SpeedDisk vs. Diskeeper

Placement of files on the hard drive is why the developers of the early
defraggers became obsessive about the number of options offered by their
products. They thought people wanted to fine-tune the data on their hard
drives, a carryover from the more static hard drive layouts on old mainframes.

The reality is that the Windows environment, with all its glorious complexity,
is 1000% more dynamic in its use of the hard drive. This is a good reason not
to be very obsessive about whether a file gets placed in a "hole" between other
files or tacked onto the free space immediately after the last file on the
drive. Nevertheless, it troubles me to see huge gaping holes resulting from
files being splattered all over the drive, because I know damned well that the
disk heads dance back and forth across longer distances to access data across
the entire drive. If the files are all shoved down at one end of the hard
drive, the average hard drive seek times are reduced quite a bit, and the system
goes a little faster.

The best answer? Hey, keep speedisk and diskeeper both on the hard drive. They
don't take up much space. Run speeddisk once in a while to slide all the files
to one end of the hard drive. Run diskeeper to do a quick and dirty defrag.

For the purposes of 99.9% of us, it is not worth even trying to use some sort of
instrumentation to see which provides the best result. Software instrumentation
contaminates the results. Hardware instrumentation is too expensive for all but
the hard drive design labs. And Windows does not lend itself to repeatability
of closely controlled tests... Ben Myers

On Sat, 22 Jan 2005 21:19:11 -0500, "Turner Morgan"
wrote:


I will be removing Diskeeper from my system and staying with the
Norton for now or until something better comes along. One of the
reasons I was checking other stuff out was because Speedisk takes so
long, even on my 2g speed system. However, the reason it takes so
long was also pointed out to me as being the reason of going the extra
mile and compressing along with defragmenting.

I should point out that there is a slight disadvantage to Norton's
compacting. And that is, depending on cluster size (or is it sector size?)
of the disk, when you have to add data to a file that might result in the
new data being added to the end of the "compact" area of the disk, that is,
far away from the parent file. With DiskKeeper's leaving holes between
"compact" areas, the new data could get placed closer to the parent file.
Hence, you could suffer a performance hit, i.e., slower access time to read
all the file's data, with Norton's method. Also, the next time you defrag
and compact with Norton, all those intervening files have to be moved
further "down" the disk to make room for the fragments of new data to be
added to the parent file. With the DiskKeeper method, there may be an empty
space closer to the parent file which would result in faster access to all
the file's pieces plus faster defragmenting because not so many files would
have to be moved to append the new data to the parent file. Confused?

BTW, I am using the speedisk that comes with an older version of
Norton Tools, the 2002 release. It ran real quickly on my older FAT32
systems but since moving to NTFS systems with XP, it has really turned
into a slug. Could another reason for the slowness be that
defragmentation and compressing are done differently on NTFS systems
thus the need to goto a newer version of speedisk?

I can't really comment on this. I'm not terribly familiar with the
differences between FAT32 and NTFS. If just read that NTFS is "better" than
FAT32. And, by the way, most of what I said above applies to FAT32; I
assume it works for NTFS also. Maybe Ben could help out here?

I just know that I have SystemWorks 2005 and when I have Speedisk defrag and
compact the 120Gb drive in my 700XL (only about 1/3 used) I just go into the
hamshack, fire up the transceiver and make a few contacts because I know
Speedisk is going to take some time, usually 1.5 hours, to finish the job.
It couldn't hurt to do the upgrade, but I'm not sure that Symantec made all
that many changes or improvements between the 2004 and 2005 versions. So,
if you can find a copy of SystemWorks 2004 around (the local Staples had the
2004 version still on the shelf just before Christmas), you might save a few
bucks over the 2005 version.

