looks at the largest contiguous free clusters. If you have
large files, it won't be able to find a spot big enough for them and will
skip. It also cannot (in Win2k) defrag the MFT (WinXP and later this
limitation is gone). Also, the defrag tool is pretty strict. Either it
will completely defrag a given file or it will skip it.

Pat