Need a REAL defragmenter

MKSheppard · Post by **MKSheppard** » 2003-10-28 03:01am

I just spent six hours today waiting for the W2K defragger to defrag my
HDD, and tonight, I check out the HDD with the analyzer, and it says it's
30% fragmented already.

Ok, I need recommendations for a REAL defragger

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2003-10-28 03:12am

Win2k's defragger is serviceable. You just need to follow some basic rules:

Don't keep your HD too full. You can't keep a HD defragged if it's 80% full. If you can't reduce your file load, get a bigger HD. If you can't do either, you're SOL.
When you defrag, make sure you have nothing running. The more processes you have running, the more files the defragger won't be able to move. Shut down all resident processes that are not necessary, all system tray icons, all active applications, etc.
Before defragging, go through and delete all unnecessary files such as IE temp files and cookies, Mozilla temp files and cookies, everything in your profile temp directory, etc.

Of course, the easy solution is to use a better filesystem, but you expressed unhappiness with Linux, so that's not an option

MKSheppard · Post by **MKSheppard** » 2003-10-28 03:15am

Darth Wong wrote:
Don't keep your HD too full. You can't keep a HD defragged if it's 80% full. If you can't reduce your file load, get a bigger HD. If you can't do either, you're SOL.

Problem is, I can't do that; fucking brother and his gigs upon gigs
of anime

I did delete over four gigs of crap I didn't need anymore. But I can't do
a total cleanout because of him

When you defrag, make sure you have nothing running. The more processes you have running, the more files the defragger won't be able to move. Shut down all resident processes that are not necessary, all system tray icons, all active applications, etc.

Nothing was running for six hours, man.

[*]Before defragging, go through and delete all unnecessary files such as IE temp files and cookies, Mozilla temp files and cookies, everything in your profile temp directory, etc.[/list]

I did that, and cleaned out my registry too.

Of course, the easy solution is to use a better filesystem, but you expressed unhappiness with Linux, so that's not an option

Linux was a good system, but I couldn't do everythin I need to do, for
example, there's no good reliable OCR software for linux, etc

Penguin · Post by **Penguin** » 2003-10-28 03:53am

Think "norton systemworks"would do the trick...

Unfortunatly, it's NOT cheep...

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-28 11:34am

NTFS does not defragment well when you start running low on space. The built-in defragmenter is about as good as you'll get - it's a licensed version of the Diskeeper engine. One thing you can attempt is to run the defragmenter multiple times.

One lesser-known fact is that the NT defragmenter can work even when processes are reading and writing to the HD (unlike W9X's defragmenter) due to the superiority of the NTFS filesystem over FAT. It's not as efficient, but it does work so you don't have to shut down every process you see.

AFAIK, no defragmenter will really work on NTFS if you start running low. I've used SystemWorks's defragmenter before, it didn't really work any better.

Yuri Prime · Post by **Yuri Prime** » 2003-10-28 11:46am

I have Norton 2002 and it tells me that XP has exclusive disk access. Is there anything I can do about that?

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-28 01:11pm

Yuri Prime wrote:I have Norton 2002 and it tells me that XP has exclusive disk access. Is there anything I can do about that?

Don't use Norton's defragmenter.

Companion Cube · Post by **Companion Cube** » 2003-10-28 01:24pm

Just out of curiousity, what does SOL stand for anyway?

Einhander Sn0m4n · Post by **Einhander Sn0m4n** » 2003-10-28 01:39pm

MKSheppard wrote:Problem is, I can't do that; fucking brother and his gigs upon gigs of anime

I did delete over four gigs of crap I didn't need anymore. But I can't do a total cleanout because of him

Blow it up anyway! He needs his own computer to fuck up on anyway...

3rd Impact wrote:Just out of curiousity, what does SOL stand for anyway?

SOL=Shit Outta Luck. Basically the state you're in after any and all attempts to fix a problem have failed miserably and there are no more options left.

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-28 01:46pm

3rd Impact wrote:Just out of curiousity, what does SOL stand for anyway?

Shit out of luck.

Faram · Post by **Faram** » 2003-10-28 03:48pm

phongn wrote:Don't use Norton's defragmenter.

I wold like to say: Don't use anything from Symantec.

Atavarius · Post by **Atavarius** » 2003-10-28 05:43pm

I have used diskeeper for sometime now.

Here.

Faram · Post by **Faram** » 2003-10-28 06:01pm

Oh btw:

Posted this Tip a while back on how to defraggle your disk

phongn · Post by **phongn** » 2003-10-28 06:37pm

Atavarius wrote:I have used diskeeper for sometime now.

Here.

The W2K defragmentation engine is Diskeeper.

Vertigo1 · Post by **Vertigo1** » 2003-10-28 08:53pm

phongn wrote:Don't use Norton's defragmenter.

Why? I've had good luck with it in the past.

BrYaN19kc · Post by **BrYaN19kc** » 2003-10-28 09:14pm

DISKEEPER by Executive Software is probably the best on the market and even recommended by Microsoft. We use it on all of our servers. The defrag program designed into Microsoft was made by Executive Software, but ti doesn't have all the bells and whistles of the real software.

Not only do we use it at our datacenter here on campus, I do know of several other universities and companies who use it as well. Executive Software has a very good reputation.