Defrag

[1badtech]

It really kinda depends on how much you're fragging up your HD. If you're installing and uninstalling alot of programs or creating/deleting a lot of files then you should do it often.

If you've changed very little on your system in the past month, then it's hardly necessary.

Just surfing the internet creates a bunch of temporary files on your hard drive. When you click on a link, you are downloading files. Windows itself is constantly creating and deleting temporary files which will fragment your drive.

 

[TRDCorolla1]

How many of you guys do disk cleanup and defrag? Do you do it on a regular basis?

I run a defrag once every 2-3 months. Disk Cleanup, I do like once a week. After all that is done, my Windows pop up really fast and everything seem to be supercharged once again.

 

[TheMajor]

Fix-It Utilities also has a very good defrag utility.

 

[SkyHi]

its best to do it once a week. i defrag once every 2 weeks.

You can't say when it's "best to defrag"
It's technically impossible, unless you're doing it every single time you access a file.

-SkyHi

 

[Crysalis]

i defrag every other day and do a discleaup every other week.

I really suggest using a "defragger" every week at the least. Also, if you dont run diskcleanup, you'll have a heck of a time doing it after you haven't done it in a while. I know that one computer that i maintain for someone had 9gb's of temporary trash on it. It took almost 3 hours to clean it. I had run diskcleanup two months before then.

Keep up with it... it wont hurt anything... its healthy!

 

[Mohdoo]

I try to defrag every month or so.

If I have been doing a lot of downloading or things like that, I do it more often, though.

 

[1badtech]

This makes for an interesting arguement on why you should defrag everyday

http://itresearch.forbes.com/data/s...qt=Executive+Software&SUBMIT.x=12&SUBMIT.y=10

That's an interesting finding. According to the research defrag helped increase the time to backup a server disk. Yet another benefit of using defrag on a regular basis.

 

[smileygladhands]

i defrag every other day and do a discleaup every other week.

I really suggest using a "defragger" every week at the least. Also, if you dont run diskcleanup, you'll have a heck of a time doing it after you haven't done it in a while. I know that one computer that i maintain for someone had 9gb's of temporary trash on it. It took almost 3 hours to clean it. I had run diskcleanup two months before then.

Keep up with it... it wont hurt anything... its healthy!

Actually, it might. Everytime you run a defrag program you're spinning your HD the entire time. If you're running one everyday or every week that's alot of access time you're adding to the life of your HD.
Running a defragger more than twice a month - or even more than once a month - is a little obsessive compulsive, IMO.

 

[smileygladhands]

This makes for an interesting arguement on why you should defrag everyday

http://itresearch.forbes.com/data/s...qt=Executive+Software&SUBMIT.x=12&SUBMIT.y=10

That IS interesting, but they're talking about companies backing up their data which is mega-huge compared to our own personal data.
It said that companies could see as much a 67% improvement in backup time if defragmenting was done prior to backup. When you take our own data you won't see anything that dramatic since our data barely a spec of theirs. Those percentages - if they meant anything to the average home user - would be decreased exponentially.

 

[1badtech]

That IS interesting, but they're talking about companies backing up their data which is mega-huge compared to our own personal data.
It said that companies could see as much a 67% improvement in backup time if defragmenting was done prior to backup. When you take our own data you won't see anything that dramatic since our data barely a spec of theirs. Those percentages - if they meant anything to the average home user - would be decreased exponentially.

Actually home users use more disk space than servers. The servers I manage are a few years old and none of them have more than 100GB. Home users these days have at least 120GB because the price of a SATA or IDE drive is a lot less than of a SCSI drive. With music and video downloads, home users are filling up their hard drives a lot faster than server users.