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[AdvancedSetup]

There are many discussions on Defragmentation and when or how to do it. In my opinion the average user probably does not need to do it more than about once a month or less. Unless you're using benchmark software to show the speed difference you often won't see or feel it on an average system. Now that is not the case though for heavy game users, Audio/Video editors, 3D Modeling, etc. as they can and will benefit from a hard drive that is kept defragmented.

Here is a list of both free and commercial utilities to perform the task of defragmenting your hard drive.

Defragmentation - From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For Vista and XP there is a built-in DEFRAG.EXE utility which can be manually run, or create a schedule and run it from a batch file. You can schedule it to run every night while you sleep if needed, or any other schedule you feel suites your needs.

XP usage example, Vista has a couple more options.

• Usage:
  
• DEFRAG <volume> [-a] [-f] [-v] [-?]
  
• volume drive letter or mount point (d: or d:\vol\mountpoint)
  
• -a Analyze only
  
• -f Force defragmentation even if free space is low
  
• -v Verbose output
  
• -? Display this help text

Simple batch file example:

@echo off
DEFRAG C:

Basic output example

Quote

defrag c: -a
Windows Disk Defragmenter
Copyright © 2003 Microsoft Corp. and Executive Software International, Inc.

Analysis Report
50.00 GB Total, 9.19 GB (18%) Free, 3% Fragmented (6% file fragmentation)

You do not need to defragment this volume.

Verbose output example

Quote

defrag c: -a -v
Windows Disk Defragmenter
Copyright © 2003 Microsoft Corp. and Executive Software International, Inc.

Analysis Report

Volume size = 50.00 GB
Cluster size = 4 KB
Used space = 40.93 GB
Free space = 9.07 GB
Percent free space = 18 %

Volume fragmentation
Total fragmentation = 3 %
File fragmentation = 6 %
Free space fragmentation = 0 %

File fragmentation
Total files = 207,378
Average file size = 297 KB
Total fragmented files = 113
Total excess fragments = 888
Average fragments per file = 1.00

Pagefile fragmentation
Pagefile size = 0 bytes
Total fragments = 0

Folder fragmentation
Total folders = 16,873
Fragmented folders = 1
Excess folder fragments = 7

Master File Table (MFT) fragmentation
Total MFT size = 245 MB
MFT record count = 224,401
Percent MFT in use = 89
Total MFT fragments = 2

You do not need to defragment this volume.

FREE Defrag Utilities

• The last free version of the commercial Diskeeper program
  
• Diskeeper Lite V7
  
• Diskeeper[R] Lite 9.0 (Build 528) - no documentation found to prevent downloading or using from the Intel Desktop Utilities
  
• Need to download the FULL version and unpack the Intel Desktop Utilities and find DK Lite under the 3rdparty folder. Also appears to contain a 64Bit version
  
• Intel Desktop Utilities v2.1.9.66 (full version including Diskeeper[R] Lite 9.0 (Build 528) * 88.9MB
  
• JkDefrag
  
• WinContig
  
• Ultra Defragmenter
  
• Auslogics Disk Defrag
  
• Contig v1.54 By Mark Russinovich
  
• PageDefrag v2.32 By Mark Russinovich
  
• DefragMentor Lite CL
  
• From everyone here at Piriform, the company that brought you CCleaner and Recuva... we now bring you a file defragmentation tool... Defraggler!
  
• Defraggler
  
• UltimateDefrag

Commercial Defrag Utilities

• Diskeeper
  
• Raxco PerfectDisk
  
• O&O Defrag
  
• Paragon Partition Manager