How Windows 7 defrag schedule work

[pominator]

I was playing around with the default Windows 7 defrag schedule and still can't figure how it work exactly.

The default schedule is set to start at 1h am wednesday with 3 minutes idle condition. Their is also a settings that set the defrag to start as soon as it can if a schedule is missed. If my understanding is right, if the computer is close in the night of wednesday to thursday, it will start to defrag next time it will be open and idle for 3 minutes. But what happen if you open your computer on friday, do some work and let it idle 3 mins. The defrag start but then you start back using your computer before the end of the defrag. Do the defrag stop completly and the next scheduled start is next wednesday ? Do it only put itself in pause until you idle again ? Do it put iself in pause until you idle again or stop automatically if too many changes are made to the filesystem ?

Anyway thanks if you have any info regarding this.

Edit : You can see the details of the schedule like this : http://www.addictivetips.com/window...weak-automatic-disk-defragmentation-in-vista/

 

[ignatzatsonic]

Is there any particular reason you are using Task Scheduler or the idle setting??

I just use the built-in Windows 7 settings, without Task Scheduler. It runs once a week completely in the background. I never notice it at all.

I haven't manually defragged in several years. Both of my hard drives are shown as 0 percent fragmented.

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Same here; I just use the built-in Win 7 defragger without the task scheduler. I have it set to run at 2AM every Wednesday. Even if I am up at the time and using the computer, I can't tell it's operating but, every time I've checked, it had been working just fine. If I manually check the day before it is scheduled to defrag, I've never had any more than 3% defragmentation; 1-2% is the norm. Can't beat that with a big stick.

 

[Britton30]

Yup, I leave it at default too, works great. Do you turn your PC off on Wednesday, or is that a rhetorical scenario?

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Yup, I leave it at default too, works great. Do you turn your PC off on Wednesday, or is that a rhetorical scenario?

Nope and that is the schedule. My PC stays on 24/7 with occasional reboots, roughly one a week. There is no need to do a shutdown just to do a defrag.

Edit: Just for excrement and merriment, I checked my HDDs and both are at 0% fragmentation.

 

[Britton30]

Jeannie, I was referring to the OP saying if "computer is close in the night of wednesday to Thursday".

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Jeannie, I was referring to the OP saying if "computer is close in the night of wednesday to Thursday".

Oopsie!

 

[pominator]

Is there any particular reason you are using Task Scheduler or the idle setting??

I just use the built-in Windows 7 settings, without Task Scheduler. It runs once a week completely in the background. I never notice it at all.

I haven't manually defragged in several years. Both of my hard drives are shown as 0 percent fragmented.

Yup, I leave it at default too, works great. Do you turn your PC off on Wednesday, or is that a rhetorical scenario?

The task scheduler settings are not a custom one but the fine tuning options of the default defrag in Windows 7. It explain the logical behind the schedule within the task scheduler, yet I do not fully understanding it.

It start defrag at wednesday 1 am if it is idle since at least 3 minutes. If the computer is close or in use, it will start the defrag next time it can, so the next time the computer will be idle 3 minutes. Like I said in my first post, what happen if one idle 3 minutes, the defrag start, then start using the computer again, way before the defrag have ended ? I don't have problem with fragmentation, I just want to understand how it works.

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Is there any particular reason you are using Task Scheduler or the idle setting??

I just use the built-in Windows 7 settings, without Task Scheduler. It runs once a week completely in the background. I never notice it at all.

I haven't manually defragged in several years. Both of my hard drives are shown as 0 percent fragmented.

Yup, I leave it at default too, works great. Do you turn your PC off on Wednesday, or is that a rhetorical scenario?

The task scheduler settings are not a custom one but the fine tuning options of the default defrag in Windows 7. It explain the logical behind the schedule within the task scheduler, yet I do not fully understanding it.

It start defrag at wednesday 1 am if it is idle since at least 3 minutes. If the computer is close or in use, it will start the defrag next time it can, so the next time the computer will be idle 3 minutes. Like I said in my first post, what happen if one idle 3 minutes, the defrag start, then start using the computer again, way before the defrag have ended ? I don't have problem with fragmentation, I just want to understand how it works.

Where are you finding these fine tuning options? I'm unable to find them in my Win 7 defragger. This is the screen I get when I hit the Windows key and type defrag:



The reason the C: drive is showing such a high defragmentation is it is a SSD and I do not defrag it; defragging a SSD can shorten the life of it with excessive writes. SSDs can handle defragmentation just fine with no loss of performance.

Clicking on the Configure Schedule button gives me this:



Clicking on Frequency just gives me a choice of Daily, Weekly, or Monthly. Clicking on Day gives me a choice of any one day Sunday through Saturday. clicking on Time just gives me a choice of any one hour of the day. Clicking on Disks gives me this:



Note only my spinners are shown and the C: drive has been excluded. Win 7 will automagically exclude SSDs as long as the Automatically Defragment New Disks box is left unchecked. Curiously enough, checking just both of the spinner's boxes will cause the Select all Disks box to automagically be selected.

Clicking OK closes the Select Disks for Schedule and Modify Schedule windows. Clicking Close in the Disk Defragmenter window will close the window and finish the scheduling process. Nowhere did I see anything about three minute delays, etc.

