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Defragmenting your Hard Drive(s)


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This is after I reformatted the HDD then checked with a reliable defragmentation utility.

Yet you have not named it.

I never had that problem. You usually only have to worry if you have power problems.

Though it has been proven that excessive defragmenting can and will cause issues with your hard drive.

I checked with Perfect Disk, the defragmentation utility that comes with Windows, O&O Defrag and Contig.

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This argument can go on and on... I'm no expert compared to you guys but to me, it makes sense that the more you use your hard drive, the more wear and tear you put on it. Kind of like a car. The more mileage on a car, the more wear and tear and the less efficiently it runs.

I think defragmenting tooooo often, like daily, would put a lot of wear and tear. I can't say I can back it up, but it makes sense logically.

I defrag only when I need to. I keep everything organized in the first place in different partitions.

I also use Ghost 2003 to restore system partition which does a good job of placing files contiguously while restoring... just ask Andromeda83.

Edited by spacesurfer
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Here a script that will just Analyze only the local hard drives and report it state.

1:\ Runs built in MS Defrag.exe to only Analyze.

2:\ It creates a textfile with the report

3:\ Open the text file for you to read.

4:\ After you close the text file it self deletes

You can use this to help you decide if you need to defrag the drives.

Save As Defrag_Report.vbs

Dim Act	: Set Act = CreateObject("Wscript.Shell")
Dim Fso : Set Fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Dim CD : CD = Act.CurrentDirectory
Dim Drv, StrDrv
Dim Cmd1 : Cmd1 = "Echo -------------------------------------- >> DefragReport.txt"
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C " & Cmd1), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Echo. >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
Set Drv = Fso.Drives
For Each StrDrv In Drv
If StrDrv.IsReady = True Then
If StrDrv.DriveType = 2 Then
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Echo Disk Drive Report ^> " & StrDrv & "\ >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Echo Volume Drive Name ^> " & StrDrv.VolumeName & " >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Echo. >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Defrag.exe " & StrDrv & "\ -A >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Echo. >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C " & Cmd1), 0,True
Act.Run("%Comspec% /C Echo. >> DefragReport.txt"), 0,True
End If
End If
Next
If Fso.FileExists(CD & "\DefragReport.txt") Then
Act.Run("Notepad.exe " & CD & "\DefragReport.txt"), 1, True
Fso.DeleteFile("DefragReport.txt"),True
End If

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Quoting: "it has been proven that excessive defragmenting can and will cause issues with your hard drive."

Hey.. You'll trash the computer long before you'll ever wear out a hard drive from use... That's parallel to like not washing your skin, cuz it makes skin-cells wash off...

The only issue it can cause, is if the HD is comfortable with how it has filed its systems, and you run defrag's feature to sort programs to run better... uncheck the sort box...

Like in Mac, it's said you shouldn't defrag a Mac just for that reason... but Windows is whole different species from Apple...

_________________

Thanks for the tip Spacesurfer... I'm gonna check that one out...

_________________

Edited by KingAuther
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^ You must be either lucky or not use your computer much.

The rated lifespans (MTBF) are usually around 5 years for most average drives now.

Modern HDDs don't just die suddenly from wear, they just get slower and noisier as the servo mechanism has to work harder to keep the heads on the right cylinder when the actuator arm bearings start wearing out, and heavy seeking causes this wear.

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I havent seen anyone else mention it yet but I am curious as to what others think about increasing the cluster size to reduce fragmentation. Aegis also mentioned in the software forum defrag topic using alternative filesystems. Preventing fragmentation is better than defraging.

BTW I used the wizard in Acronis DiskDirector to convert the cluster size of partitions because it will show much much space will be wasted with the respective increases.

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Defrag your drive daily in most cases it may be extream but haveing your system on for an extended time is not good nor is turning it off and on multiple times a day or daily for that matter. intresting topic i have started. Lets think how long we as end-users really keep a drive to begin with.

Edited by Shindo_Hikaru
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I havent seen anyone else mention it yet but I am curious as to what others think about increasing the cluster size to reduce fragmentation. Aegis also mentioned in the software forum defrag topic using alternative filesystems. Preventing fragmentation is better than defraging.

BTW I used the wizard in Acronis DiskDirector to convert the cluster size of partitions because it will show much much space will be wasted with the respective increases.

