defrager alternatives.

[sh410]

Does anyone have suggestions for a defrager other than the native windows offering?

[sherlock62]

shum02 wrote:

sherlock62 wrote:
And no, you never want to defrag an SSD. To slip up and defrag an SSD in error does not mean disaster but it is to be avoided.

Win 8.1, which I am on now will not let you run a defrag on a SSD drive, Win 7 the same. The OS is getting to the point that it will protect itself and it's hardware from "unqualified" users. Most users have no idea the utility is even there or how to get to it, use it, or even what it does and why it might be needed. This is in most cases a good idea.

Yup........ Same seen in Win 10.

[shum02]

sherlock62 wrote:
And no, you never want to defrag an SSD. To slip up and defrag an SSD in error does not mean disaster but it is to be avoided.

Win 8.1, which I am on now will not let you run a defrag on a SSD drive, Win 7 the same. The OS is getting to the point that it will protect itself and it's hardware from "unqualified" users. Most users have no idea the utility is even there or how to get to it, use it, or even what it does and why it might be needed. This is in most cases a good idea.

[sherlock62]

fj12ryder wrote:

sherlock62 wrote:
So, so much misinformation in this thread.

Defragging a hard drive, with the Windows defragger or free/or purchased 3rd party defragging program, defragging is beneficial. In regard to an SSD, do not defrag.

^^^^^^Like you said: "So, so much misinformation in this thread."

fj12ryder... To clarify my thoughts.. Indeed, in the year 2015 to initiate a defrag (3rd party or Windows defrag) is not a priority as defragging is done lets say automatically by the OS.(for example, Windows 7, by default, sets up a schedule to defrag the hard drive.) But.. but, the computer usually waits for an idle moment to do the defrag if it can't do as it automatically scheduled itself to do it.. MOST home computer users turn on the computer, use it and then shut it right down. The computer thus, never gets / does not have the opportunity to do the defrag.. For the computer user to initiate a defrag(3rd party or Windows defrag) is not required lets say but for the reasons I just mentioned to do a defrag / to initiate a defrag is often a positive thing. And no, you never want to defrag an SSD. To slip up and defrag an SSD in error does not mean disaster but it is to be avoided.

[2oldman]

sherlock62 wrote:
So, so much misinformation in this thread.

It's risky coming here for solid technical information.

[fj12ryder]

sherlock62 wrote:
So, so much misinformation in this thread.

Defragging a hard drive, with the Windows defragger or free/or purchased 3rd party defragging program, defragging is beneficial. In regard to an SSD, do not defrag.

^^^^^^Like you said: "So, so much misinformation in this thread."

[sherlock62]

So, so much misinformation in this thread.

Defragging a hard drive, with the Windows defragger or free/or purchased 3rd party defragging program, defragging is beneficial. In regard to an SSD, do not defrag.

[shum02]

fj12ryder wrote:
Actually the later iterations of Windows run defrag when the computer is idle, so the HDD gets defragged even though you aren't aware of it.

XP and older does not do it automatically but Win 7 and 8.X do. If SSD the operating system will not defrag as not required/wanted.

Never needed anything other than the Windows utility since NT4.0. It works as well as anything else and is free.

[fj12ryder]

Actually the later iterations of Windows run defrag when the computer is idle, so the HDD gets defragged even though you aren't aware of it.

[ReadyToGo]

I don't defrag often also. I see very little need to do it.
I might do it once a quarter if that. Just like not needing to clean or 'defrag' the registry, there is little to no reason to do so.
As long as you don't pay for the software to do it, there isn't any harm to defrag the hard drive, but there is little reason to do so.

[fj12ryder]

sherlock62 wrote:

fj12ryder wrote:
Haven't seen the need since Windows XP.

Hope you are kidding.. Anyway, Auslogics FREE. Get it here.

Nope, not kidding in the least. I've seen too many comparison by third parties with no real bias, that show running a third party defrag program on Windows 7 and Windows 8/8.1 make no difference in the real world operation of the computer. Some benchmark programs can be run to show that they help, but they just convince the already convinced that they work.

Why cause even more wear and tear on your hard drive? And an excellent way to shorten the life of a SSD in pretty short order. Can't hurt? Maybe, maybe not. Hard drives have finite read/write cycles, why push your luck for no real benefit.

[wildtoad]

2oldman wrote:
I have never understood why defragging is ever necessary.

Reading from and writing to a rotating disk drive is about the slowest activity the computer will do. As you write to the disk it may not write the file in contiguous sectors but may have to scatter it all over the place. Thus when you re read the file the disk arm has to move about which in relative terms can be quite slow. The defraging attemps to put all the pieces of a single file back together to reduce the time it takes to acces the file.

Depending on how much memory your computer has the more disk activity will occur just to load and run programs. So for this reason it's good to have plenty of free disk space. (And as much memory as you can)

Most users will not notice the delays, but some users just want it to be as fast as it can be.

[wildtoad]

Alan_Hepburn wrote:
I've been using Smart Defrag from IoBit for several years now and it seems to work well.

X2. Defraging is not as important as it once was, but it doesn't hurt.

[Gdetrailer]

sherlock62 wrote:

fj12ryder wrote:
Haven't seen the need since Windows XP.

Hope you are kidding.. Anyway, Auslogics FREE. Get it here.

No, FJ is not "kidding".

XP is defaulted to automatically "defrag" the HD anytime the system is not busy or accessing the HD. So in a nutshell if your screen saver is running the OS is automatically defragging when needed.

I have used a few defragging software products back on Win95/98 and honestly they never performed any better than the built in defrag of the OS..

Just be aware, if you have ANY SSD drives in your system YOU DO NOT EVER RUN A DEFRAG.. Doing so is unnecessary and will eventually damage the SSD drive..

[sherlock62]

fj12ryder wrote:
Haven't seen the need since Windows XP.

Hope you are kidding.. Anyway, Auslogics FREE. Get it here.

[fj12ryder]

Haven't seen the need since Windows XP.