Regards,
Turner

Ben Myers wrote:
The Windows XP defragger, a crippled Diskeeper in poor disguise, is truly
crippled though. A real defragger shoves all the files to one end of the hard
drive to speed up disk accesses further. The Windows XP defragger apparently
does defragment most of the files though, altho you can never tell with
Micro$oft. Files in use by the system cannot be defragmented, so boot in safe
mode for a better defragging experience. Sysutils has a free page file
defragger on its web site, to take care of page file defragmentation... Ben
Myers

ben can you please post a link to the page file defragmenter. i have bee
looking on sysutils and have not been able to find it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 15:24:14 -0700, "Tom Clydesdale"
wrote:


For whatever it might be worth I normally run the defragmenter that came
with WindowsXP and Norton agrees that the resulting drive is 100% defragged.
Who knows?
(The WinXP version runs about 3 times as fast as the Norton version ergo I
use it.)

".@." [email protected] wrote in message
news
I have been using Norton SpeedDisk v6.03.36a to defragment my HD for
some time now and have been mostly satisfied with it. Taking the
suggestion to give Executive Software Diskeeper v9.0.515 a try for
fragmenting my HD, I installed it for a test run.

I found out that both Norton SpeedDisk and Diskeeper do not agree on
what a defragmented HD is. Example: I run SpeedDisk and it tells me
that I am defragmented and I let it take the time it needs to defrag
the HD. It has a GUI that shows via colors the fragmentation and you
can see the files being moved and the colors starting to line up, thus
fragmentation being taken care of. I then run Diskeeper right after
SpeedDisk has finished defragging the HD and it says that I am 30%-40%
fragmented and I let it take the time to defragment the HD. It also
has a GUI that lets me see what is going on. Right after letting
Diskeeper finish doing its thing, I run SpeedDisk again and it says
that I am fragmented all to hell and shows me the fragmentation via
the GUI.

So, both programs seem to have a different opinion as to the
fragmentation of the HD. Looks to me that a fragmented HD is like a
pregnant woman. Either it is or it ain't! So why does Diskeeper and
SpeedDisk seem to have a problem agreeing on if it is or not and which
one is telling the truth and which on is telling a lie if either one
actually knows in the first place.

Thanks in advance & Regards,

Found via google with the search argument "defragment page file", without the
quotes:

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...gedefrag.shtml

.... Ben Myers

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:20:02 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:

Ben Myers wrote:
The Windows XP defragger, a crippled Diskeeper in poor disguise, is truly
crippled though. A real defragger shoves all the files to one end of the hard
drive to speed up disk accesses further. The Windows XP defragger apparently
does defragment most of the files though, altho you can never tell with
Micro$oft. Files in use by the system cannot be defragmented, so boot in safe
mode for a better defragging experience. Sysutils has a free page file
defragger on its web site, to take care of page file defragmentation... Ben
Myers

ben can you please post a link to the page file defragmenter. i have bee
looking on sysutils and have not been able to find it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 15:24:14 -0700, "Tom Clydesdale"
wrote:


For whatever it might be worth I normally run the defragmenter that came
with WindowsXP and Norton agrees that the resulting drive is 100% defragged.
Who knows?
(The WinXP version runs about 3 times as fast as the Norton version ergo I
use it.)

".@." [email protected] wrote in message
news
I have been using Norton SpeedDisk v6.03.36a to defragment my HD for
some time now and have been mostly satisfied with it. Taking the
suggestion to give Executive Software Diskeeper v9.0.515 a try for
fragmenting my HD, I installed it for a test run.

I found out that both Norton SpeedDisk and Diskeeper do not agree on
what a defragmented HD is. Example: I run SpeedDisk and it tells me
that I am defragmented and I let it take the time it needs to defrag
the HD. It has a GUI that shows via colors the fragmentation and you
can see the files being moved and the colors starting to line up, thus
fragmentation being taken care of. I then run Diskeeper right after
SpeedDisk has finished defragging the HD and it says that I am 30%-40%
fragmented and I let it take the time to defragment the HD. It also
has a GUI that lets me see what is going on. Right after letting
Diskeeper finish doing its thing, I run SpeedDisk again and it says
that I am fragmented all to hell and shows me the fragmentation via
the GUI.

