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Windows Vista: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm
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by barriepayne5 - 8/6/08 4:54 PM In reply to: Roland, Interesting.. Different Figures Here.. by Grif Thomas
It would be interesting to see a benchmark test run before and after your next defrag of the PC's. In fact, I think I may do it myself on mine since it's been longer. I'll defrag over night and post some results.
Well, Since This IS A Vista Forum...
by Grif Thomas - 8/6/08 5:11 PM
In reply to: reply by barriepayne5
I'm not sure any of our current tests, or this discussion, have anything to do with anything.. Vista is a little more difficult to run such tests unless the background/automatic defrag is completely disabled.. And unfortunately, I've got no Vista machines with which I can run tests on.. How 'bout you?
Hope this helps.
Grif
Ahhh.. "standard rules used by statisticians"
by Grif Thomas - 8/6/08 3:55 PM
In reply to: All three are invalid by Jimmy Greystone
There is no such thing.. Unfortunately, "statisticians" can be just a biased as anyone else.. What's that old saying..? "Figures never lie.. but liars figure."
And surely you know that most testing of private products is done by the producer of the product. That doesn't invalidate the testing despite your contention that it does. Food, drugs, pesticide safety, and most other companies requesting approval of a product are required to pay for and provide their own testing results for certification of the product. It's the certification body that decides whether the testing is done correctly based on the validity of the test, NOT by who ran the test.
Oh, and another couple of minutes on Google comes up with another such test. As I stated in my previous post.."Defrag Benchmarks ARE Available".. All you really need to do is look. The link below isn't a bad set of testing results either.. Although it is posted on the Diskeeper site, the tests were conducted by an individual not associated with the company itself. I find it an interesting method for running the test.. A little different than most. And it really doesn't promote a particular product. It basically reports the impact of fragementation on file and program access.. No specific defragmenting program is even listed.:
http://www.diskeeper.com/defrag/impact-of-disk-fragmentation.asp
Of course, all statistics can be rebutted but make sure YOU use those same "standard rules used by statisticians" when making your own decisions. It's your choice whether to accept the preponderance of the evidence, or not... As it is our decision to do the same. I find very few publications, and none valid by your own standards, which would support your statement below, even if you did exaggerate a bit,.:
"Defragmenting really doesn't give any kind of a performance boost in probably 99% of common computer uses of the average person, and really is just unnecessary stress on the drive"
Hope this helps.
Grif
True
by Jimmy Greystone - 8/6/08 6:18 PM In reply to: Ahhh.. "standard rules used by statisticians" by Grif Thomas
True, statisticians are biased, and that is precisely why they are expected to provide the methodology. It's part of a peer review process they adopted from the scientific method used by people in the "hard" sciences. Of course most of the time it's the marketing and PR people who will take the results of some study and figure out some way to make it work in their favor. One of my favorites was the RIAA funding a study on music piracy, which found 40% of higher education students pirate music. Of course you flip that around, and it becomes 60% of higher education students -- more than half -- DON'T pirate music. The numbers are just numbers, it's the conclusions you draw from those numbers that are significant.
And the kind of testing you describe is COMPLETELY different from the kind of testing done to promote a product. One is showing that there's little risk to the general public, the other is trying to hawk their wares. You don't see the obvious difference there?
It's one thing if I'm conducting a study to show that my product won't cause your computer to blow up. It's another when I'm conducting a study claiming that my product will improve the performance of your computer by 1000%.
So, since Diskeeper sells a defragmenting tool, and even seems to have someone from Diskeeper practically ******* themselves out on these forums trying to promote it... Nope, sorry, it's invalid due to conflict of interest. They're never going to publish, on their website no less, some study that basically states that their program is a waste of money, offers no real benefit, etc. It doesn't take someone with an MBA to figure that one out.
You really think that Microsoft is going to publish the results of a study that shows Linux having a substantial edge over Windows? You really think they're going to put that up on their Windows Server site? Make a big headline out of it, and pepper the entire microsoft.com website with links to that study. Can you honestly say you think that would happen? That no matter what the results, they would publish them unaltered?
What's more likely going to happen, is that Microsoft will simply bury the study and find another testing lab to conduct results. They'll keep doing this until they find one that will produce the results they want. Or, in an equally plausible scenario... The higher ups at the testing firm won't want to lose a big account like Microsoft, so they will tell the testers to give Microsoft whatever results they want.
That sort of thing does go on all the time, so don't go thinking you can dismiss it as some paranoid fantasy.
In any case, there are some standard rules used by statisticians, who tend to take the blame for the actions of marketing and PR flacks who take their data and contort it to whatever they desire. Statisticians are really just a form of math nerd. They usually don't care about the results, they care more about their credibility within the field, so will try very hard to get accurate results.
So again, I have to say that my burden of proof isn't really all that high -- more like a speed bump than a wall -- yet so far the 4 links you've posted have failed to overcome even that.
