is XP’s defrag good enough or should I use something else?

Topic

New Reply

I admit I haven’t been following standard recommendations and I haven’t defragged in years. That’s not as bad as it sounds: my 320 GB drive is only a little more than 1/4 full and everything is running well. But I’d like to speed things a little up if possible. I’ve installed MyDefrag but never run it. So which defrag should I use?

Thanks,
Ellen

Reply | Quote

Replies

With XP I used a defrag app from Auslogics. This seemed to work quite well. They try to sell you stuff if you check on things other than defrag, but if you just stick with defrag and optimize it’s fine.

Reply | Quote

Ted,

What do you mean by optimize? Choosing options they give you with the program?

Thanks,
Ellen

Reply | Quote

There are a couple of options. Defrag only and defrag and optimize. This Auslogics sitewill discuss the options for you. Choose Features in the bottom section to read about Defrag and Optimize.

Reply | Quote

Windows XP’s native defrag program is sufficient, but the MyDefrag program you have may be a little better.
So yes, by all means, go ahead and use it, but use only one program to defrag your drive. Avoid using multiple tools.

Reply | Quote

… , but use only one program to defrag your drive. Avoid using multiple tools.

Why? :confused:

Bruce

Reply | Quote

Because running differing tools may just shuffle files around and create more work than is necessary on the drive, and achieve very little in terms of usefull real world defragmentation benefits. Don’t over do it. Defragmenting is important, but one need not be anal about it.

Reply | Quote

Running different defrag apps one after the other just moves the same data a second time. Each defrag app uses different optimizing methods and different algorithms. This will cause things to be moved twice.

As Clint mentions, defrag is important, but does not need to be done as often as older versions of Windows. Each new version has gotten better at managing files and disk space.

Reply | Quote

I have my image backup in case anything goes wrong, but if something does go wrong, would it necessarily be completely obvious, like not being able to boot, or could it be something more subtle?

Thanks,
Ellen

Reply | Quote

I have my image backup in case anything goes wrong, but if something does go wrong, would it necessarily be completely obvious, like not being able to boot, or could it be something more subtle?

Thanks,
Ellen

It’s very unlikely there would be a problem, even with multiple differing defragmentation programs, just a waste of time is all.
Ensure you are able to access & restore your image via a bootable disk, then you will have covered yourself in the off hand there is a problem, any problem.

MyDefrag is a decent program that I’ve used in XP with no problems.

Reply | Quote

With way too many years of experience, with different Defrag programs, I still depend on the original Windows Defragmenter.
It’s SAFE, it’s efficient and it’s already a part of Windows, and I can find it quickly on EVERY PC…. nothing to download and install.

I tried a defrag that came with another program (I think it was from Auslogic) and it made a total mess out of my hard drive.
There were files scattered from one end of the drive to the other. I had to do a Ghost Restore to get my drive back in order again.
Windows Defrag, will not make a mess like that.

One vital step that 99% of users miss when doing a defrag, is to delete ALL the JUNK out of the drive before defragmenting it.

Moving junk files around defeats the whole purpose of doing a Defrag, and puts a lot more wear and tear on the drive.

I have several cleanup programs that I use before ever doing a Backup or a Defrag. The first is the Windows Disk Cleanup,
run in the Extended mode. Then I have a Cleanup.bat program that I wrote myself. I also use the cleanup routine in
“Easy Cleaner 2″. Any piece of junk, anywhere on my hard drive, is fair game!
I even delete old System Restore Points and the Pagefile, before I do my Backups.
Old saying…..”Minus Crud, is Cool!”

By doing a massive cleanup before backing up my C: drive, I decrease the size of my backup image file(s) by over five gigabytes.

Good Luck and Happy Computing!

The Doctor 😎

Reply | Quote

Just to report: I ran MyDefrag and so far things look good. I notice so far that folders populate much faster.

Ellen

Reply | Quote