Windows XP defragment = crap

I'm not joking.

Just look at the report

Volume (C
Volume size = 72.65 GB
Cluster size = 32 KB
Used space = 13.94 GB
Free space = 58.70 GB
Percent free space = 80 %

Volume fragmentation
Total fragmentation = 24 %
File fragmentation = 49 %
Free space fragmentation = 0 %

File fragmentation
Total files = 24,842
Average file size = 459 KB
Total fragmented files = 34
Total excess fragments = 502
Average fragments per file = 1.02

Pagefile fragmentation
Pagefile size = 1.50 GB
Total fragments = 3

Folder fragmentation
Total folders = 1,822
Fragmented folders = 5
Excess folder fragments = 7

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


File fragmentation is 49% and it still tells me it always ends up with a message that it can not defrag.... and I've got 80% free space... which is more then enough to defrag....


PS: the main files that can't be defragged are Valve Steam (HL2) software.




Anyone know a good defragmenting program?

Thanks

 

I've used Diskeeper with no problems for the last 3 years on my Windows XP Pro laptop. It also allows you to do a DOS fragmentation that will defragment the pagefile.

I have the Home Edition of Diskeeper 8, they're now up to version 10. Was money very well spent for me.

http://www.diskeeper.com/

 

Totaly agree that Windows defrag is horsesh*t, my brother only uses it to pc and it cant/wont get it lower than 51% fragmentation, which is moronic.

Personly i use O&O, and its bloody brilliant.
This is a new machine so theres alot of files going back and forth, and i ended up with 50% fragmentation. Set O&O to 'sealth' and it just sat there in the background defragging, after 10minutes it finished and i was at 0.1% fragmentation. AND during the whole time i never went above 10% CPU, and was happily surfing about and downloading without even noticing i was running.

 

Yep, O&O is brilliant. Can set it to defrag in the background, can defrag multiple harddrives in parallel, and it just does a much better job of it.
Costs money though, but there's a free trial available.

 

I'll add my vote for O&O. Excellent program.

By the way, STEAM now comes with a built in "defrag" for cleaning up all the local GCF cache files.
If you go into your Games menu, then pick a game and hit the properties button. Click on the Local Files tab. It will tell you if your files are fragmented and it has a button to defrag them.

 

Also, make sure Steam isn't running when you defragment. Wouldn't surprise me if it locks the GCF files.

 

Is there any good defrag programs for free?

 

wow it ried O&O and so far I'm impressed. Any tips of whats the best configurations to use for a laptop so that I can just set it and then forget about it forever and ever?

- I want it to only use up some resources when I'm using the computer
- might as well go 100% and hog up the PC when I'm away (screensaver is on)
- I don't want to be able to notice it when I'm working

automatic defrag sounds nice but wouldn't it be defragementing my personal computer too often? for general use (internet, typing, surfing, downloading torrent) ; i think a defreg every 1-2 months would suffice.

added: Activating Boot time defragmentation <-- should this be enabled? or should I do it manually every x months?

 

I can't defrag cos of STEAM. When i run windows defrag it says not all files could be defragmented and when I view the report CS:S is there with a whopping 1.6 gigs not being defragged.

I suppose it wouldn't be too bad if the STEAM defrag worked but that just says that theres no defragmentation and defrags very quick.

One of them may be wrong but I guess I have to get o&o to try and defrag my laptop now.

 

Nah, it just means it can deal with fragmentation as it occurs. It's much more efficient to defragment those 10 files a day that need fragmentation, than waiting 100 days and then fragmenting 1000 files.
Defragmenting takes no time if there are only a handful fragmented files, so automatic isn't a problem.

Well, *is* it fragmented then? Just because Windows defrag says the file can't be defragged doesn't neccesarily mean that the file *needs* defragmenting.

So my guess would be that the file isn't fragmented, and Windows just tells you that it can't access the file.
Also, have you considered shutting down Steam while defragging?
It's very hard for the defragger to access files that are on use, after all.

 

Agreed.
Whenever you are running any sort of HD cleaner or defrag, you should shut down EVERY other program that you can. Turn off your wireless, disconnect from internet, whatever. Kill everything in the task bar. This will insure that nothing is trying to write to the drive while it is being worked on.

 

What file system are you using? Is it FAT32? 32 KB cluster size is responsible for a huge slack space on your disk! Perhaps a few GB. If it is NTFS it should be around 4KB (4096 bytes). No defragmenter will help you with this. Imagine a cluster as the smallest box for putting a file or a part of a file in it. So 1kb file or 0kb file or a part of a file also takes 32kb on your disk! Access is faster (due to the smaller number of clusters), but the slack space (meaning that you actually need more disk space per certain amount of data) is much bigger. Especially on C:! Windows folder is full o small files for example. I would recommend to check it if it is a FAT32 and change it to NTFS.

BTW so called offline defragmention during windows boot will defragment even pagefile.sys and hiberfil.sys on your c: (two large files). That is what you want. I use Perfectdisk and it has that option.

I hope it helps.

Cheers,

Ivan

 

Thanks for the info on O&O. I'll check them out.

I've been using Diskkeeper 9.0 for several years. Haven't wanted to upgrade since it was sold off by Executive Software.

 

ikovac: Keep in mind though, smaller cluster size requires a larger index, which again consumes more space...
But yeah, there are plenty of reasons why you should run NTFS instead of FAT32. The smaller cluster size (which is *usually* better) is only one of them.

 

bleh.. I always turn off indexing anyway. The extremely minor improvment in search time is not worth the resoureces the indexing service uses.

But yes. look to converting from FAT32 to NTFS, you'll be better off.

 

Well, being that after the 30 day trial, I registered my copy of O & O just yesterday, I'll add my accolades.

Great product, does what it's supposed to do, and does it with minimal interference (actually, NO interference... you don't really even know it's defragging.....)

 

I like Windows XP Defragment. It does the job for me, and its one less thing to have to buy and install.

 

lol, I did actually have Steam off while defragging, in fact i had pretty much everything off and I just had the defragger on.
I have got diskeeper now and according to that my steam files are the most fragmented. No idea if its right or not, I have read elsewhere that the windows defragmenter is a crap version of diskeeper so maybe thats why.

 

Hi Jalf,

Yes that is true, but I guess the size of the index (FAT on FAT32 and MFT on NTFS) is much smaller than the slack space lost by a large (32kb) cluster size. And if I am not mistaken NTFS MFT takes 12,5% of the disk space regardless of how many files you have on it. It can grow though if you have huge amounts of files. That looks stupid at first, but files and directories below typically 1500 bytes are completely stored within the MFT record! They don't take 4kb cluster space in the user area of the disk, making the slack space actually even smaller in a percentage. So NTFS besides its 4kb cluster size (on volumes over 2GB) will greatly improve the performance and free space on large volumes. MFT also doesn't suffer from FAT32's numerous disk accesses into FAT for each file. It is more like a database.

And another interesting thing: FAT 32 for small volumes is faster, but NTFS is absolutely the winner in many areas (security, compression, on large volumes (over 2GB).

It is very important to have the MFT defragmented. It can be done only offline (during the boot for example).

Cheers,

Ivan

 

Well, generally speaking, there's no doubt NTFS is better, for all sorts of reasons (including, afaik, more efficient usage of the disk space)

I don't mean the indexing service. The file system itself keeps an index of where on the disk each file is located. It has to, otherwise it'd need to search the entire HD every time you opened a file or directory. That's an integral part of the file system, and can't be disabled. And it takes up quite a bit of space, because you have quite a lot of files.

 

Thanks. I figured that out from the next couple posts. My misunderstanding.