Defrag took forever

[Gig-O-Ram]

I was helping my wife with her laptop today, because she wanted to turn off some of the services and things that run in the background, hoping to get faster boot times. We got that done, and then I ran a defrag on her main partition (there are 2 on the lappy). I had it do the analyze thing, but it never seemed to get above 10%, so I just had it go straight into defrag, and I swear it took more than 3 1/2 hours!

The hdd has 120GB divided into two equal partitions, and the main one has 48% used space (OS and data), so I figured it must just be the fact of nearly half of it used, and it was sort of messed up, as why it took so long. Defrags on my hdd can take a while, but not that long, though my main drive is one 120GB partition w/63% free space.

[gvblake22]

Wow, that is quite a long time. But as you said, the size of the drive, total used space, and severity of file fragmentation will all contribute to longer and longer defrag times.

[Gig-O-Ram]

I was beginning to think something wasn't working right, but when I saw it go from "compacting files" to "Moving -X- file", I figured it was going okay, even if it was slow. We've had the lappy for a few months, and though it doesn't get the same level of use as our desktops, it has never been defragged.

[Archilochus]

Most new comptuers I've worked on need a Defrag right out of the box.. :)

[Cyberlon]

Never count on the percentage indicator that Microsoft provides. Ever installed something to your machine and seen the indicator say 3 seconds left for over a minute? -lol
Laptop hard drives are also using slower rotation speeds compared to desktop models, both to conserve power and lessen the heat... this gives slightly poorer performance.

[Gig-O-Ram]

Originally Posted by Cyberlon

Never count on the percentage indicator that Microsoft provides. Ever installed something to your machine and seen the indicator say 3 seconds left for over a minute? -lol
Laptop hard drives are also using slower rotation speeds compared to desktop models, both to conserve power and lessen the heat... this gives slightly poorer performance.

Yeah, I know what you're talking about...the several-minutes-long seconds. I didn't consider that a LT hdd would work slower, either, but it makes sense. I guess I will have to watch that the next time I run the defrag.

[Quakindude]

Keeping it defragged on a regular basis will greatly reduce the time it takes to do this simple house-keeping task. For folks who install/uninstall a lot of programs, I recommend a weekly defrag. If you're the usual user though, and only install a new program every once in a while, once a month will do you fine. Soon as I find some files though, I'm going to post back in this thread with a free, yet very good program for defragging.


Here we go. By far, this is the best free defragging app you'll ever find IMHO.

Go here to get Contig.exe

Once you have that downloaded to your desktop, if you want to use a GUI for it instead of the DOS box, you can go here.

I put both files in a folder called defrag on my desktop. Just unzip both files and place in a folder. Then run the Power Defragmenter GUI to defrag your HDD. Much better than Windows built in utility.

[Gig-O-Ram]

I downloaded that program and just tried it... MAN! I wonder if anyone has looked at that thing run when they were on drugs? Not that I do, or even condone drug use, but I was just looking at it and wondering...Someone on acid might find it facinating, LOL!

[Quakindude]

Yeah, it shows everything running by in the DOS window. If you want a very good defrag, run the Power Mode. It does a double pass defrag that really tunes up your HDD's.

[Gig-O-Ram]

Originally Posted by Quakindude

Yeah, it shows everything running by in the DOS window. If you want a very good defrag, run the Power Mode. It does a double pass defrag that really tunes up your HDD's.

I did...and that's what I was talking about in the previous post...