So, both programs seem to have a different opinion as to the
fragmentation of the HD. Looks to me that a fragmented HD is like a
pregnant woman. Either it is or it ain't! So why does Diskeeper and
SpeedDisk seem to have a problem agreeing on if it is or not and which
one is telling the truth and which on is telling a lie if either one
actually knows in the first place.

Thanks in advance & Regards,

Ben Myers wrote:
Found via google with the search argument "defragment page file", without the
quotes:

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...gedefrag.shtml

... Ben Myers
after i ask i did uses google and found it on sysinternals and not sysutils.

thanks

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:20:02 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:


Ben Myers wrote:

The Windows XP defragger, a crippled Diskeeper in poor disguise, is truly
crippled though. A real defragger shoves all the files to one end of the hard
drive to speed up disk accesses further. The Windows XP defragger apparently
does defragment most of the files though, altho you can never tell with
Micro$oft. Files in use by the system cannot be defragmented, so boot in safe
mode for a better defragging experience. Sysutils has a free page file
defragger on its web site, to take care of page file defragmentation... Ben
Myers

ben can you please post a link to the page file defragmenter. i have bee
looking on sysutils and have not been able to find it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 15:24:14 -0700, "Tom Clydesdale"
wrote:



For whatever it might be worth I normally run the defragmenter that came
with WindowsXP and Norton agrees that the resulting drive is 100% defragged.
Who knows?
(The WinXP version runs about 3 times as fast as the Norton version ergo I
use it.)

".@." [email protected] wrote in message
news

I have been using Norton SpeedDisk v6.03.36a to defragment my HD for
some time now and have been mostly satisfied with it. Taking the
suggestion to give Executive Software Diskeeper v9.0.515 a try for
fragmenting my HD, I installed it for a test run.

I found out that both Norton SpeedDisk and Diskeeper do not agree on
what a defragmented HD is. Example: I run SpeedDisk and it tells me
that I am defragmented and I let it take the time it needs to defrag
the HD. It has a GUI that shows via colors the fragmentation and you
can see the files being moved and the colors starting to line up, thus
fragmentation being taken care of. I then run Diskeeper right after
SpeedDisk has finished defragging the HD and it says that I am 30%-40%
fragmented and I let it take the time to defragment the HD. It also
has a GUI that lets me see what is going on. Right after letting
Diskeeper finish doing its thing, I run SpeedDisk again and it says
that I am fragmented all to hell and shows me the fragmentation via
the GUI.

So, both programs seem to have a different opinion as to the
fragmentation of the HD. Looks to me that a fragmented HD is like a
pregnant woman. Either it is or it ain't! So why does Diskeeper and
SpeedDisk seem to have a problem agreeing on if it is or not and which
one is telling the truth and which on is telling a lie if either one
actually knows in the first place.

Thanks in advance & Regards,

Sorry. In my haste to post a response and move on to other things, the names of
sometimes get scrambled up in my head. Main thing is you found it, and it
works... Ben

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 17:30:58 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:

Ben Myers wrote:
Found via google with the search argument "defragment page file", without the
quotes:

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...gedefrag.shtml

... Ben Myers
after i ask i did uses google and found it on sysinternals and not sysutils.

thanks

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:20:02 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:


Ben Myers wrote:

The Windows XP defragger, a crippled Diskeeper in poor disguise, is truly
crippled though. A real defragger shoves all the files to one end of the hard
drive to speed up disk accesses further. The Windows XP defragger apparently
does defragment most of the files though, altho you can never tell with
Micro$oft. Files in use by the system cannot be defragmented, so boot in safe
mode for a better defragging experience. Sysutils has a free page file
defragger on its web site, to take care of page file defragmentation... Ben
Myers

ben can you please post a link to the page file defragmenter. i have bee
looking on sysutils and have not been able to find it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.

On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 15:24:14 -0700, "Tom Clydesdale"
wrote:



For whatever it might be worth I normally run the defragmenter that came
with WindowsXP and Norton agrees that the resulting drive is 100% defragged.
Who knows?
(The WinXP version runs about 3 times as fast as the Norton version ergo I
use it.)