 

[LMiller7]

Windows defrag doesn't do it's own scheduling but uses the system task scheduler. Only the most basic functions are available from the defrag dialog. For full control you have to go into the task scheduler.

It start defrag at wednesday 1 am if it is idle since at least 3 minutes. If the computer is close or in use, it will start the defrag next time it can, so the next time the computer will be idle 3 minutes. Like I said in my first post, what happen if one idle 3 minutes, the defrag start, then start using the computer again, way before the defrag have ended ? I don't have problem with fragmentation, I just want to understand how it works.

The task scheduler provides control over what happens when the computer comes out of the idle state while a task is running. Open the properties for the task and select the "conditions" tab.

Note the second checkbox labeled "Stop if the computer ceases to be idle". Quite clear.
Note the third checkbox labeled "Restart if the idle state resumkes". Also quite clear.

Or have I misunderstood the question?

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Curious. I looked in Task Scheduler and didn't find any entries related to defragging.

 

[Britton30]

I found it here Jeannie.

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Ok, found it. Apparently, defrag will run just fine with the default settings (no three minute delay, etc.) because all of that is disabled (grayed out) on mine and, when ever I checked the fragmentation levels of the spinners on Thursday, they have been at zero. It is possible to overthink things.

 

[Britton30]

Ok, found it. Apparently, defrag will run just fine with the default settings (no three minute delay, etc.) because all of that is disabled (grayed out) on mine and, when ever I checked the fragmentation levels of the spinners on Thursday, they have been at zero. It is possible to overthink things.

I've never done that.

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Ok, found it. Apparently, defrag will run just fine with the default settings (no three minute delay, etc.) because all of that is disabled (grayed out) on mine and, when ever I checked the fragmentation levels of the spinners on Thursday, they have been at zero. It is possible to overthink things.

I've never done that.

LOL! Just like I never have.

 

[pominator]

The task scheduler provides control over what happens when the computer comes out of the idle state while a task is running. Open the properties for the task and select the "conditions" tab.

Note the second checkbox labeled "Stop if the computer ceases to be idle". Quite clear.
Note the third checkbox labeled "Restart if the idle state resumkes". Also quite clear.

Or have I misunderstood the question?

I did not saw thos options, it is quite clear indeed. The only case where a disk is not defragmented is when a user always close his computer as soon as he don't use it anymore. Thanks for clearing this up. Always good to let his computer idle at least one day per week.

 

[Mang Nux]

Will the task scheduler method allow the defrag to run when the PC is in a logged off state? I scheduled defrag through the standard interface, but it wouldn't run until the next time a user logged in. On the other hand my AV's scheduled scan ran just fine while logged off.

EDIT: I looked at it in task scheduler, and the logged on/off section was greyed out (although there was a check on the "run whether user is logged on or not" box). Why is it greyed out?

 

[LMiller7]

EDIT: I looked at it in task scheduler, and the logged on/off section was greyed out (although there was a check on the "run whether user is logged on or not" box). Why is it greyed out?

That section will be disabled unless you select a user account other than the default of "SYSTEM". The SYSTEM account is always logged on while Windows is running so the the question is meaningless. It is common practice for programs to disable options that have no relevance in the current context.

 

[DavidE]

I was playing around with the default Windows 7 defrag schedule and still can't figure how it work exactly.

The default schedule is set to start at 1h am wednesday with 3 minutes idle condition. Their is also a settings that set the defrag to start as soon as it can if a schedule is missed. If my understanding is right, if the computer is close in the night of wednesday to thursday, it will start to defrag next time it will be open and idle for 3 minutes. But what happen if you open your computer on friday, do some work and let it idle 3 mins. The defrag start but then you start back using your computer before the end of the defrag. Do the defrag stop completly and the next scheduled start is next wednesday ? Do it only put itself in pause until you idle again ? Do it put iself in pause until you idle again or stop automatically if too many changes are made to the filesystem ?

Anyway thanks if you have any info regarding this.

Edit : You can see the details of the schedule like this : Use Task Scheduler To Tweak Automatic Disk Defragmentation In Windows 7/Vista

I was curious about this so I looked at my History for this task.
On 2/28/2014 I see a defrag started, stopped for "not idle", started later, ...
Eventually it re-started and completed

In Task Scheduler I now use "Enable All Tasks History" all the time, on all my systems.
From what I found it does not impact system performance or disk usage in any noticeable way.
The W7 default setting is to have History disabled, for whatever reason ...
Enabling History allows looking back if I ever want to...

I don't normally turn off my PCs.
I use Hybrid Sleep, usually sleep is set at 30 minutes ...

I've noticed sometimes it doesn't sleep "at the expected scheduled time" ...
I found some programs prevent Auto Sleep while they are running.
Maybe defrag is one of these programs?

You could at least turn on "Enable History" temporarily to see what it shows for your scenario/question.
If you don't want it on all the time, turn it off after your testing.

 

[Mang Nux]

EDIT: I looked at it in task scheduler, and the logged on/off section was greyed out (although there was a check on the "run whether user is logged on or not" box). Why is it greyed out?

That section will be disabled unless you select a user account other than the default of "SYSTEM". The SYSTEM account is always logged on while Windows is running so the the question is meaningless. It is common practice.

OK. But if it's being run by 'system', and 'system' is always logged on, then why did it delay my sceduled 3am defrag until a 9am when a user was logged on?