What is Defragging?
Defragging is process done to a hard disk in order to improve performance and
recover some lost disk space. Defragging is an essential part of a PC's upkeep
as it keeps all the data on your hard disk in an easily readable order. If a
hard disk is left without defragging, then over time the disk will begin to lose
performance and also slowly reduce the available capacity to data. As you will
be aware if your hard disk is running slowly then this will affect the rest of
the system performance, in all applications and especially in games, where frame
rate is important.
How does Defragging improve performance?
When you defrag your hard disk you re-arrange the order in which the data is
stored on the drive. The PC will arrange the data so that data that belongs
together and needs to be read together is actually put in the same place on the
drive. The obvious question here is why doesn't the PC store the data in the
correct way in the first place? In an ideal situation (such as a blank disk) the
PC would do these as a first option. However with the amount of data being
deleted and wrote to the disk every second the PC is on it is no wonder that the
data cannot be stored together.
Lets have a look at an example. Say you write 3 files to a disk all 10Mb in
size the data would be all in a line each 10mb block after the other. This is
how your PC would prefer to store the data for maximum performance. It stands to
reason that this is how you would like it to be stored as well if you needed to
search for the data. But now lets say that you decide to delete the middle file
as its no longer any use to you. You now have a gap inbetween your files.
Lets say this time you write a file of 15mb in size. This file will be
written in the first 10Mb of space and the remaining 5Mb added to the backend of
the free space.As you can imagine with the millions of files being written to
and deleted from the disk each day, not to mention the temporary files that
windows uses on a frequent basis its not hard to imagine the state in which your
hard disk can be in after months of use. After a defrag in this simple example
your PC would re-arrange the disk to look as follows.
When files or indeed groups of files that belong together are stores next to
each other the PC has a much easier time locating the data plus the disk heads
don't have to travel to different parts of the disk to retrieve the data
required. This of course speeds up the disks performance and so in turn
increases overall system performance. There are of course levels of performance
gains. It becomes more negligible as you move to faster hard disks with large
memory buffers to compensate for file fragmentation however I would not ignore
the problem of fragmentation, it doesn't take much effort to defrag your disk
now and then
How does defragging increase disk space?
Simply put defragging doesn't really create any free space on your hard disk.
It may appear when you look at the graphics that defrag programs show you, that
the disk looks like it has more space, but all you are doing is moving data
about not removing any. Any disk space gain is negligible and is caused when the
defrag program puts together half clusters of data. Clusters can hold a number
of files, but if not filled the next file is started at the next cluster. If a
file is broken into pieces around the disk and defrag can put the file back into
a single cluster, or just save a cluster somewhere a small amount of space will
be released.
Advanced Defragging
Some defragging software can go a little beyond just sorting your files so
they are all together. Programs such as Norton Speed Disk can also sort your
entire sets of files and programs into the order that they are used. For example
it can be set so that your windows swap file is at the fastest part of the disk,
followed by games and most used applications which also need the fastest part of
the hard disk., Then documents etc and rarely used application can be put to the
back of the disk., This gives the priority speed access to the applications that
need it most. Again this may only be a small increase in performance but every
little helps.
Software to use for Defragging
You will be pleased to know that Windows comes with an adequate defrag
program which everyone can use. There are also some other pieces of software out
there for a more specific use. Norton Speed disk is one option on the market
which comes as part of Norton Utilities and Norton Systemworks. Doing a search
on Defrag software on your favourite search engine will give you some options of
free to use and pay for software.
Stephen Orgill
Editor -
http://www.pantherproducts.co.uk
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