".@." [email protected] wrote in message
news

I have been using Norton SpeedDisk v6.03.36a to defragment my HD for
some time now and have been mostly satisfied with it. Taking the
suggestion to give Executive Software Diskeeper v9.0.515 a try for
fragmenting my HD, I installed it for a test run.

I found out that both Norton SpeedDisk and Diskeeper do not agree on
what a defragmented HD is. Example: I run SpeedDisk and it tells me
that I am defragmented and I let it take the time it needs to defrag
the HD. It has a GUI that shows via colors the fragmentation and you
can see the files being moved and the colors starting to line up, thus
fragmentation being taken care of. I then run Diskeeper right after
SpeedDisk has finished defragging the HD and it says that I am 30%-40%
fragmented and I let it take the time to defragment the HD. It also
has a GUI that lets me see what is going on. Right after letting
Diskeeper finish doing its thing, I run SpeedDisk again and it says
that I am fragmented all to hell and shows me the fragmentation via
the GUI.

So, both programs seem to have a different opinion as to the
fragmentation of the HD. Looks to me that a fragmented HD is like a
pregnant woman. Either it is or it ain't! So why does Diskeeper and
SpeedDisk seem to have a problem agreeing on if it is or not and which
one is telling the truth and which on is telling a lie if either one
actually knows in the first place.

Thanks in advance & Regards,

sorry to top post....

btw do you happen to be the same ben myers that help me upgrade my kids
compaq 5000 pc before xmas. if you remember, i had a ton of questions.

if you are he, i really appreciated all your help, the upgrade went off
with little problems. my kids were happy as could be with the upgrade.

i hate to say it, they have a FASTER machine than mine now.

Ben Myers wrote:
Sorry. In my haste to post a response and move on to other things, the names of
sometimes get scrambled up in my head. Main thing is you found it, and it
works... Ben

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 17:30:58 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:


Ben Myers wrote:

Found via google with the search argument "defragment page file", without the
quotes:

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...gedefrag.shtml

... Ben Myers

after i ask i did uses google and found it on sysinternals and not sysutils.

thanks

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:20:02 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:



Ben Myers wrote:


The Windows XP defragger, a crippled Diskeeper in poor disguise, is truly
crippled though. A real defragger shoves all the files to one end of the hard
drive to speed up disk accesses further. The Windows XP defragger apparently
does defragment most of the files though, altho you can never tell with
Micro$oft. Files in use by the system cannot be defragmented, so boot in safe
mode for a better defragging experience. Sysutils has a free page file
defragger on its web site, to take care of page file defragmentation... Ben
Myers

ben can you please post a link to the page file defragmenter. i have bee
looking on sysutils and have not been able to find it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.


On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 15:24:14 -0700, "Tom Clydesdale"
wrote:




For whatever it might be worth I normally run the defragmenter that came
with WindowsXP and Norton agrees that the resulting drive is 100% defragged.
Who knows?
(The WinXP version runs about 3 times as fast as the Norton version ergo I
use it.)

".@." [email protected] wrote in message
newses2v0pcenq4l6k0i7sco2bpii99cium8i@4ax. com...



I have been using Norton SpeedDisk v6.03.36a to defragment my HD for
some time now and have been mostly satisfied with it. Taking the
suggestion to give Executive Software Diskeeper v9.0.515 a try for
fragmenting my HD, I installed it for a test run.

I found out that both Norton SpeedDisk and Diskeeper do not agree on
what a defragmented HD is. Example: I run SpeedDisk and it tells me
that I am defragmented and I let it take the time it needs to defrag
the HD. It has a GUI that shows via colors the fragmentation and you
can see the files being moved and the colors starting to line up, thus
fragmentation being taken care of. I then run Diskeeper right after
SpeedDisk has finished defragging the HD and it says that I am 30%-40%
fragmented and I let it take the time to defragment the HD. It also
has a GUI that lets me see what is going on. Right after letting
Diskeeper finish doing its thing, I run SpeedDisk again and it says
that I am fragmented all to hell and shows me the fragmentation via
the GUI.

