Which Defragger do you use and why?

pdsnickles · Apr 17, 2009

I've heard good things about the commercial apps Perfect Disk and O&O, and the freebie jkdefrag.

My main concern with jkdefrag is this:
"[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]The "Prefetch\Layout.ini" file is not yet supported. This means that JkDefrag will undo the boot optimization of the built-in XP and Vista defragger."

I'm not sure what that means but it doesn't sound good...

So which Defragger should I buy? (Or is Vista's own defragger good enough?)

Opinions?
[/FONT]

archie123 · Apr 17, 2009

I use perfectdisk 10 , ive been perfectdisk for a very long time , i know it can be set to defrag bootime files but as for that blurb you mentioned ive no idea

PerfectDisk - Defrag Software for Your Desktops, Servers and Enterprise

it is certified by microsoft for Vista , not that it means a whole lot

H2SO4 · Apr 17, 2009

To understand that disclaimer it's necessary to understand "prefetch".

Ever since XP, Windows has monitored its own boot sequence and the first 10 seconds of every app startup. For example, if you start Photoshop.exe, a whole bunch of DLLs and "filters" are loaded into the Photoshop process during its first few seconds. The prefetch mechanism keeps tabs on what's being loaded on a per-process basis and writes logs with its observations into the \windows\prefetch folder. (It does the same thing during the Windows boot.)

The Windows defragger then uses that prefetch info to rearrange those files and sections of files which are commonly loaded together on a given machine into contiguous blocks on the HDD, so that the head can read as much as possible without having to seek and wait for further rotational delay - a very slow operation, comparatively speaking.

That disclaimer appears to be saying "we don't handle prefetch so if you use our defragger we'll move the files/fragments around in a way which will undo their prefetch optimisation." However, the use of "yet" makes me optimistic that they intend to implement this as an additional feature in the future

Personally, I can't be bothered using any defraggers. I just let Vista do its thang and I don't seem to have any noticeable fragmentation problems.

rive0108 · Apr 17, 2009

pdsnickles said:
I've heard good things about the commercial apps Perfect Disk and O&O, and the freebie jkdefrag.

My main concern with jkdefrag is this:
"[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]The "Prefetch\Layout.ini" file is not yet supported. This means that JkDefrag will undo the boot optimization of the built-in XP and Vista defragger."[/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]I'm not sure what that means but it doesn't sound good...

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]So which Defragger should I buy? (Or is Vista's own defragger good enough?)[/FONT]

[FONT=Times New Roman, Times, serif]Opinions?[/FONT]
[/FONT]

Have you tried a "full" (not default) admin:command line defrag with Vista? it is best to do this in conjunction with a sfc scan and diskcheck for optimal results and improved speed and performance.
H2S04 give it a try and tell me what you think.
for more Info (and user comments): http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/165576-how-make-vista-more-responsive-faster.html?filter

sfc /scannow
defrag c: -w
note- this (-w) means consolidate all fragments regardless of size. default defrag will not consolidate fragments 64MB in size or larger)

10201d1234934004-how-make-vista-more-responsive-faster-defrag.gif

10202d1234934006-how-make-vista-more-responsive-faster-check-disk.gif

garysgold · Apr 17, 2009

H2SO4 said:
Personally, I can't be bothered using any defraggers. I just let Vista do its thang and I don't seem to have any noticeable fragmentation problems.

Gary

pdsnickles · Apr 17, 2009

Gary and H2:
I'm assuming you don't do a lot of downloading, processing .rar's, or ripping and deleting, etc. or I think your Vista would get pretty fragmented and you'd notice a slowing down, if you don't defrag.
I can't believe you don't at least set the Vista defragger to do it's "thang" once a week or so!
I did the defrag via command that rive recommends above, yesterday. I only did it because I am getting ready to shrink my C drive with Paragon Partioner so I thought it might be a good idea (not sure).
I'm still debating on whether to get O&O, Perfect Disk, or jkdefrag (and live with its slower booting - thanks for the explanation. I wonder just HOW much slower it will be without the pre-fetch...? I'm thinking it may not make that much difference because I always go into Configure StartUp apps and uncheck all but the things I really need in there so I "only" end up with a half dozen or so including my firewall, and macro utility, MS Works Calendar and one or two other things).

garysgold · Apr 17, 2009

Vista has a once a week defrag scheduled in the task scheduler by default (at least it did here). When I first started using Vista I would try running the defrager from the tools tab of the drive properties dialog and it always said it was not needed. The vista defrag works fine and in the background (I have better things to do than watch boxes or lines move around) and yes I do a lot of downloading etc. Another defragger is not really needed unless you do like watching lines or boxes moving around.
If you do get another defragger, I suggest that you be sure to remove the scheduled entry for the windows defragger to avoid problems.