It definitely will reduce fragmentation, but if you have many small files it'll waste space.

(I'm talking about FAT32. If I remember correctly, NTFS allows multiple files to be stored in one cluster.)

Edited by LLXX
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I think the analogy of washing dishes to defragmentation is incompatible.

It's more like broken China or scattered puzzle pieces or a messy office with paper/files everywhere--since your hard drive is not really dirty--just not organized. Hehe. The messier or the more pieces, the longer it takes to organize it... Anywho..

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Lets think how long we as end-users really keep a drive to begin with.

what does this mean? afaik everyone keeps their hdds until they die... thats unless they have lots of money to spend on plenty of brand new drives.

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You're right ripken, it's not true at all. As I'm sure you know, defragmenting causes excessive disk usage by moving files to reorder them to eliminate free space gaps between files. If you do this every day, that's far more wear and tear on your computer's hard drive.

Defragmenting once every month or two I can see being feasible. Daily is far too excessive and will cause more problems than what it's worth.

I'm really surprised that people don't realize that defragging frequently (even daily) does more harm than good.

I'd really like to understand this further. NTFS does not cure disk defragmentation, but it may help to deter it. I've worked on XP systems, and 2K systems both with NTFS, and disk defrags when run, can run for an hour or more (The record being 27hours for 14GB of data, on a 20GB drive though).

VMware disks will fragment as they grow, and even if you allocate the disk data before hand they fragment. I use Diskeeper Pro 10 to defrag my drive, and it runs daily. I have been doing this (with previous versions) for 2 years.

I would assume that the extra wear and tear MAY occur on the Read/Write Head moving back and forth, but unless you have set your HD's to stop (which slows the PC up and is a pain to wait for them to spin up) after XX minutes, your wearing the bearing and the motor our anyway.

I would also argue that defragmenting moves the data closer together, eliminating dead space. The dead space eliminated the need to move the R/W heads, meaning less wear on them.

This argument is not to dissimilar to the war on whether it's better to shutoff your computer, or leave it running all the time. Which is worse on the Processor/RAM and other chipsets?

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What is the process of fragmentation?.. Is there a way to force the OS to put things back where it found them when it's finished with them?.. or is the problem that the OS is forever messing upon itself, like a critter with distemper..? In other words, Is the PC OS not yet "potty trained".. or is it like a critter born without rectal muscles.. as in poorly developed?..

http://www.theabsolute.net/sware/dskinv.html

http://www.diskcleaners.com/clndisk.html

http://www.filesland.com/companies/CM-Data...6-download.html

How does the OS build a cluster?..

How does the OS know the front end of a cluster from the back end of a cluster?..

Why are clusters needed?..

What size should a cluster be to be optimum?..

How small can a cluster be?..

How large can a cluster be?..

Is a cluster just a memory dump, and storage tank?..

If the OS didn't have clusters, would it still function?..

What are all those dots in a cluster?..

Can I put a smilie in a cluster?..

Can you modify a cluster?..

Is there an OS that doesn't have clusters?..

Who invented the cluster?.. What were his initial thoughts for his reasoning in inventing and developing the cluster?..

What is happening in the evolution of the cluster?..

If the OS had a better line to a cluster, would that prevent fragmentation?..

If defragmentation was incorporated with the running process, would that prevent fragmentation?..

Edited by KingAuther
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Defrag your drive daily in most cases it may be extream but haveing your system on for an extended time is not good nor is turning it off and on multiple times a day or daily for that matter. intresting topic i have started. Lets think how long we as end-users really keep a drive to begin with.

Having a system on for a long period of time doesn't do much harm as long as temperatures are reasonable. Turning a system on and off probably does more harm than leaving the system on throughout the day. Reason? Heat stresses. Every time you start and stop your computer, it heats up and cools down. Thermal expansion puts stress on the components. Tugboat drivers never turn off their engines, and some of the ones off the coast here in Vancouver have been running for over 20 years!

I've got an old Athlon system at home that's been running for 6 years. Still starts up, still runs XP just fine. The reason why the old drive died (aside from the fact that it was a Maxtor), was because the case had no cooling for it - idle temperatures were about 50C!

I'll keep a drive (and a computer for that matter) until it dies. The less wear and tear, the better.

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