So, both programs seem to have a different opinion as to the
fragmentation of the HD. Looks to me that a fragmented HD is like a
pregnant woman. Either it is or it ain't! So why does Diskeeper and
SpeedDisk seem to have a problem agreeing on if it is or not and which
one is telling the truth and which on is telling a lie if either one
actually knows in the first place.

Thanks in advance & Regards,

Must have been me. I seem to be the only Ben Myers posting in the computer
newsgroups. There are clones of myself who are English journalists/authors,
experts on beer, and who knows what else. Glad it worked out for you... Ben

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 18:47:45 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:

sorry to top post....

btw do you happen to be the same ben myers that help me upgrade my kids
compaq 5000 pc before xmas. if you remember, i had a ton of questions.

if you are he, i really appreciated all your help, the upgrade went off
with little problems. my kids were happy as could be with the upgrade.

i hate to say it, they have a FASTER machine than mine now.

Ben Myers wrote:
Sorry. In my haste to post a response and move on to other things, the names of
sometimes get scrambled up in my head. Main thing is you found it, and it
works... Ben

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 17:30:58 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:


Ben Myers wrote:

Found via google with the search argument "defragment page file", without the
quotes:

http://www.sysinternals.com/ntw2k/fr...gedefrag.shtml

... Ben Myers

after i ask i did uses google and found it on sysinternals and not sysutils.

thanks

On Mon, 24 Jan 2005 15:20:02 GMT, bob brozewicz
wrote:



Ben Myers wrote:


The Windows XP defragger, a crippled Diskeeper in poor disguise, is truly
crippled though. A real defragger shoves all the files to one end of the hard
drive to speed up disk accesses further. The Windows XP defragger apparently
does defragment most of the files though, altho you can never tell with
Micro$oft. Files in use by the system cannot be defragmented, so boot in safe
mode for a better defragging experience. Sysutils has a free page file
defragger on its web site, to take care of page file defragmentation... Ben
Myers

ben can you please post a link to the page file defragmenter. i have bee
looking on sysutils and have not been able to find it.

any help would be greatly appreciated.


On Fri, 21 Jan 2005 15:24:14 -0700, "Tom Clydesdale"
wrote:




For whatever it might be worth I normally run the defragmenter that came
with WindowsXP and Norton agrees that the resulting drive is 100% defragged.
Who knows?
(The WinXP version runs about 3 times as fast as the Norton version ergo I
use it.)

".@." [email protected] wrote in message
newses2v0pcenq4l6k0i7sco2bpii99cium8i@4ax .com...



I have been using Norton SpeedDisk v6.03.36a to defragment my HD for
some time now and have been mostly satisfied with it. Taking the
suggestion to give Executive Software Diskeeper v9.0.515 a try for
fragmenting my HD, I installed it for a test run.

I found out that both Norton SpeedDisk and Diskeeper do not agree on
what a defragmented HD is. Example: I run SpeedDisk and it tells me
that I am defragmented and I let it take the time it needs to defrag
the HD. It has a GUI that shows via colors the fragmentation and you
can see the files being moved and the colors starting to line up, thus
fragmentation being taken care of. I then run Diskeeper right after
SpeedDisk has finished defragging the HD and it says that I am 30%-40%
fragmented and I let it take the time to defragment the HD. It also
has a GUI that lets me see what is going on. Right after letting
Diskeeper finish doing its thing, I run SpeedDisk again and it says
that I am fragmented all to hell and shows me the fragmentation via
the GUI.

So, both programs seem to have a different opinion as to the
fragmentation of the HD. Looks to me that a fragmented HD is like a
pregnant woman. Either it is or it ain't! So why does Diskeeper and
SpeedDisk seem to have a problem agreeing on if it is or not and which
one is telling the truth and which on is telling a lie if either one
actually knows in the first place.

Thanks in advance & Regards,

Ben Myers wrote:

For the purposes of 99.9% of us, it is not worth even trying to use
some sort of
instrumentation to see which provides the best result. Software
instrumentation
contaminates the results. ...


Yes, the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle applies to computers also.