Boot blocks growing in Perfect Disk

[Gustavus]

In Raxco's Perfect Disk (version 12 build 290) I have noticed a very strange thing. In the disk map, the Boot info is put at the first of the disk. When I first installed PD this was around 10 blocks -- each 19.66 MB on my harddisk. It has slowly grown to where it is now 41 blocks. The disk is very clean -- 0% fragmentation of files and around 2% for unused space. Over half of the HD is unused. So far as I can tell, this is not a problem, but it bothers me to have inexplicable things going on in my machines.

Anyone know why this would be happening?

Thanks

 

[corkyg]

If Vista or 7, probably Shadow Copies, part of System Restore.

 

[Gustavus]

corkyg

Thanks for the reply. I had overlooked saying I run Windows XP SP3.

I do have an additional bit of information which points the finger at something internal to Perfect Disk. Version 12.5.310 just became available so I upgraded from 290 to 310. The number of blocks devoted to "boot" in the disk map dropped from 41 to 20.

It will be interesting to see if the size starts creeping up again

 

[corkyg]

OK - I too am running XP/SP3 with PD12.5/310. I haven't noted any major changes in the boot sector, but it is a bit smaller. It varies in Win 7 as well. I figure a lot of it depends on startup processes linked to loading Windows. Here's mine as of right now:

 

[Gustavus]

Back up to 25 blocks, so it is something related to repeated runs of PD. I will at some point uninstall and then reinstall PD to see if it starts over at 20 blocks.

Curious.

 

[corkyg]

I run PD every morning on the XP system, and the boot area stays very stable. Actually it has shrunk from the above illustration. A lot depends on start up programs and background drivers that run at boot. In MSCONFIG/Startup, I unchecked everything related to PD.

 

[Diceman2037]

Layout.ini and the contents within it determine the amount of blocks indicated as having importance to the boot area as it grows and shrinks with usage.

Every so often windows will rerun the superfetch optimiser and reconstruct the layout.ini from the recent usage patterns. This will reflect on subsequent defrags by making the boot area appear to grow or shrink with usage.

In MSCONFIG/Startup, I unchecked everything related to PD.

Disabling PDAgent just disables scheduled defrags
PDEngine service will only run when called by PDAgent/PDAgent1

 

[corkyg]

Layout.ini and the contents within it determine the amount of blocks indicated as having importance to the boot area as it grows and shrinks with usage. Every so often windows will rerun the superfetch optimiser and reconstruct the layout.ini from the recent usage patterns. This will reflect on subsequent defrags by making the boot area appear to grow or shrink with usage. Disabling PDAgent just disables scheduled defrags PDEngine service will only run when called by PDAgent/PDAgent1

Good poop! Since I do not allow PD to do anything automagically, none of this is a problem for me in XP or Win 7. I don't allow "Stealth" either. Nothing happens unless I make it happen.

 

[jjsbasmt]

corkyg, I don't want to start a "Are Outside Defraggers Needed in Vist/Win7?" but I too have used PD sice the PD 7 days and have PD 12 on my Vista and Win 7 machines. However, even if I don't use PD, Vista and 7 don't seem to get frgmented or is it that they automatically take care of the chore as a part of the OS? I noticed that XP can get very fragmented in a few days. I'm like you, I run PD manually when installed. When I work on other peoples systems I install Auslogics or Smart Defrag which seem to work quite fast and of course are free. Your thoughts, please.

 

[Diceman2037]

Perfectdisk disables the defrag service schedule when you install it or if you modify the Let XXX handle boot files setting in the PD settings

 

[corkyg]

corkyg, I don't want to start a "Are Outside Defraggers Needed in Vist/Win7?" but I too have used PD sice the PD 7 days and have PD 12 on my Vista and Win 7 machines. However, even if I don't use PD, Vista and 7 don't seem to get frgmented or is it that they automatically take care of the chore as a part of the OS? I noticed that XP can get very fragmented in a few days. I'm like you, I run PD manually when installed. When I work on other peoples systems I install Auslogics or Smart Defrag which seem to work quite fast and of course are free. Your thoughts, please.

I think we are pretty well synch'd. My daily use machine is XP Pro, and even with it, the defrag problems are minor. I run PD on all 4 drives every morning - usually takes no more than 3-4 minutes total. Scheduling is always OFF - nothing automatic. My goal is absolute zero frags, and I achieve it every day just for the fun of it.

My Win 7 machines are another matter. And, in the case of my laptops with hybrid drives, even less need. In fact, maybe once a month if I'm bored.

Your use of freebies when working on other people's systems is good. I use Win 7's built in defregger, even though I dislike the GUI by Diskeeper.

As we move to SSDs, defragging really goes away. The name of the game is white space consolidation, and TRIM handles that in Win 7.

PD's graphic map descends directly from the old Norton Speed Disk, and I also like the distinction between defragging and optimizing. That's another Norton SD feature.