wonderboy1953
In Runtime
- Messages
- 195
I've never noticed a difference myself and I have read from the internet that its value is questionable.
What's your experience?
What's your experience?
Does defragging help your system?
- Thread starter wonderboy1953
- Start date
~Darkseeker~
Fully Optimized
- Messages
- 2,494
- Location
- Welwyn Garden City, United Kingdom
you have to understand why fragging happens before you see the benefit.
Harddrives are split into clusters, default size is around 512bytes. When a file is put on the hard drive it is spread between as many contiguous clusters as it needs. However, when files are copies, moved, things are installed and deleted, some files can be spread between non-contiguous clusters (clusters that aren't next to each other) and this is called file fragmentation. Read times can be dramatically increased by fragmentation, but it has to be pretty badly fragmented to make a noticable impact on performance. Usually, the bigger the drive, the more fragmentation occurs, because there are often alot of empty clusters.
It depends on the level of fragmentation whether or not defragging will make a noticable difference.
Harddrives are split into clusters, default size is around 512bytes. When a file is put on the hard drive it is spread between as many contiguous clusters as it needs. However, when files are copies, moved, things are installed and deleted, some files can be spread between non-contiguous clusters (clusters that aren't next to each other) and this is called file fragmentation. Read times can be dramatically increased by fragmentation, but it has to be pretty badly fragmented to make a noticable impact on performance. Usually, the bigger the drive, the more fragmentation occurs, because there are often alot of empty clusters.
It depends on the level of fragmentation whether or not defragging will make a noticable difference.
I voted yes.
If the drive is only slightly fragmented, then there won't be much of an increase in performance after the defrag.
However, if the drive was badly fragmented, then the performance improvement is definitely noticeable, particularly on machines with slower HDDs such as laptops.
I have 'fixed' some laptops/PCs for friends that hadn't been defragged for months by simply running disk cleanup followed a complete defrag. Apps launched much faster and files opened quicker....
(Disk cleanup itself doesn't do anything, it's just to clear up some space and avoid defragging useless files)
If the drive is only slightly fragmented, then there won't be much of an increase in performance after the defrag.
However, if the drive was badly fragmented, then the performance improvement is definitely noticeable, particularly on machines with slower HDDs such as laptops.
I have 'fixed' some laptops/PCs for friends that hadn't been defragged for months by simply running disk cleanup followed a complete defrag. Apps launched much faster and files opened quicker....
(Disk cleanup itself doesn't do anything, it's just to clear up some space and avoid defragging useless files)
wonderboy1953
In Runtime
- Messages
- 195
Lengthening the life of your drive?
Spoke with my friend (who fixes computers) who says that a defrag can lengthen the
life of a drive.
It would take a long-term study to confirm this and some people may find it's not worth doing this due to planned obsolescence. So if you want to lengthen the life of your drive, this method may be worthwhile.
Spoke with my friend (who fixes computers) who says that a defrag can lengthen the
life of a drive.
It would take a long-term study to confirm this and some people may find it's not worth doing this due to planned obsolescence. So if you want to lengthen the life of your drive, this method may be worthwhile.
Similar threads
