Defragmenting Software

The unbearable slowness of hard disks
One of the best things about buying a new PC is how fast it is. Launching applications and opening files seems instantaneous. Menus fly open, and files save in a flash.

Over time, as you install more programs, create and edit files, remove applications, and replace them with new ones, the computer starts to bog down. After a couple of years of regular use, the thrill is gone and Windows' hourglass icon becomes a constant companion.As if that weren't enough, applications gradually require more memory and disk space. Windows itself swells as Microsoft grafts on more service packs and security patches. This is just one of those inevitabilities, like death and taxes: as time goes on, software gets bigger and your PC gets slower.

Another reason your computer slows down over time is file fragmentation. When you install the very first applications to an empty hard drive, the disk is free to write the files to a series of logically contiguous sectors across the drive's platter or platters. Writing files to contiguous sectors when you install an application, copy or save a file, or perform other disk operations requires the least amount of movement of the read-write head between write operations.

The same goes for read operations, such as launching an application or opening a file. If the file's sectors are all more or less in the same neighborhood, disk-intensive tasks go more quickly.

Fragmented files take more time to save and open Of course, if files always had to be stored on the disk contiguously, the hard disk's controller would have much more work to do. Every time a growing file bumped into an existing file written to sectors just beyond it, the controller would have to copy the entire file to a new location, calling a momentary halt to your productivity.This also leads to a significant amount of wasted disk space, riddling your drive with a Swiss-cheese array of clusters too small to hold a complete file.For this reason, disk controllers and file systems work together to write bits and pieces of files to the closest available free sectors. Over time, files become increasingly fragmented across the disk.

The more scattered the files become, the more the read-write head has to travel and the more disk operations slow. As the drive fills up, fewer large areas of free sectors are available, and the problem becomes worse.

Disk-defragmenting utilities consolidate scattered files to free space and boost overall performance. Windows comes with a basic defragger: select All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk Defragmenter to launch it.

In Windows Vista, Disk Defragmenter is set to run by default once per week, so Vista users are already benefiting from some amount of regular defragmentation. Nevertheless, you'll realize a greater improvement in the performance of any Windows system by using a third-party defragger instead.





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