How often do you defrag your HD?

gizbug

Platinum Member
May 14, 2001
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I have my Perfectdisk set to run every night. What do most users on here do with defrag? Weekly? Stealth option? Nightly?

 

lxskllr

No Lifer
Nov 30, 2004
57,347
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In XP when I did it manually, I defragged every couple of months or so. Vista defaults to once per week, and I just kept it.
 

mmntech

Lifer
Sep 20, 2007
17,504
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I use Smart Defrag, set to do it whenever it needs to. I do an optimized defrag about once a month with it.
 

Muse

Lifer
Jul 11, 2001
37,358
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Funny, I used to get messages I needed to defrag every week or two on my lightly used laptop, ~40% freespace 60 GB HD, an annoyance. I'd usually go ahead and defrag, but the machine stopped bugging me for some reason. On my desktop with several HDs, I do it occasionally, don't really have a routine.
 

0roo0roo

No Lifer
Sep 21, 2002
64,862
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Originally posted by: gizbug
I have my Perfectdisk set to run every night. What do most users on here do with defrag? Weekly? Stealth option? Nightly?

thats probably overkill.

once every couple months...

if you want a speed boost get an ssd. otherwise its mostly a waste of time
 

corkyg

Elite Member | Peripherals
Super Moderator
Mar 4, 2000
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Whenever I have nothing else to do. It is almost fun to achieve a complete zero frag state. (PD10) I have learned one thing over the years - the more frequently you optimize thye drive, the less time it takes to do it.

One thing I never do is automatic. I guess I'm a control freak. :)
 

AMD K9

Senior member
Jan 13, 2005
687
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Smart Defrag and turned off automatic defrag and I do it 2-3 times a week. I do the quick optimize once every other week, deep optimize once a month.
 

philosofool

Senior member
Nov 3, 2008
281
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A little off topic, but there's no need to start a new thread for this:

Smart Defrag: is it way better than Vista's built in defrag?

In response to OP, Vista by default defrags once a week and I'm happy with that.
 

fffblackmage

Platinum Member
Dec 28, 2007
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I run the defrag manually, so it's really whenever I remember, which means I'll run it again next month... if I remember to....
 

Majic 7

Senior member
Mar 27, 2008
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I'm not sure if this is specific to my machine but this is what I found for myself. Vista 64 HP. It has to be running for the scheduled defrag to happen. It will not wake up to do it. I changed the schedule to when I knew the machine would be running and checked processes to see what was running when it was scheduled to run. No defrag, had to manually run it. Really not sure if nothing can be running for the defrag to start, I was surfing. I manually defragged a few weeks ago and it took more than six hours, as if it had never done it in the year and a half I've had Vista. Moving to 7 with a SSD this month so it won't matter to me anymore but I am curious about other people's experience with this.
 

Billb2

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2005
3,035
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There are many files that can't be defragged while the OS is running. Most good defrag software will have an option to defrag these files with a pre-boot defrag.

Ever try to defrag a pagefile?
 

corkyg

Elite Member | Peripherals
Super Moderator
Mar 4, 2000
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Originally posted by: Billb2
Ever try to defrag a pagefile?
Like you said, it is done via a boot time defrag along with system files such as metadata. I do that about once a month.

 

TC91

Golden Member
Jul 9, 2007
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usually only after installing a game or something big like that (manual defrag)
 

corkyg

Elite Member | Peripherals
Super Moderator
Mar 4, 2000
27,370
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Originally posted by: yinan Never. Running SSDs. 2x256 of Flashy Goodness.
Better learn more about the effects of free space fragmentation and the degredation of write speed. This is a long and detailed report. Pay attention to the last sections dealing with ATA-TRIM.

Anand

And also consider this: SSD