Scanning the Disk

[CaliGirl]

How often should a person scan their disk thorough? I have a 40GB hard drive.

A bit of info:

I have programs in drive C, and tonight after 5 hours I stoppped scanning it. BTW...I had the screen saver on, so I am hoping that was part of the problem of taking so long.

My data is in drive D. Did not try and scan that drive at all.

In drive E is spare.

Is there any other info you need to help me out?

I know that one should scan disk and defrag once a week, right?

[nosferatuscoffin]

First off, I am not sure which version of Windows you are running. 98 or XP.

In either case, a scandisk only needs to be done when the computer is shut down improperly, whether through a power loss, program crash or even the cat hitting the Reset button. http://freeconservatives.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif Also, if you think the system is running slow, it can be run to make sure all of the drive's clusters are in sound shape. Defrag can be run every month or so.

Before doing a scandisk or defrag, it is important to make sure you have no programs running in the background, except for for Explorer and Task Manager. Shutdown everything in your taskbar (any icons that are in the bottom right hand corner next to the clock) with the exception of your speaker icon (which may or not be present depening on your settings). Generally, most of these programs will let you right-click their icons and offer an "Exit" or "Shut Down" option.

After closing down those icons, hit Ctl-Alt-Del and see what else might be running. Under 98, close down everything but Explorer and Task Manager. Under XP, click the Applications tab. If nothing is shown as running there, you are Ok and and are ready to run scandisk or defrag.I suggest let those programs scan and defrag both drives.

The time it takes to defrag largely depends on how large the drive is, how much data is on the drive and how fragmented it is. My D drive is also 40GB and very full, so it would take many hours for it to scan, probably ovemight.

Also, XP requires at least 15% of the drive's contents to be free, so in the case of the 40GB drive, you will need at least 6GB free for it to run properly.

[rbisrb2]

I remember defragging my 286 10meg hardrive, at least 12 hrs, set up a 386 for a guy defragged his 20 meg in about 30 min. Wow I thought, now my 20 gig takes about an hour on my 1 gig celeron. That was about 15 years ago. Amazing!

[rbisrb2]

It was also BW, (before windows) I ran DRDOS! hehe, bought it for cheap, back then you could get previous versions. Man, do I feel old! LOL

[nosferatuscoffin]

DR-DOS was a superior flavor of DOS made by DEC during the 80's into the early 90's. Then again, DEC OS's were generally better and more stable then Microsoft ones. Not that it takes much to do that. Heh.

As for your 1Ghz Celeron, like I said before, a lot depends on how fragmented the drive is as far as the speed of Defrag goes.

[DoctorDoom]

If you are using XP, be prepared for a LONG session of defragging. The defragger that comes with it is snailware. VoptXP (http://www.vopt.com/) is much faster. It will also defrag 95/98/Me.

One major difference that I've noticed between XP and 9x is that XP leaves a lot of small chunks of data scattered around the drive because they are declared unmoveable. It's not a big deal, but looking at the "map" gives the same sensation as looking out at the front yard and seeing dandelions, the difference being that these digital weeds can't be pulled.

If all else fails, use Safe Mode to run drefrag. Check with your computer manual see see how to boot in safe mode. This loads just enough to allow the most basic Windows activities, but it prevents loading all those applications that constantly whack the hard drive and restart the scandisk/defrag.

Be sure to disable the screen saver and anything else that will alter sytem operation after a set time.


As for defragging frequency, it depends entirely on how you use a particular drive. If you have 'C' set up strictly for Windows and programs, and do little if any routine adding or deleting of files, once it is defragged it should need only infrequent attention. The major culprit in fragmentation is the "swap file" (Page file" in XP). In default mode, Windows resizes it dynamically and will stuff bits and pieces of it wherever there's a free hole in the data.

The best bet is to take control of it and manually set its maximum and minimum sizes to the same number. This creates a fixed file that does not grow or shrink. An even better approach would be to move the swap/page file to your unused 'E' partition and set it to a fixed size, and remove it from 'C' (the default). 'C can then be compacted much more thoroughly.

If you're interested...

How to Optimize Your Swapfile (http://www.xtremepccentral.com/articles/swapfileoptimization/)

[nosferatuscoffin]

Agreed. On the XP defrag issue, I also have noticed that it is far less efficient then (gasp!) ME's defragger. One reason for that is that, since XP is based on NT's kernel, it will flag a far flung piece of the disk as 'unmovable' because of all of the 'restore' points that are added by XP as more and more device drivers are adding to an XP box. Acutally, the only good thing about ME, was that it's defragger was the best defragger that MS ever put out.

Safe mode is always a good idea for defragging, since it will generally not only speed up the process by elimnating most background programs from accessing the hard drive(s) during defragging, but you are also using fewer Windows resources.

As for frequency, I generally recommend every month or two for the average person who uses a web browser (or AOL) on a fairly regular basis. If it is used just for document writing and email, then every 4-6 months will probably do just fine.

One program that can help with keeping your drive from becoming fragmented, and one I have used for a over a year is History Kill http://www.swanksoft.com/ It enbales you to keep you temp and cookies folders clean, and can also clean out recent document listings, Recyle Bin as well as coming with an (almost too good) pop-up killer.

It is currently going for $39.95 as it is on sale on their site.

[CaliGirl]

[ QUOTE ]
nosferatuscoffin said:
First off, I am not sure which version of Windows you are running. 98 or XP.