And don't go trying to turn the conversation around onto something I said. You find me even a SINGLE study that meets my incredibly simple guidelines and THEN we can talk about what I said. You already took up the challenge to find such a thing, so you forfeited your right to try and counter my claim until you've defended your own claim that defragmenting is useful. So either keep googling or admit that you cannot successfully back up your claim with any hard evidence. Don't go trying to pull stunts like shifting the focus of the conversation. I lived with a social worker for many many years, so I know all the tricks people use, and you're going to have to try a LOT harder if you want to pull one over on me.
So, again: Either you keep googling until you do find some study that can overcome the shallow speed bump that is my requirements, or you admit that you cannot back up your assertion with any hard data.
LOL, Right Back 'Atcha....
by Grif Thomas - 8/6/08 8:44 PM
In reply to: True by Jimmy Greystone
Unfortunately, it seems like you're exaggerating again.. No one here ever suggested that a defrag would "improve the performance of your computer by 1000%"
From my point of view, I HAVE provided sufficient evidence for all but those who are unwilling to see the light. As already posted, the evidence is there if YOU choose to become enlightened. And I shouldn't have to do any more searching for the answer.. It satisfies me and most others.. Now it's your turn.. We have forfeited nothing.. If the folks you disagree with are required to provide evidence that fits your narrow view of "proof", we're waiting for you to provide supporting evidence for your contentions as well. So far, you've provided nothing more than your opinion.
So I'll quote right back 'atcha:
"Either you keep googling until you do find some study that can overcome the shallow speed bump that is my requirements, or you admit that you cannot back up your assertion with any hard data."
There's No difference in the tests.. If you don't think Monsanto, Novartis, and DuPont want to "hawk their wares" when they are required by the government to perform safety tests on their insecticides and herbicides, you clearly don't know the subject. They spend millions to make billions and they would provide the data for "clean" safety tests whether they were required to do so or not.. It's a selling point..
Living with a social worker.. hmmmm
Hope this helps.
Grif
A few other points of disagreement
by coffee_ninja - 11/14/08 3:44 PM In reply to: Two things by Jimmy GreystoneYou make plenty of valid points, but in this day and age I don't think that we can consider the "average user" the sort that uses their computer to check their email and write the occasional Word document, and so "average use" scenarios aren't what they used to be. Plenty of folks are authoring videos, ripping DVD's, downloading music, and installing games whose size measures in the of gigabytes. These are all activities that can lead to quite a bit of fragmentation.
In addition: more and more business applications run databases on the back-end. Within the vocational technical school that I work for full time I can count at least 15 different desktop applications running SQL Server Express on the back-end; and I run Microsoft Small Business Accounting for my part time consulting gig, which uses SQL Server Express as well. So in regard to the comment about databases, its not as though they are limited to large-scale business environments anymore.
In regards to defragmentation sending our disks to an early grave, I wonder how true this actually is. I would love to see some sort of tests done to prove one way or the other whether defragmenting files once or constant access of fragmented files is harder on a drive. Personally I would think that if files were rarely changing (more readings than writes) that it would be easier on your drive to fragment once and then read the files back from a single location, because the hard drive wouldn't cover as much distance to pick up all the file's pieces. But if the files are constantly changing, a defragmentation operation would basically be undone when they are changed. Again, I'm just speculating about this.
However one common use case in which defragmentation shines is in a case where all of the files on a drive need to be scanned. One obvious scenario would be antivirus and spyware scanning. Another might be when you want to search for a file. DiskKeeper published a white paper with results of running various antivirus applications both before and after a defrag. They did the tests using a variety of defragmentation programs, not just their own. All tests showed that defragmentation prior to a virus scan sped up the scan by a significant amount, regardless of the defrag software used and the antivirus software used to scan.
Defrag
by Willy - 7/27/08 4:03 AM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420Your system should be as "idle" as possible to help reduce defrag interference. Afterall, defrag is a serious task and it should be given all the time it needs. Disable or shutdown any backgrd. tasks/options to help in this regard you deem necessary. I've found MS own defrag feature capable of doing this task as any other pgm. out there. I suggest if possible the pgm. CCleaner to reduce some clutter, etc., to reduce junk files and or temp. files that are useless anyways beforehand or use MS own disk clean feature under the system tools. Every bit helps, IMHO.
tada -----Willy 
Defragmentation and PC usage
by Diskeeper_Rep - 7/28/08 6:17 AM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420Hi Rammstein420,
I cannot comment on other defragmenters, but with Diskeeper 2008, you can safely use your PC when defrag is in progress.
Diskeeper 2008 is designed to be a fully automatic defrag solution that runs in the background and defragments the disks in real-time using only a portion of the unutilized system resources. This resource utilization technology is called InvisiTasking, and makes the defrag process completely transparent to the user because all the other computing processes are given higher priority. Defragmentation will automatically initiate, pause/suspend and resume according to the CPU activity and disk I/O environment.
