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25% fragmentation resists efforts


shokan
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I've tried my own O&O and also a trial PCTools defrag, and I still have 25% fragmentation showing mixed in the free space area. I've redone it several times. This is a 200Gb HD. Also, I tried running Consolidate Free Space with the PCTools product, but after 12 hours barely 5% has been shown completed, and my PS fan went full-blast the entire time. Should I try this again? ... it would take days. It still wouldn't get rid of the 25% fragmentation that's in the free space area of the graph, I don't think.

Thanks.

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Can you show us a screenshot of the graph? I do not quite understand what is fragmented, from your description - free space only?

This was the Consolidate Free Space progress after half a day (defrag had already been done on the whole volume before). The red, of course, is the fragmented files. White is free space. Using O&O, the results are similar, though there is no free space consolidation feature. I've run the defrag several times and, at most, I get only another 1% gained.

What I meant is that the red and white are in the same area. The defrags have consolidated the contiguous files (green).

Will it make a difference to get rid of this large amount of fragmentation? And, how do I do it?

Thanks again.

post-10915-1237343833_thumb.jpg

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Your defrag tool does not show the amount and percentage of free space. Some tools need a certain amount of free space to be able to defrag at all.

I recommend that you get a new defragmenter;

  • the best defragmenter I know is Diskeeper, but it's not free
  • The best free defragmenter is Defraggler

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But is it really worth the bother, I wonder? Here's 2 articles that challenge the commonly accepted view that an advanced defragging tool is essential: DANSDATE (item 5) and THIRDRING (item 3).

I tried a couple of advanced defrag tools in the past and performance-wise all I noticed was the occasional crash due to "unable to locate... " but no improvement in performance.

So I reverted back the standard Microsoft de-fragger & no longer have those sorts of problems.

Microsoft claim from their tests that the NTFS file system on a modern hard disk is impervious to noticeable improvement by defragmentating.

More important is to have adequate RAM and a suitably configured pageing file, since those are the locations from where most programs are running.

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Contrary to the above, I find that Diskeeper give a very noticeable improvement in performance. A full defrag takes only a minute or two on my 250GB hard drive. It can also be set to operate silently in the background. The Boot time defrag utility is particularly useful, and can run check disk first. A free trial is available.

HERE. You cannot do any harm by trying it out. You may well be pleasantly surprised. :D

P.S. The Microsoft defrag utility is based upon Diskeeper, and is a VERY poor imitation.

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I wouldn't worry too much about this. It doesn't necessarily mean that this part of the disk is not usable, just that the data in there is somewhat untidy.

If you are having problems with the drive, it might be good to carry out a CheckDisk scan which will definitively tell you if the drive is faulty and will attempt to repair/remove the faulty sections (if you instruct it to do that).

Please come back if you want to know how to do a ChkDsk.

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No point in leaving well alone. A disk in bad need of defragment wears out quicker. There is absolutely no harm in trying out Diskeeper, as others on here can testify. The choice is yours of course, but C Cleaner followed by Diskeeper will surprise you with the improvements. Before actually running C Cleaner open the program and click on Options/Cookies. Drag and drop cookies from right to left if you want to keep them. This is applicable to cookies from such as this site, where you need your log on details saved. The version of C Cleaner to look for is shown under Other versions, this will avoid the accompanying tool bars. :D

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Since Andsome started a "sales pitch" here for Diskeeper, I may as well add why this paid defragmenter is better than free ones...

  • it can defrag the page file
  • it can defrag the MFT (Master File Table)
  • it can defrag the folders file
  • it can run scheduled defrags while the computer is idle

It can probably do a lot more, but the above points were enough for me to buy Diskeeper many years ago.

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Since Andsome started a "sales pitch" here for Diskeeper, I may as well add why this paid defragmenter is better than free ones...

  • it can defrag the page file
  • it can defrag the MFT (Master File Table)
  • it can defrag the folders file
  • it can run scheduled defrags while the computer is idle

It can probably do a lot more, but the above points were enough for me to buy Diskeeper many years ago.

The boot time defrag is well worth running periodically. It makes one hell of a difference, and can be left to run while you have a cuppa. It only takes a few minutes in any case, even if you set it to check disk first. :D

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