Defragging while in sleep in Vista

[tigersty1e]

If I want to defrag my hard drive overnight manually in Vista, can I put the computer to sleep?


Or if I have the OS set to sleep after 30 minutes of inactivity, will the computer go to sleep?

 

[Aberforth]

I think Vista runs defrag whenever the computer is idle but there are obvious disadvantages because you cannot check the the progress of defragmentation and it also happens to be slow. If you really want a intelligent and fastest defragger I suggest you check out DiskTrix Ultimate Defrag- it's lightweight and bloody fast, defragmented my entire drive in 2 hours.

 

[zerogear]

If it is defragging, it doesn't goto sleep until it is done.
And it doesn't auto-defrag if you are in sleep mode.

Sleep (S3) is basically saving everything you are doing onto the RAM, and going into low power mode that shuts off almost everything else.

 

[nerp]

Vista will defrag when you're not doing anything. Set the machine to sleep/hibernate automatically and it will defrag when it makes sense to do so. You won't run into a situation where a defrag is slowing down your work. And if the machine is sleeping during the regularly scheduled defrag time, it will re-schedule the defrag to a different time and make up for it at some point. The beauty of Vista defrag is that you can completley ignore it and not think about it and it gets the job done effortlessly. People are obsessed with defragging for some strange reason and will recommend you install third party utils and such, but I suggest you ignore that advice, ignore defrag, use your computer normally and save the time and energy for something more interesting and useful.

 

[zerogear]

Well, installing 3rd party defrag made sense in Win9x days, but ever since 2000 (I believe). the defrag utility has been based on Diskeeper, which is fairly decent in my opinion. I personally use O&O Defrag since I've gotten so used to it, but its more of a habit than a necessity at this point.

Just set/schedule and forget about it.

 

[nerp]

If you own a license for something it makes sense to use it but I do think that buying a license for defrag in Vista isn't that important. Kind of like buying a copy of PowerDVD when you have MCE, unless it's a personal preference. In the end the movie is going to look the same full screen when you're watching it. 🙂

 

[CKTurbo128]

Just schedule your defrag for overnight (unless you're a night-only person).

I schedule my defrag at 2:00 AM daily (along with virus/spyware scans), although I put it my rig asleep for most nights.

 

[tigersty1e]

The problem with putting my rig to have the auto defragger is that I only turn my system on when I game.

So the only time Vista will have to defrag will be when I'm gaming which I don't want.

I'm also trying to cut down on the electricity bill.

 

[soonerproud]

Originally posted by: tigersty1e
The problem with putting my rig to have the auto defragger is that I only turn my system on when I game.

So the only time Vista will have to defrag will be when I'm gaming which I don't want.

I'm also trying to cut down on the electricity bill.

Defrag will not happen while you are gaming due to it's set priority. What you need to do is either disable scheduled defrag and do it manually once a week or leave the computer on the night you decide to schedule defrag. It really is as simple as that.

 

[tigersty1e]

That's what I do now. Manually defrag. That's why I'm asking if defrag works while sleeping...

oh well, I guess power saver option in power options is my only choice.

 

[nerp]

In my experience, setting the machine to sleep after 15 minutes of inactivity and hibernate after 20-30 will keep your machine powered off when not in use but still squeeze a defrag in when you walk away from a gaming session. That's pretty much how I treat my machines although I do leave some apps going at times that keep the machine from hibernating on occasion.