Gary

stew2 · Apr 17, 2009

I recommend Perfectdisk its simply the best defragger there is but if you dont want to spend money then right click on your desktop and select new shortcut. In the location box type C:\Windows\System32\Defrag.exe -w -v %SystemDrive% then click next and finish. Then right click on your desktop again and create a new shortcut and in the location box type C:\Windows\System32\Defrag.exe -b %SystemDrive% then click next and finish.

This gives you two shortcuts the first one is to defrag the hard drive and the second is to defrag the boot files.

Dont rely on the standard defragger as its **** and misses out files bigger than 64MB, boot files, metadata, page file etc

H2SO4 · Apr 17, 2009

I agree 127%, but I don't know how to do the thumbs-up smilie thing :confused:

My line about my "using defraggers" was poorly phrased. What I meant was that I don't invoke any defraggers myself - I just let Vista's in-built defragging keep things tidy in the background.

garysgold · Apr 17, 2009

Rt. click on the pic and save to your hard drive. When you want to use it in a post, click on the paperclip. A window opens to upload a file. Browse to the pic to select. Click the upload button (you can close the window when uploaded). Click on the paperclip again and select the file. Submit post and wallah.

pdsnickles · Apr 17, 2009

garysgold said:
Vista has a once a week defrag scheduled in the task scheduler by default (at least it did here). When I first started using Vista I would try running the defrager from the tools tab of the drive properties dialog and it always said it was not needed. The vista defrag works fine and in the background (I have better things to do than watch boxes or lines move around) and yes I do a lot of downloading etc. Another defragger is not really needed unless you do like watching lines or boxes moving around.
If you do get another defragger, I suggest that you be sure to remove the scheduled entry for the windows defragger to avoid problems.

Gary

I misunderstood what H2 said and you agreed with. I thought he meant (and you meant) that he did not use even the Vista defragger. I now gather that you do use that, you just do not use a commercial product.

pdsnickles · Apr 17, 2009

archie123 said:
I use perfectdisk 10 , ive been perfectdisk for a very long time , i know it can be set to defrag bootime files but as for that blurb you mentioned ive no idea

PerfectDisk - Defrag Software for Your Desktops, Servers and Enterprise

it is certified by microsoft for Vista , not that it means a whole lot

I have a question about Perfect Disk (and other defraggers):
Can you or should you use them to defrag the System Recovery partition? I downloaded Perfect Disk and I can't see a way to choose ONLY the C drive in a schedule, it seems to want to defrag the whole computer including the Recovery Partition.

Also, can these things - or again, should these things - run when your anti-virus is active or do you have to make sure your anti-virus is not scanning when defragging? (I think the answer is that you should turn it off, but I just want to make sure.)

I'm also assuming that the Recovery Partition should not be defragged, but I can't figure out why the default Perfect Disk scheduling utility seems to have no way to choose only the C partition not the other partitions on my computer HD.

pdsnickles · Apr 17, 2009

Here's a weird thing:
I downloaded Perfect Disk and ran both a boot defrag (which defrags the page file and something else) and an offline defrag because I want to try and shrink my C drive as small as possible with the Vista shrink utility.

So the PD analysis said my drive was not fragged - excellent with only 1% frag or something like that. But I ran it anyway as above, then I ran it again in Smart Placement mode and got it to almost 0% fragged.

Then I went to check Windows Defragment to make sure the schedule was turned OFF and when I went to it, it said "You need to run Defrag"!

Now also, I had just run Windows Defrag last night in the command mode -w or whatever it was, per Brink's tutorial, so I am really wondering WHY Vista is telling me I should defrag again after doing Vista's last night, and PD's today...??

(I'm guessing they have different ideas of what "defragged" is, and so what one considers defragged, the other considers fragged...)

By the way, Perfect Disk got Vista able to shrink my C drive an extra 100 gigs! Before Vista would only let me shrink my 650 gig C drive down to 450 gigs, now it's got it down to 350 gigs. I'm going to turn System Restore off and defrag again and see what I can get. I guess - according to PD and other things I've read - you can shrink using Vista and then defrag and shrink again and get it down to a much smaller size. I'm trying to get it down to 100 gigs and I don't trust 3rd party partitioners that much (call me crazy!)...

H2SO4 · Apr 17, 2009

pdsnickles said:
...
Now also, I had just run Windows Defrag last night in the command mode -w or whatever it was, per Brink's tutorial, so I am really wondering WHY Vista is telling me I should defrag again after doing Vista's last night, and PD's today...??