[/ QUOTE ]

I am running Win98 2nd Edition

[ QUOTE ]
In either case, a scandisk only needs to be done when the computer is shut down improperly, whether through a power loss, program crash or even the cat hitting the Reset button. http://freeconservatives.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif Also, if you think the system is running slow, it can be run to make sure all of the drive's clusters are in sound shape. Defrag can be run every month or so.

[/ QUOTE ]

Are you talking about a thorough scan disk, or just the normal one? I have two choices when scanning the disk. Also, I have been told to do a scan disk before defragging.

[ QUOTE ]
Before doing a scandisk or defrag, it is important to make sure you have no programs running in the background, except for for Explorer and Task Manager. Shutdown everything in your taskbar (any icons that are in the bottom right hand corner next to the clock) with the exception of your speaker icon (which may or not be present depening on your settings). Generally, most of these programs will let you right-click their icons and offer an "Exit" or "Shut Down" option.

[/ QUOTE ]

Oh, didn't know about the icons either. For some reason I left the screen saver on, and was thinking it was the reason why it was taking so long.

[ QUOTE ]
The time it takes to defrag largely depends on how large the drive is, how much data is on the drive and how fragmented it is. My D drive is also 40GB and very full, so it would take many hours for it to scan, probably ovemight.

[/ QUOTE ]

I defragged both drives this morning, the C drive [programs] took 43 minutes, and the D drive [data] took 3 minutes.

I have a 40GB drive, the C drive has 13.3GB of free space, and my D drive has 3.44GB of free space. The E drive has 20.0GB of free space.

I was also told to defrag once a week. You say once a month is OK?

[DoctorDoom]

98SE, hey? THAT one I'm familiar with, having used it for a couple of years (and it's still on a drive in another tray).

For SE I always used Norton's Speed Disk. Once a fixed swapfile size is set, Speed Disk can move it to the inside of the hard drive as a contigous block of sectors for the fastest possible access to it. Unlike Windows defrag (any version), in 98 it can move the "unmovable" chunks. And, it's just plain fast. The same can't be said for XP, however, but that won't affect you in any case.

Recommendation: if all your data is going onto the D partition, and C holds ONLY Windows, programs and a fixed-size swap file, once a month should be adequate. Fragmentation occurs primarily when a lot of saves and deletes are going on.

One thing to consider: your browser does a lot of saving and deleting to its cache, which by default is on C, and it could very well build up fragmentation over time. One recommendation: before defragging, empty the browser cache; if you're using Outlook Express for email, click on File > Folder > Compact all folders, which could clear up megabytes of space if it was never done; delete the files in C:\Windows\Temp (do it after bootup so it doesn't affect anything that might be running from there -- unlikely, but...); empty the Recycle Bin; THEN defrag. There's little use in defragging junk that, once deleted, will make more holes to invite fragmentation.

By doing that, any files that are saved and deleted will be stored at the end of the main data, and defragging will be quite a bit faster.

I did note when running 98SE that it was more prone to fragmentation than 95, with which I started PC 'puting. Ergo, it needed more frequent attention. You could try once a month on C. If it takes a fairly long time, cut the time in half. Experiment until you reach an optimum point where you don't gain any useful time-saving by more frequent defrags.

If you're interested in using the Windows Me defragger that nos mentioned, check these pages. You can downloaed the file from either of them.

Fix your Windows 'defrag' program with this Microsoft replacement (http://aroundcny.com/technofile/texts/tec060902.html)

Defrag slows down or stops during operation (http://www.tek-tips.com/gfaqs.cfm/pid/615/fid/3094)

You can download the file from this page as well (I just did it).

SureCool.Com (http://www.surecool.com/)

Scroll down and look for this symbol:

http://www.surecool.com/defrag.gif

The file link is directly under it. Also open up the "Read First" file for info on using it. Note: it's a zip file, so you will need an unzipping program. If you don't have one installed, let us know.

[DoctorDoom]

Other points.

[ QUOTE ]
I have been told to do a scan disk before defragging.

[/ QUOTE ]
It can't hurt anything, but Defrag does an analysis of the disk before it starts, and it will tell you if it finds something that needs the scandisk.

[ QUOTE ]
Oh, didn't know about the icons either. For some reason I left the screen saver on, and was thinking it was the reason why it was taking so long.

[/ QUOTE ]
The screensaver will definitely impact defragging, especially if it's one of those with the "slide show" of pictures. It's best to disable it.

Also, it your box has a not-so-new processor, it would be better to avoid the "details" screen. It's fascinating to watch, but keeping the screen updated slows the defrag down a little. If, OTOH, your CPU is a screamer, it won't make a noticeable difference.

[CaliGirl]

[ QUOTE ]
DoctorDoom said:
Other points.

Also, it your box has a not-so-new processor, it would be better to avoid the "details" screen. It's fascinating to watch, but keeping the screen updated slows the defrag down a little. If, OTOH, your CPU is a screamer, it won't make a noticeable difference.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ok, I won't watch the detail screen. http://freeconservatives.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/rotflmbo.gif Yes, it is very fascinating to watch to see what kind of mess everything is.

BTW...what does OTOH & CPU mean? http://freeconservatives.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/icon127.gif

Thanks Doc and nos for all of your help. http://freeconservatives.com/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/patriot.gif I am going to print out all of your instructions for the next time.

[Timberwolf]

OTOH - On The Other Hand
CPU - Central Processing Unit (the processor chipt)