Defrag and Cleaning

I am the guy that is now going from XP to 7. I've read all the threads on defragging and have concluded that there is more support given to defrag as opposed not to.

Questions:

1. Is the Windows 7 utility competent?
2. Is it a good idea to run the programs that defrag on the fly?
3. At what percentage would be a gauge to defrag?
4. Is the clean utility competent in 7? If not I see overwhelming support for CCleaner.

Thanks,

Jack

Windows Defrag is competent.

Its default schedule is weekly.

I have NEVER manually defragged my drives and I have never seen fragmentation levels above 5%.

The clean utility of Windows 7 is competent. So is CCleaner, but try to restrain yourself from using its registry cleaner.

I would venture to say that most of us have moved on to using SSD drives about the same time we moved to Windows 7. Thus, no defrag tools needed ... at least on the boot side. The main reason to defrag is for speed, so with only my data drive not being SSD, speed is not really the problem it once was. So, I just use the built-in tool. Defraggler is a nice option if you want more visual feedback of what is happening.

pcunite said:

I would venture to say that most of us have moved on to using SSD drives about the same time we moved to Windows 7. Thus, no defrag tools needed ... at least on the boot side. The main reason to defrag is for speed, so with only my data drive not being SSD, speed is not really the problem it once was. So, I just use the built-in tool. Defraggler is a nice option if you want more visual feedback of what is happening.

Learning Curve Question; What is unique about a Solid State Drive as opposed to the regular ones?

jack1953 said:

Learning Curve Question; What is unique about a Solid State Drive as opposed to the regular ones?

Speed.

More particularly, access times. Most noticeable in booting, defragging, virus scans, and overall "responsiveness".

ignatzatsonic said:

jack1953 said:

Learning Curve Question; What is unique about a Solid State Drive as opposed to the regular ones?

Speed.

More particularly, access times. Most noticeable in booting, defragging, virus scans, and overall "responsiveness".

I thought the speed was determined by the processor?

ignatzatsonic said:

jack1953 said:

Learning Curve Question; What is unique about a Solid State Drive as opposed to the regular ones?

Speed.

More particularly, access times. Most noticeable in booting, defragging, virus scans, and overall "responsiveness".

Is it me, or do the SSDs require less space? What I mean is, the ones I have seen advertised are usually much smaller in G size.

SSDs are much more expensive per gigabyte. but most people only keep their operating system and programs on the SSD, so 60 to 120 GB is enough. Maybe $100 to $150 in the USA.

Re speed: CPU speed helps at some things (such as encoding video, mathematical computations), but disk speed is an over-riding issue on many PC tasks.