Compress files in XP Pro

[edjam]

Hi, you know when you go to Disk Cleanup, do you compress unused files? AM not sure whether to or not.

 

[spyordie007]

Originally posted by: edjam
Hi, you know when you go to Disk Cleanup, do you compress unused files? AM not sure whether to or not.

the NTFS file system supports compressing files as they are stored on the HD, that option will compress the files that have not been used recently to save HD space.

If those files are compressed and you do access them your access will be slightly slower as the os will have to decompress them as you access them.

I personally would not as I have plenty of storage space, however if you are desperate for HD space it is a good option.

-Spy

 

[Nothinman]

If those files are compressed and you do access them your access will be slightly slower as the os will have to decompress them as you access them.

Actually many people believe reading the compressed files is faster because it's less disk accesses and that's the slowest part, any half-decent PC has more than enough free cycles to decompress the file into memory without any noticable speed decrease.

I personally never noticed a speed increase or decrease, but maybe that's just the seek times of my 15K RPM drives =)

 

[gizbug]

What about the allow indexing option, right below the compress option?
Enable this on NTFS partitions?

 

[Nothinman]

Indexing will definately hurt performance as it indexes all the files on the disk. After it's created the initial index it might not be too bad though. It gives you some really nice search options and really fast results for normally slow as hell searches (i.e. file contents), but for most people it's pointless.

 

[spyordie007]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
Indexing will definately hurt performance as it indexes all the files on the disk. After it's created the initial index it might not be too bad though. It gives you some really nice search options and really fast results for normally slow as hell searches (i.e. file contents), but for most people it's pointless.

If you have a large number of files it's nice as well.

Hope you have plenty of HD space if you plan on using indexing, it took me several hundred megs with of HD space to index everything (I however probably have more files than most).

Nothingman-

That's great, I had no idea people were getting such good results with the compressed folders, I might just have to go run some benches to see what kind of differances I get. I have always shyed away from them since the drivespace days and kept some of my old grudges.

-Spy

 

[Nothinman]

I have always shyed away from them since the drivespace days and kept some of my old grudges.

They're very different beasts with completely different approaches, NTFS compression is worth checking out.