Glad to help, or at least satisfy the curiosity and perhaps show everyone
that we're not just fooling around, we did have a reason.
We get this question a lot, and now I can just copy/paste that answer in
when I get it. I've been thinking about posting it for a while.
-Victoria
"Leo" <ldontwant@mail.com> wrote in message
news:09604230-FF76-4E32-A8A8-88BB46332409@microsoft.com...
> Thanks for that answer.
>
> --
> Leo
>
> When I was young and adventurous, I wanted to join a violent,
> armed group with no regard for the law, but the IRS wasn't hiring.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> "Victoria House [MSFT]" <vhouse@online.microsoft.com> wrote in message
> news:693A92AF-B285-4EA7-BCAF-CB40AFF1D3AD@microsoft.com...
>> Why the old Windows Defrag UI was inaccurate:
>>
>> Say you have a 100GB volume.
>> To be truly accurate, defrag would display 1 colored bar for each cluster
>> on the volume (4k/cluster on most). Anything else is inaccurate.
>> Your screen may be about 1900x1280 pixels, so you can fit about 1900
>> clusters in the width of your screen, graphically.
>>
>> You need about 26214400 bars of 1 cluster each to display your disk
>> accurately, cluster by cluster on your 100GB hard drive. (ie each cluster
>> that is free is white, each that is part of a fragmented piece of file is
>> red, and the rest are green or blue). If defrag took up your whole
>> monitor, we would need about 13797 rows of volume data to be accurate.
>> That's a lot to scroll through for a picture of the volume.
>> The old UI could be expanded to nearly screen width. So that means each
>> bar in the old UI, on a 100GB volume, would have been nearly 14000
>> clusters (taken from row calculation above.)
>> That is to say, 54MB+.
>>
>> Therefore, our UI was inaccurate. I don't know the calculation for a
>> pixel width in the old code....
>> BUT if for example, we went by "winner per pixel width", then one
>> single-pixel-width bar's color would be determined simply by whether
>> there was more free space, fragged space, non fragged space, or unmovable
>> space. So in the 54MB example, if 10MB was free space, 10MB was fragged
>> space, and 10MB was unmovable, with the rest being non-fragmented space,
>> the entire bar would be blue. This problem is of course twice as bad
>> with a 200GB volume.
>>
>> With storage sizes increasing so quickly, there is not a good way to be
>> accurate enough to provide a decent picture. Admittedly, once defrag has
>> been running on a schedule on your computer for a while, the volume will
>> be largely separated into big blue and white chunks, but for less
>> frequently defragmented volumes, the UI is still no good.
>>
>> **
>> You can view the accuracy problem yourself by resizing the defrag
>> analysis window in XP (in computer management) a few times and watching
>> red bars "magically" disappear with the resizing. Sometimes they even
>> migrate. I have one on an XP box that magically appears when the window
>> is slightly wider than my screen, in the middle of an otherwise "free"
>> space.
>> **
>>
>>
>> As to 2nd question:
>> I can not speak for Microsoft as to the accuracy of other defragmenter
>> UIs, only our own.
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> "Leo" <ldontwant@mail.com> wrote in message
>> news:8F1D73E8-8314-4AD4-AD9A-784F37E34778@microsoft.com...
>>> Could you please explain why it is MS cannot provide and accurate GUI
>>> for the defragmentation program?
>>>
>>> Is it the MS position that all the third party defrag applications
>>> contain inaccurate GUI's?
>>>
>>> --
>>> Leo
>>>
>>> When I was young and adventurous, I wanted to join a violent,
>>> armed group with no regard for the law, but the IRS wasn't hiring.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> "Victoria House [MSFT]" <vhouse@online.microsoft.com> wrote in message
>>> news:0BBB1A03-3380-417E-81E8-218B90BD876E@microsoft.com...
>>>> Defragging in XP may have caused system files that should never be
>>>> moved to be moved in Vista. Any other hypotheses are welcome.
>>>>
>>>> The defragmentation program in Vista is mostly an improvement on XP
>>>> (low priority IO, etc) with the inaccurate GUI taken out.
>>>>
>>>> You can call defrag.exe from any administrator command prompt. From an
>>>> administrator command prompt type defrag /? and you will get a help
>>>> printout. I use defrag /v <vol>: to defragment from the command prompt
>>>> when I need to defrag from the command prompt. Defrag /a /v <vol>: is
>>>> useful as well.
>>>>
>>>> I believe this attempts to answer your questions/issues.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks!
>>>> -Victoria
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> "WTan" <WTan@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
>>>> news:346FF659-F6F7-4558-B596-859AA9E9E1C3@microsoft.com...
>>>>> Is defragmentation using XP is okay?
>>>>>
>>>>> I tried on Vista RC1 or Beta 2 (can't remember which. I tried them
>>>>> both). I
>>>>> defrag it using XP - the drive where i installed vista, and the Vista
>>>>> can't
>>>>> load afterwards.
>>>>>
>>>>> I don't want to try this on my Retail vista yet. I found the
>>>>> defragmentation
>>>>> program in vista disappointing.
>>>>>
>>>>> I also read in help and support, that you can get a more advance view
>>>>> by
>>>>> using file called defrag.exe
>>>>>
>>>>> where I can get that file?
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks
>>>>
>>>
>>
>