Windows defrag is slow and is not as good as a paid app imho. Having said that I've been using PerfectDisk for a few years now and I don't see myself switching to anything else anytime soon. Upgrades to newer versions are also very cheap (about $10) which I like:) Worth a trial imho
Disk Defrag Software | Defragment Computer | Disk Defragmenter - PerfectDisk
Additionally, because I triple boot, there are some boot files that I must specify to be 'excluded' from defragging otherwise it deactivates my bootloader (Acronis OS Selector) when they get moved so using windows defrag is not an option for me since it doesn't allow for exclusions.
Just for laughs...
Many of the non-default defraggers can slow the system down by destroying prefetch optimisation.
As Antman said, the actual definition of "fragmented" is in the eye of the beholder. It's possible to choose any arbitrary definition for what constitutes the best possible layout. You could have small files first, then medium, then large, or perhaps all EXEs, then all DLLs, then all TXT... clearly some schemes will be better in certain ways but worse in others.
What the OS "prefetch" mechanism does is to watch what's happening during the boot phase and during the first 10 seconds of an app's startup. It records information along these lines:
- While starting Notepad, we first read all of Notepad.exe.
- Then we accessed the second half of NTDLL.dll.
- Then we read from 25% to 50% of Comctl32.dll.
- Then we finished by reading from 65% to 75% of Advapi32.dll.
(Obviously, just an example.) Later, the in-built defragger comes along and examines that recorded prefetch info. It may conclude that a lot of apps currently on the system do similar things with those particular files, so that it makes sense to reorganise their storage on-disk to make those fragments contiguous. The disk head(s) can then read them in one swoop without having to incur the penalty of extra seek time and rotational delay to move between the various fragments.
To an outsider, that disk layout may look completely insane and highly fragmented - "why the HECK would you have a quarter of Comctl32.dll sandwiched between a half of NTDLL.dll and a tenth of Advapi32.dll?!?" If that outsider is a disk defragmenter which doesn't understand prefetch, and many of them don't, it may be tempted to rearrange the file chunks so they all look "pretty" again, whatever its definition may be.
You end up with a dialog box that says "fragmentation: 0%" and a system which performs slightly more slowly :)
This is really nice IMO. It always worked perfect for me, but a HOG on my single core laptop. PerfectSpeed PC Optimizer
Damn just noticed its the same as what Zahl posted lol
I wouldnt have two defraggers running. They could be conflicting each other in terms of prioritising where files are placed. Disable the scheduler on windows defrag and use diskeeper.
PerfectDisk 10 is better though
Sorry to break this to you, but there is no such thing as a non-fragmenting file system. There are ways to mitigate fragmentation (NTFS supports several of these), but those only work on small files. There is also a limitation of actual space on the HDD. Fragmentation is not something that is curable due to the way bits are stored on the HDD they will eventually fragment when files are added, deleted, changed, etc.
The EXT* file system fragments just as NTFS does.
Go to start, enter "defrag" in search and select "defragment your hard drive" and you will see it has probably been running auto since you installed Win 7.It's funny you bring this up today because I was just taking a closer look at my Diskeeper 2009. I've had it since XP, and now running it 64bit in Windows 7 and I have to say I don't think I am going to continue using it.
I have it set to Auto so it defrags in the background, one of their claims to fame is how it only works when the system is idle, and uses such negligible resources to run, and I will give it that as it accomplishes this part well, but I don't think it has ever done a good job keeping the drives defragmented 'automatically'.
The point of 'auto' is to set and forget it, but occasionally when I do a manual 'analyze' it tells me the drive is defragmented and performance is 'degraded'
So I ask myself whats the point? I'm sure that windows defrag can do just as good a job or better when defragging manually.
edit: I just noticed in your post you state that the built in defrag runs automatically as well. I did not know this and am curious if this is true. If it were than I have serious issues knowing that 2 programs running in conjunction cannot keep my drives defragmented!
Ya I already did just that after reading the first post and sure enough it was set on a schedule for once a week defrag. Maybe this was causing Diskeeper to show it being defragmented since they may have ultimately placed files in locations each program sought to be better. In any case, I have already uninstalled Diskeeper and turned off the schedule on windows defrag and am running o&o. So far I like the simplicity of the GUI and of course it gives me the options for file exclusions which in my case is important since I have bootfiles for Acronis OS Selector that can't be moved.Go to start, enter "defrag" in search and select "defragment your hard drive" and you will see it has probably been running auto since you installed Win 7.It's funny you bring this up today because I was just taking a closer look at my Diskeeper 2009. I've had it since XP, and now running it 64bit in Windows 7 and I have to say I don't think I am going to continue using it.
I have it set to Auto so it defrags in the background, one of their claims to fame is how it only works when the system is idle, and uses such negligible resources to run, and I will give it that as it accomplishes this part well, but I don't think it has ever done a good job keeping the drives defragmented 'automatically'.
The point of 'auto' is to set and forget it, but occasionally when I do a manual 'analyze' it tells me the drive is defragmented and performance is 'degraded'
So I ask myself whats the point? I'm sure that windows defrag can do just as good a job or better when defragging manually.
edit: I just noticed in your post you state that the built in defrag runs automatically as well. I did not know this and am curious if this is true. If it were than I have serious issues knowing that 2 programs running in conjunction cannot keep my drives defragmented!
Honestly, I cannot say that I have really ever been able to "prove" a performance increase after having defragmented a Windows volume in quite some time. I'd say that I probably fire up the built-in windows defrag tool every 3 months or so and let it run overnight. I've tried others like defraggler and auslogics product and I didn't feel any difference after having used either of those either.
And I just recently switched to an SSD drive on my main machine...and there isn't a good reason to have to bother with defrag on these...so I expect to see my use of defragmented utilities dropping even more.
Defrag can be overused in terms of effectiveness, but I alwys run it after a couple of days of video editing. I use three volumes to process video and I frag each of them when done. The volume where I acquire from and ultimately write to maybe doesn't need to be fragged each time.
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