Defrag Sytem files?

J

Justintoxicated

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My System files are ALL over the place on my HD I mean super fragmented...What do I need to defrag system files?.

Also using Diskkeeper I have defraged probably 30 times now and my HD still have moderate/high defragmentation for other files.

HD is a raptor 150
 
drizzt81 said:
Pagedefrag (a free tool) can defragment your page file.
Click to expand...

I don't need to defrag my page file, I need to defrag all the other system files. I hope I don't have to re-install windows to get them in order.

O&O defrag?

would perfect disk work?
 
To start it off.. No, you do not have to reinstall windows. I had the same problem with system files being fragmented, and found out how to defragment them, so I'll tell you my story.


I've used O&O Defrag for as long as I can remember, as I like the interface and defragmentation options.

Over time I noticed system files locked on the drive, and the offline defragmentation doing nothing to them. I watched as more and more locked files appeared on the drive, impeding my defragmentation routine. After some time of this I went searching for another defragmentation program to do the job.

I came across both Perfect Disk and Diskeeper.

Diskeeper played with the MFT and Pagefile, while having some "I-FAAST" option. (http://www.diskeeper.com/defrag/i-faast.asp) To use it, you need to have automatic defragmentation enabled, and I don't like programs automatically defragging my drive, so I barely used that function in Diskeeper. Otherwise, it was just a test of the program to see how it compared against the other two, in which I uninstalled it a week later.

Perfect Disk did things neither program could do, which was defragment locked system files (MFT, UsnJrnl, Logfile, etc. along with the Pagefile), exactly what I was looking for. It could also do it without restarting windows, providing you were doing it on another partition/drive. After seeing that, I started it up, set it to defrag, restarted, and was amazed that it defragmented the system files. After that, I did my Complete/NAME defrag routine with O&O Defrag without any troubles, and was satisfied with a performance improvement.


To sum it up, I use O&O Defrag normally, and PD when my system files get out of whack. (or when I want to move the MFT, which is sadly random.)
 
DAOWAce said:
To start it off.. No, you do not have to reinstall windows. I had the same problem with system files being fragmented, and found out how to defragment them, so I'll tell you my story.


I've used O&O Defrag for as long as I can remember, as I like the interface and defragmentation options.

Over time I noticed system files locked on the drive, and the offline defragmentation doing nothing to them. I watched as more and more locked files appeared on the drive, impeding my defragmentation routine. After some time of this I went searching for another defragmentation program to do the job.

I came across both Perfect Disk and Diskeeper.

Diskeeper played with the MFT and Pagefile, while having some "I-FAAST" option. (http://www.diskeeper.com/defrag/i-faast.asp) To use it, you need to have automatic defragmentation enabled, and I don't like programs automatically defragging my drive, so I barely used that function in Diskeeper. Otherwise, it was just a test of the program to see how it compared against the other two, in which I uninstalled it a week later.

Perfect Disk did things neither program could do, which was defragment locked system files (MFT, UsnJrnl, Logfile, etc. along with the Pagefile), exactly what I was looking for. It could also do it without restarting windows, providing you were doing it on another partition/drive. After seeing that, I started it up, set it to defrag, restarted, and was amazed that it defragmented the system files. After that, I did my Complete/NAME defrag routine with O&O Defrag without any troubles, and was satisfied with a performance improvement.


To sum it up, I use O&O Defrag normally, and PD when my system files get out of whack. (or when I want to move the MFT, which is sadly random.)
Click to expand...

Thanks I'll look into both of those. Disk keeper has let me down, as it does not even seem to want to properly defrag non-system files. (have to keep running it and running it for small gains).
 
Ok so I borrowed a copy of Perfect Disk.

however I can't for the life of me figure this program out.

it wants me to setup networds etc. I just want to run the damn program on the computer I installed it on :(

Whats up with this hassel? Plus I can't get it to run anyways it just says failed when I attempt to do so. No Errors, just failed...

Basicaly it looks like I have to
1) install PD
2) Create an Admin account with a password on my PC.
3) Tell PD to use this account (has to have password so my default account will not work)
4) Add my computer to the PD Managed Network.
5) Tell PD to Install (AGAIN?) to my computer through the netword.
60 No Idea I can't get it to install it just says "working"
 
Sounds to me like you downloaded the server version of PerfectDisk.
 
Yeah, thats the network version.

I love Perfect Disk. The new interface on Perfect Disk 8 is fugly, but it gets the job done.
 
Ok I got the right version and ran defrag. Nice! Then I set it to defrag system files on Reboot.

Locked up! Luckily right after analysis.

A few cuss words later I removed multiple drives to defrag on startup (Page file is on another partition) And It went throught it pretty quick.

Just for to see what would happen I launched Diskkeeper. It showed alot of fragmentation still (although it reported nothing serious)! but this time it was able to fully defragment, (acording to diskkeeper) Hell even perfect disk said there were still fragmented files.

I guess I will just keep both programs. Computer has some snap to it again.
 
PerfectDisk 8 ftw! Your best bet is to change the options to allow PerfectDisk to handle all the layout.ini operations in Windows (the second option not the first - not the "Recommended" setting, but the one below it).

Next thing is change the SmartPlacement settings for the system drive by right-clicking on a drive in the available drives and choosing Drive Properties. Change the defaults from 60 and 30 to 5 and 1 - this puts the most commonly used files (those that have been accessed within the past day or so) in the highest performance position - meaning on the outer edges of the hard drive platters, aka the beginning of the drive. Files that have been accessed between 1 and 5 days will be assigned spots next, and files that haven't been touched in 5 days or longer will go to the back of the line, so to speak.

These options can make a DRAMATIC difference in the responsiveness of your system, and I recommend 2 defrags a week - that's one every 3.5 days roughly if you can manage it. PerfectDisk can do the job in a few minutes compared to some of the competition, so it's my defragger of choice for XP and older versions of Windows.

If this is Vista, I'd say you don't need a third-party defragger as Vista is self-tuning and will generally keep the fragmentation levels below 1-2% all by itself no matter how much housecleaning and file movement/deletions you do.

Hope this helps...

ps
To clarify: the default options for PerfectDisk will not get you the best possible drive performance after a defrag, and neither will the default options of any other defrag utility on the market today. You have to choose some common settings to adjust and then they'll have the intended effect. But the defaults never guarantee best performance, ever. And yes, choose Aggressive free space consolidation. :)
 
Thanks bbz_Ghost,

Always makes asking questions worth while when you get excelent responses. Too bad something like this does not get bookmarked (maybe not my thread but something similar to your response), as I'm sure it will be asked again. 2 Defrags a week is alot, but I will set something up for at least once a week.
 
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