Vista Tutorial - How to defrag offline ?

Is there a way to defragment offline (not in the windows operating system), similar to the way chkdsk /r is done to the operating system's partition/HDD offline(right before windows boots)?

Ok,
I did some research, and the only way I see to do it is to make a DOS included bootable DVD, CD, USB, ETC. that will boot into DOS with a DOS compatible defrag program. That or buy one of those expensive Full Hard Drive diagnostics & repair programs that pros use. In my opinion, it's a lot of work & expense for a defrag unless you have your reasons.

Auslogics makes a great free defragger that is quicker & better than the one that came with Vista. Here's a link:

http://www.auslogics.com/disk-defrag/

Shawn

What are the expensive programs you're talking about?

They are the full professional retail versions of defrag programs. (Ex: Disk Keeper, Auslogic's, etc) Just make sure they are Vista compatible & have the boot option.

Found something while I was digging more. It says it's for all OS & lists XP but not Vista, so may need to run with compatibility mode. Definetely will need to do "Run as administrator". Program is called "PageDefrag V2.32" off Microsoft's website.

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/sysinternals/FileAndDisk/PageDefrag.mspx


SEEMS VISTA DOES IT AUTOMATICALLY THOUGH.

Here's a registry hack for "Automatic Boot Disk Optimization" (defrag) in Vista. Should be enabled by default. Here's how to check:

1. Open Start Menu.
2. In white line (Start Search) area, type Regedit and press Enter.
3. Click Continue button for UAC prompt.
4. In regedit, go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOptimizeFunction
5. In right pane, you should see Enable with value Y (Enabled) or N (Disabled)
6. If you don't see Enable, but see Disable instead, then:
A) right click on Disable
B) click Rename
C) type Enable and press Enter
D) right click this Enable
E) click Modify
F) type Y (for data)
G) click OK to apply
7. Close regedit.

Hope this works for you. Sorry it took a bit to dig up all the dirt on this one,

Shawn

How to Run Disk Defragmenter from the Command Prompt :
INFO: This is the same as the Disk Defragmenter inside of Vista, but from the command prompt with more details.

http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/81786-disk-defragmenter-command-prompt.html

Shawn