Windows XP Partial Defrag
Not sure if this is a tip or OS related post.. so I'll just stick it in here for now..
5) Quick Partial Defrag In XP
Hi Fred, I am a relatively new subscriber to the Langalist
newsletter and must say I enjoy it thoroughly.
I was searching for a way to speed the execution of some of my
programs and also the overall speed of my interface (WindowXP
professional), the problem with the defragmenter is it takes
ages to do its job especially when I leave it for a few weeks.
Uninstalling and installing programs seems to take its toll on
the old hard drive and consequently major fragmentation
occurs, I was unaware of the command line version of
defragmenter until I read an article on a website I just
happen to drop on.
Apparently to improve the speed of your starting applications,
WindowsXP continually monitors files that are used when the
computer starts and when you start applications. It then
creates an index that lists segments of frequently used
programs and the order they are loaded in. This pre-fetching
process improves performance by allowing the operating system
to quickly grab program files. [More on PreFetch:
http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2003/2003-09-22.htm#7 ]
WindowsXP runs this about every 3 days but if you need to
optimize manually all you need to do is run a Command window
and type defrag c: -b
This will do a very fast defrag of your starting applications
and put them on the outer part of your hard drive making it
feel as though you have just completed a full re-installation
of WindowsXP!--- Dave Leversidge
Thanks, Dave! The "-b" switch was news to me--- I'd never heard of it.
I
let my system do a full automated defrag every night (via Task
Scheduler), and that places my most-used software towards the front of
the disk anyway, so I'd never sought out a separate option for doing
that.
But for cases where you can't run a full defrag--- it can indeed be
slow, especially if it hasn't been done in a while--- just being able
to
move the most-critical apps around is very handy. Nice!
From the langalist newsletter:
http://www.langa.com
:D
