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I searched but didn't find any recent posts on defraggers. My computer guy installed Piriform defragger which seems to work but it sure takes a long time. I just wondered if there are any other better products out there that would be quicker and better. Thanks!
Windows has built in defragmentation, why do you need third party tool?
Defraggler (the one the OP mentions), can do more than what the built in Windows one can do (including shifting large files to the end of the HDD to keep future fragmentation to a minimum).
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If it's SSD do not defragment the drive.
Agree, and most defragmenting software will warn you / block defragmenting an SSD.
I searched but didn't find any recent posts on defraggers. My computer guy installed Piriform defragger which seems to work but it sure takes a long time. I just wondered if there are any other better products out there that would be quicker and better. Thanks!
I don't use it often, but I do use Defraggler from Piriform when I do need one.
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Agree, and most defragmenting software will warn you / block defragmenting an SSD.
aside from being a waste of time, is there any danger from defragging an ssd ?
isnt defragging usually a waste of time these days since the smallest drives nowadays are usually 500 gb and even if there is wasted space there is usually a high likelihood of having enough contiguous space (i rarely hear hard drive chatter like in the 90's which means the hdd is looking for data for the same file on multiple platters which makes it take longer to pull in all sections of the data) ?
havent used windows in a long time... didnt even know defragging was still a thing.
Windows has built in defragmentation, why do you need third party tool?
Yes and I find the one that comes with Windows to be the best!!
One time I read Windows ME defrag was FASTER than the 98 one I had so I tried it.......... It missed stuff constantly and it the computer under alot of stress while it was running.... (Much more aggresive)
I have since put the 98 one back on......... Defragging is an IMPORTANT TOOL,speed is not needed!!
Thanks for the responses, I have one of the last Win7 machines (Dell) and hoped that the Piriform would speed up the machine , if nothing else. Sorry, I am ignorant but don't know if I am defragging a SSD. (?). BTW, I use a few different CCleaners and Malwarebyte anti-malware programs, also Avast as well. Thanks again. :-)
Since regular HDD's are partially mechanical they will "wear out" after prolonged use and even though they are still functioning "logically", the mechanical side of it slows down. The system will see it as functioning but it way slower than it should be. In these cases even defragmenting it will not speed it up. You could replace the HD by "cloning" your existing one to a new one. Another thing to consider is that Windows itself will slow down considerably as time goes by. You can clean it and optimize it all you want but it won't help that much. Your best course of action assuming everything is in working order is to "reload" the OS from scratch. It is a PITA for most. What type of system is it? Desktop? Laptop?
Since regular HDD's are partially mechanical they will "wear out" after prolonged use and even though they are still functioning "logically", the mechanical side of it slows down. The system will see it as functioning but it way slower than it should be. In these cases even defragmenting it will not speed it up. You could replace the HD by "cloning" your existing one to a new one. Another thing to consider is that Windows itself will slow down considerably as time goes by. You can clean it and optimize it all you want but it won't help that much. Your best course of action assuming everything is in working order is to "reload" the OS from scratch. It is a PITA for most. What type of system is it? Desktop? Laptop?
It is a laptop. The Piriform states that I have 452 GB total which I am using 57 GB. Therefore , the HD is not overloaded at all.
aside from being a waste of time, is there any danger from defragging an ssd ?
isnt defragging usually a waste of time these days since the smallest drives nowadays are usually 500 gb and even if there is wasted space there is usually a high likelihood of having enough contiguous space (i rarely hear hard drive chatter like in the 90's which means the hdd is looking for data for the same file on multiple platters which makes it take longer to pull in all sections of the data) ?
havent used windows in a long time... didnt even know defragging was still a thing.
There's some concern that normal, scheduled defraging will shorten the lifespan of an SSD as you are doing numerous unnecessary writes to the drive.
For must users manually running defrag is probably not necessary, and modern Windows versions do it as a scheduled task automatically every so often.
In my case, I do see some benefit to running it on occasion. I have 443 GB of Steam games on my platter based drive (208,000 + files), along with a number of VMWare images that don't get used daily (my daily use images are on my SSDs).
The Steam games update with enough regularity that fragmentation does occur.
Virtual Machine drive images are a particular problem;
In my configuration, they are split into multiple 2 GB files and they are set to only grow as needed (I don't create a full size empty drive at creation).
VMWare creates the files initially as 320 KB each, and then grows the drive as needed. So my current master Win 8 VM has 150 GB of drive space set aside (77 individual files), but is only using about 10 GB of that (so 7 files at between 700 MB and 2 GB each, and the other 70 are all 320 KB each). As the VM needs more space it begins to fill into the empty files, and you start to get fragmentation (of single 2 GB files).
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