I have five defrag programs installed on my laptop at present: Diskeeper 2008 Pro Premier ($100) for testing, PerfectDisk 8 ($40) for emergencies and metadata defragmentation, JkDefrag 3.34 for daily tidying up, PageDefrag for quick boot-time defragmentation of critical system files, and Contig, for a quick defrag of Access data files that I'm working on. The last 3 programs are free: two from SysInternals (now part of Microsoft) and one from Jeroen Kessels.
Whenever I fix up a home PC for someone who can't afford PerfectDisk, or if it is already installed, I also install the last 3, along with NTREGOPT for getting rid of excess registry space. So I keep a setup file with all these utilities included, made with Inno Setup. The latest one is listed below. It's freeware and virus-free. And it works better than any version of Diskeeper, from their cheapie Home version ($30) to their eye-watering Server version ($300).
The large yellow blob in the middle of the screen shown above is a 4.88GB SQL Server critical data file that DK2008 doesn't want to defrag. The light green files are ones that JKD would want to put in Zone 2, and the dark green ones in the "spacehogs" zone 3. Notice how the free space is divided into chunks by DK2008's "NEW! COMPLETE FILE AND FREE SPACE DEFRAGMENTATION" feature. I guess I shouldn't mock them because they're new to free space defragging, while PerfectDisk has been getting it right for years.
Download JkDefrag 3.34 + NTREGOPT + PageDefrag + Contig, all in a simple setup program (759,489 bytes). The install program is unsigned but works fine.Update 18 Feb 2008: The setup program now includes JkDefrag 3.34, and leaves out the JkDefrag GUI included before. If you want a GUI instead, get it here (3,726,575 bytes)
Update 28 January 2010: If you are using your computer for private or non-commercial purposes, then check out Puran Defrag Free Edition, which is awesome.
19 comments:
Well Said Donn!
I love freeware that outperforms bulky commercial packages. Great shoot-outs! Downloaded, testing, im sure i'd love it!
Really useful and thanks for sharing
How did you make the multi-app installer ?
- idea for another blog ?
Cheers,
SteveC.
I used Inno Setup, a really cool setup program from http://www.jrsoftware.org/
Sorry, didn't make myself clear, could you post your "solution" for multiple apps in a single install. I've downloaded a copy of Inno and I'd like to try out your code and create my own multi installer
Cheers,
Steve C.
You can download the .iss file here
Excellent, much appreciated
Cheers,
Steve C.
Have you seen the new "AusLogics Registry Defrag" ? It appears to do a better job than NTREGOPT from what I've seen from using them both and I wanted to let you know it'd be worth testing sometime. It has more details in it's results and there's also a performance enhancement % along with the size % reduced. Did I mention it's also freeware? Pretty nice. It's newer than NTREGOPT.
This is very helpful. Thank you. Will you be updating this for JkDefrag version 3.33?
I tried to download the JKDefrag and got the message that it does not have a valid signature and I should not add it.
I believe your recommendation and if it's won awards it's certainly a good program........ but don't know how to proceed..
Sorry to be so dumb about this... Thanks very much for your help!
Out of interest, were the SQL services stopped when you defragged, or the data files still mounted?
In most cases the SQL services are stopped, but from time to time I forget. Unless the SQL engine is very busy, I have noticed no difference in the defrag effectiveness.
I'm just wondering if you had to use one which would it be perfectdisk or JKdefrag?
Not to be a coyright cop or anything but I am just curious to know about such things. Is it strictly legal for you to distribute sysinternals' software without permission from your website or is it that you dont care? I read their EULA and they certainly seem to expresslehy forbid it
Read the EULA again.
Mr. Anonymous is right. The Sysinternals EULA does not allow redistribution.
The EULA says:
You may not:
* publish the software for others to copy;
* rent, lease or lend the software;
* transfer the software or this agreement to any third party
I guess you mean the first point. My understanding is that by including the software in a setup program that installs the software for the user, I am allowing the user to do more convenitently what they would have done anyway.
I will write to sysinternals and see what they say.
Do you know if this package works with vista 64bit?
It may do, but I hve no way of knowing.
JkDefrag has a separate 64bit version, so rather use that.
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