If you wish to know more about InvisiTasking,Diskeeper or defragmentation, please visit the White Papers section of the Diskeeper website which has free downloadable pdfs.
http://www.diskeeper.com/products/documentation/documentation.asp
You can also download Diskeeper 2008 and evaluate it for free (30 days) to see if it meets your requirements.
Best Regards
----------------------
Representative
Diskeeper Corporation
----------------------
DEFRAG
by Randy Walter - 8/1/08 9:25 PM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420DEFRAG runtime is a function of the number of sectors on your hard drive that are being utilized. The reason the system might need to DEFRAG occurs because the read-head seek time becomes excessive as it moves back and forth across the disk cylinders searching for the next fragment in the file you are accessing. This is an issue due to the mere fact that it results in degraded computer performance. If I feel I just can't help myself I typically run DISKCLEANUP before the DEFRAG. DISKCLEANUP will show you what files it will delete for you. In addition, if you choose "MORE OPTIONS" you can remove system restore checkpoints and backup images which can use up quite a bit of your hard drive. This will speed-up the DEFRAG. To find these programs use the microsoft "flag" key. Click on "All Programs", click "Accessories" then click
"System Tools". Now you will see the cleanup and defrag programs. As far I know these are Microsoft programs. Hope this helps.
Deep defrag
by mwooge - 8/1/08 10:23 PM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420I have no idea what a "deep" defrag is, but a simple defrag as done by the MS defrag should be all you need, and it'll only take hours, not days.
It's okay to use your computer while MS's defrag is running, though it'll slow it down and it might not do as good a job. I find it runs faster if I turn off my screen saver first.
Fat32 and NTFS.
by 3rdalbum - 8/2/08 3:48 AM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420If you're using the Fat32 filesystem, then it's a really bad idea - if you crashed, your filesystem would become inconsistant, and there would be a chance that you'd lose data because of it. Even a chance of catastrophic data loss. I wouldn't do it.
You're probably more safe with NTFS, but you'll suffer low performance during it. I believe it's possible to stop a defrag mid-way and then start again later which could be of use to you. Ideally, you should be using as few files as possible when you're defragmenting because they will be locked and the defragger won't be able to move them at that time.
The best way of defragging is to back up all your data to an external drive, reinstall Windows, and put your data back.
defrag the drive
by Michael00360 - 8/2/08 6:34 AM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420I would not suggest using the computer or running programs in the background while defraging the computer. It can interrupt the process and make it take even longer. You may want to check out AusLogics Disk Defrag. http://www.auslogics.com/en/software/disk-defrag It's free and it does a really good job at defragging the hard drive.
No real problem
by morrie 52 - 8/2/08 7:23 AM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420If you just use the internet while it does it's thing then just a little slowing down of your computer is normal.As to whether you are in the weekly defrag ,me,in that it the quicker access actually improves reliability or in the school that you ware your drive down with that much defraging.If you use an excellent free defrag like Iobit,http://www.iobit.com/iobitsmartdefrag.html,which is on all the time,defraging on the fly,and open Windows own tool and check whether needs doing it will state do not bother,which proves how good it is,and is much faster than Windows defrag.
Don't bother
by dknapp - 8/6/08 7:51 PM In reply to: How bad is it to continue to use your pc during deep defragm by Rammstein420I do PC support for over 1,000 PCs and have been doing so for the 23 years I have been at my company. We NEVER defrag servers, and rarely defrag PCs. Only the old, slow ones get defragged and only then if the analysis is solid red. New ones, running Vista, could hardly be at a performance risk from fragmentation. The OS buffers reads and writes, uses look ahead algorithms and goes to great extents to make sure speed it top notch. The disk would have to be massively fragmented for you to notice anything. So, the "deep defrag" every week or so is a waste of time. Do it once a year and you might notice something, but I doubt it.
Results
by barriepayne5 - 8/6/08 8:35 PM In reply to: Don't bother by dknappHere are the results of my unscientific test. I just went online and downloaded the first free defrag utility I could find. I ran this under vista business 32bit on a secondary 150 gig SATA drive that I don't use for anything anymore. It used to be the primary drive of my XP build and it's been installed in this machine since before I installed Vista on a different drive. Whether or not it's been auto defraging I don't know. It may have been but reguardless, Analyzing the drive reported 18.05% fragmentation.
Analyzed with Smart Defrag version 6: 18.05% fragmented
Ran Passmark HD tests. Final result: 66.6
Ran Vista defrag
Ran Smart defrag and optimize
Analzed with Smart Defrag again: 12.89% fragmented
Ran Passmark HD tests. Final result: 70.5
Total performance increase? 0.944%
So my result showed that on my system, reducing the fragmentation by just over 5% increased performance less than 1%.
I know that this isn't the be all end all of what I could accomplish but I was just simulating ma and pa kettle clicking 'defrag now'
This is consistant with what I have seen over the years which is why I don't recommend defraging very often.
I also have screen shots of all the tests I may post if I get to it.
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