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Question of the Day: Are you keeping your Prime subscription?
Is Windows defrag any good
- Thread starter whipper
- Start date
The_Unbeliever
Honorary Master
D4N
Expert Member
Defrag = Waste of time, especially on NTFS drives.
d0b33
Honorary Master
+1
The GUI version is JKDeragGUI if you don't like to use the command prompt, works on Windows 7 too.
The_Unbeliever
Honorary Master
Budza
Executive Member
Well, gee, DBE. Great answer!
Why is defragging a waste of time? I can hear my drive grinding away, and it seems to do so less if its properly defragmented. I assume this is because its seek times are reduced for files that are contiguous. What advantage do NTFS drives have that they do not need to be defragmented?
Why is defragging a waste of time? I can hear my drive grinding away, and it seems to do so less if its properly defragmented. I assume this is because its seek times are reduced for files that are contiguous. What advantage do NTFS drives have that they do not need to be defragmented?
I believe in defrag, especially at work, where the XP pcs normally run for more than a year before a format, then you can see the difference. At home, I don't waste my time as the next format is just around the corner? 
The_Techie
Resident Techie
The amount of time spent defragging does not offset the perceivable performance increase in my experience. Then again, you can always schedule a defrag to run while you sleep and reap the benefits 
howardb
Expert Member
You can also try Raxco's PerfectDisk - works well...
Jabberwocky
Expert Member
You might see a very minor improvement. Worth doing it overnight once every few years or so if you have a crapload of junk on your hdds. Not worth doing it while watching though.... you will need to use the pc for eons to make up for the time wasted
The_Unbeliever
Honorary Master
The amount of time spent defragging does not offset the perceivable performance increase in my experience. Then again, you can always schedule a defrag to run while you sleep and reap the benefits
I scheduled a defrag to run after-hours on my work PC (and the servers I work on).
That way I don't need to wait for something to finish.
Defrag is a total waste of time, not because there is no gain - but because the gain is so small that it is not worth the time it takes to run the defrag. The reasoning:
NTFS is an efficient file system and with the fast seek times, NCQ and large cache of modern Disks having non-contiguous files is not such a problem.
Running defrag mostly benefits large files, e.g. page files, Databases and movies files. Fixing the size of your page files prevents it from fragmenting, same as databases. DVD rips and movie files are not effected by fragmenting (for example you watch the movie over an hour or two whilst it caches or streams, a few milliseconds delay is not an issue).
Programs that run hundreds of small files, such as an OS boot, will be effected more by the physical placement of the files on the Disk, rather than the degree of fragmentation. So if you could line all the files that windows use to load, sequentially on the very edge of the hard-disk, your OS should boot quicker. (You can actually do this by short formatting your HDD, they do this with SANS to improve the benchmark scores!).
Now if you consider the above, and the fact that it takes a very, very long to format a disk and the benefit (if any) will be very small - then it hardly makes it worth the effort.
NTFS is an efficient file system and with the fast seek times, NCQ and large cache of modern Disks having non-contiguous files is not such a problem.
Running defrag mostly benefits large files, e.g. page files, Databases and movies files. Fixing the size of your page files prevents it from fragmenting, same as databases. DVD rips and movie files are not effected by fragmenting (for example you watch the movie over an hour or two whilst it caches or streams, a few milliseconds delay is not an issue).
Programs that run hundreds of small files, such as an OS boot, will be effected more by the physical placement of the files on the Disk, rather than the degree of fragmentation. So if you could line all the files that windows use to load, sequentially on the very edge of the hard-disk, your OS should boot quicker. (You can actually do this by short formatting your HDD, they do this with SANS to improve the benchmark scores!).
Now if you consider the above, and the fact that it takes a very, very long to format a disk and the benefit (if any) will be very small - then it hardly makes it worth the effort.
just a tip though - it aint helping your hard drive if it defrags every day.
defrag it every now and then rather.
defragging every day is worse than not defragging it at all, because you're accessing much more files.
Budza
Executive Member
Thanks Conradl. Will stop the weekly defrag I have been doing, and just do it whenever I am bored/ going out to lunch for a few hours. Defrag debunked.
Asha'man X
Expert Member
I found that letting Diskeeper run every 2-3 days at my ex job kept everything running smoothly. It was only one server, but it was heavily used, tons of small files. That Windows server has been running almost 3 years without a format once, and it's still ok. It was getting old hardware wise, but disk speed was still ok thanks to the defrag.
Kloofvreter
Honorary Master
That means the data is not fragmented, and you are wasting your time.
daveza
Honorary Master
Using the Windows defragmentor is about as useful as sweeping leaves in a hurricane.
Lots of work and you hardly notice any difference afterwards.
I have noticed a difference using Diskeeper.
Lots of work and you hardly notice any difference afterwards.
I have noticed a difference using Diskeeper.
adamr
Executive Member
i am using jkdefrag . . . Dunno if it is doing its job. But its quick. My start ups are slow 
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