Defragmenting Harddrives on G1

Hi everyone

I just bought my G1 two days ago and found the first problem. When I try to defrag the C or D drives, it freezes at 1%.

Can anyone help please !

 

How long did you try leaving it? And could you print screen the analysis report?

 

i don't think it's frozen per se, it's just taking a long time.

i also have a very strong suspicion that it's still in FAT32 format, and i think that's why it's taking so long.

 

here is a screenshot

http://img410.imageshack.us/img410/6220/asusg1defragsx7.jpg

I left my laptop for 15min and it is still at 1%

 

yup. fat32. i'd say that's the culprit.

it took me 4 hours to defrag the first time i did it...

read this http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=99870

 

Should go with NTFS. It is the successor to FAT32 and works a lot better.

As far as it not working well under FAT32, I would suggest checking for other applications running, mkaing disk accesses and just plain making the defragmenter tool's job harder. NTFS has a better way of tracking what was last changed on the disk whereas FAT32 doesn't, so it likely struggles more because of it.

 

so, how do I change it to NTFS?

 

i provided a link for a reason

 

Yep, I confirm that it's not frozen but takes a huge amount of time because of the inefficiency of FAT32. Use the link LordFarkward gave you to convert to NTFS. Here's a more direct link:
http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/ntfscvt.php

but some things have changed (you can use a CD instead of a floppy disk). And you also can forego the defrag before sliding, I did that last time and the sliding worked just fine (under 20mins). Defragging in NTFS afterwards was child's play, took half an hour for a drive with > 100 000 files.

 

Is there a good reason to partition the drive?

 

Also, don't use the built-in defragger, it sux. Get Executive Software Diskeeper, it's blazing fast and can even defrag in the background:

http://www.diskeeper.com

Totally worth the $30 it costs.

 

Yes. I would strongly suggest everybody to make their OS partition separate from the data partition(s), and never keep any important data on the OS partition. OS partitions can die in many ways, and even if they don't and just the OS dies, it's easier to reinstall when you know you don't have to backup 100GB from various locations on the OS partition.

After separate OS partition, the rest is personal preference. I go for two more partitions, one for generic Data and the rest for movies, music, etc. i.e. Media.

 

Honestly speaking, if something eats the partition table or the disk dies, you're screwed anyway.

Nothing replaces a real backup. If you absolutely need that data and can't live without it, you should be thinking about doing routine or timered backups to another computer. Or possibly copying to an external hard disk.

As far as partitions, it's usually good to separate it, since it makes it tidier and easier to blow away the C: partition if you need to reinstall, though some data is stored directly into your profile (nothing that the built-in backup can't fix, but anyway). Although some people find it simpler to have it 100% for the OS partition, it's usually really a bad idea unless they're a complete computer noob. Also, it can backfire in your face if you have too many. At one point, I had a lot of 2 GB partitions because my old system had it like that and couldn't do anything for video since they were too small and all over the place...

In any case, the V1Jp I got came default with a 60/40 split. Depending on what you're planning on storing on that second partition, you might want to flip it the other way around... (especially if it's video...)

 

Absolutely agreed.

True again. But I've had some instances where the OS partition was "eaten" only.

And the main point where it helps is reinstalling the OS, without worrying about data recovery from that partition.

But I stress again, nothing replaces a backup.