Defrag question

[Beirut]

Is it a good idea to defrag multiple drives at once?

[Tony Furze]

Try this:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/System-Tweak/SmartDefrag.shtml

all the best

TF

[Husar]

Did you try the tool Xiahou posted in the freeware thread?
I just ran it yesterday and it defragmented all my 3 partitions one after the other without using a lot of ressources, worked quite well and didn't take too long.

edit: Since that isn't a direct answer to your question, I think it would work but wouldn't do it myself anyway for my superstitious belief that my CPU should "concentrate" on system tasks one after the other to prevent any possible damage.

[Beirut]

edit: Since that isn't a direct answer to your question, I think it would work but wouldn't do it myself anyway for my superstitious belief that my CPU should "concentrate" on system tasks one after the other to prevent any possible damage.

I follow that superstition, methinks.

But I will check that link Tony posted.

Thanks.

[Whacker]

I'll toss in my two cents for what it's worth. I've used both Diskeeper and PerfectDisk commercially, and found them to be resource pigs, and quite inefficient.

Right now I use a combination of the built-in windows Defrag util (which is oddly enough a compact, features, better version of Diskeeper) which can "compress" files to save filespace, and JKDefrag (http://www.kessels.com/JkDefrag/). I do the Windows defrag manually once every so often, every few months or so, and have the task manager set up to do JKDefrag once every night at about 3-4 AM.

The last thing I'll add is that whatever one chooses to use for their defrag solution, how one does it is really most important. Solutions that defrag "on the fly" and are always enabled are completely unnecessary and system hogs in my experience and opinion. Even defragging once a night is probably excessive for most people, once a week or so would be fine, it really depends on user habits and usage. The other important thing is to not defrag while one is using their system, as usually many files will be opened by the user, system, and applications and the tool will not be able to rewrite them to other parts of the disk, thus largely defeating the purpose. Net is, 1. don't do a "constant" defrag, 2. don't defrag while you are using the PC, and 3. set it up to defrag on a reasonable schedule.

:balloon2:

[Xiahou]

I've really been impressed with JkDefrag. It defrags under situations where Windows defrag just gives up- it seems to be much more intelligent about reorganizing files.

Previously, I was in the "defrag once a month- if that" crowd. But now, once you get through the initial defrag with JkDefrag, it takes so little time to stay on top of things that I think it might be better to do quick defrags daily or weekly instead of long drawn out defrags monthly. If you stay on top of things with regular defrags, it should only take a few minutes to run it and keep your drives optimized.