(I'm guessing they have different ideas of what "defragged" is, and so what one considers defragged, the other considers fragged...)

Exactly. A defragging solution may choose to implement almost any arbitrary algorithm. Sorting everything in alphabetical order, or big files first, small files afterwards, or all-system-files-together, or...

If you defrag with "product A" and then analyse the results with "product B", the latter will usually perceive your disk as horribly fragmented.

In practice, most defraggers have multiple criteria for what constitutes an optimal on-disk file layout, so you're really pitting one vendor's logic and design against another's.

archie123 · Apr 18, 2009

H2SO4 said:
pdsnickles said:

...
Now also, I had just run Windows Defrag last night in the command mode -w or whatever it was, per Brink's tutorial, so I am really wondering WHY Vista is telling me I should defrag again after doing Vista's last night, and PD's today...??

(I'm guessing they have different ideas of what "defragged" is, and so what one considers defragged, the other considers fragged...)

Click to expand...

Exactly. A defragging solution may choose to implement almost any arbitrary algorithm. Sorting everything in alphabetical order, or big files first, small files afterwards, or all-system-files-together, or...

If you defrag with "product A" and then analyse the results with "product B", the latter will usually perceive your disk as horribly fragmented.

In practice, most defraggers have multiple criteria for what constitutes an optimal on-disk file layout, so you're really pitting one vendor's logic and design against another's.

PerfectDisk Software Support | PerfectDisk.com

Martee · Apr 18, 2009

Personally I use native Windows defragger running from the command prompt. I don't trust any third party applications in that department.

pdsnickles · Apr 18, 2009

I ran Perfect Disk about 4 times in a row, each with a restart at boot to defrag my System Files, so I could shrink my C drive with Vista down to 85gigs (down from 650 gigs). I also did some other things like turning off page file and restore points and deleting those files in order to shrink more.

I do not advise this practice. I'm not sure if Perfect Disk had anything to do with it or not, but it *might* not be a good idea to defrag system files, at least not 3-4 times in succession along with shrinks.

Though when I turned off Page Filing and turned it back on afterwards, it asked me if I should replace the current page file and I said yes. Not sure if that was the right answer. In any case, now I have some issues with my system that I did not have before.

Perfect Disk does say you can use it to shrink C drive more and outlines the procedure:
1. Turn off System Restore
2. Perform a boot time defrag
3. Do a Consolidate free space defrag
4. Shrink the drive
5. Repeat 2 through 4 until drive is shrunk as much as you want it
6. Turn System Restore back on

In addition to this I also killed the hibernate file and turned off page filing, per various recommendations by tech support people on the web.

I post this only in case someone planning to shrink C drive reads this in their research of Perfect Disk. If you do it, try following PD's instructions above but don't mess with the page file, etc. that others recommend. That's what I would do were I to do it again.

garysgold · Apr 18, 2009

To me it's like the last time I bought tires. At the tire store they tell me they take 35 psi but when I look at what's embossed on the tire, it says 40-45 psi. Thank you very much, but I think the company that made the tire knows more about it than the guy who put it on my car.

pdsnickles · Apr 18, 2009

garysgold said:
To me it's like the last time I bought tires. At the tire store they tell me they take 35 psi but when I look at what's embossed on the tire, it says 40-45 psi. Thank you very much, but I think the company that made the tire knows more about it than the guy who put it on my car.

Just to play "Devil's Advocate" -
Do you also only use Window's Firewall and only Window's disc partitioner and only Windows Defender - no outside software for these Windows built in utilities?

In spite of the problem I posted above (I blame myself and think PD probably had nothing to do with it), I used Perfect Disk for 4 years with my XP, and it seemed to do a very good job. Does Vista do a "good enough" job? Maybe, but the way I see it - to extend your analogy - when you get a root canal done to you want to have it done by your local dentist who does 8-10 a year, or would you rather have it done by an endodontist who specializes in it and does 8-10 a week? (As someone who has had a lot of root canals - and some very bad ones by dentists who think they know but really don't - I can tell you, in the case of root canals: go to an endodontist! Make of that what you will. )

garysgold · Apr 18, 2009

Hi pdsnickles,

Actually I was answering Martee's post. I was typing while you were posting, but to answer your extension, I don't want the manufacturer to mount the tires, but they designed it and tested it and they know the tire better than the guy mounting the tire and I trust their assessment of the proper tire pressure more than the mechanics. Now would I want a kid who has mounted 2 tires or the old guy that's been doing it for years, I'll go with the old guy, cause 'old guys rule' (one of my tee shirts).

Just MHO.

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