I have always been impressed with the commercial version of PuranDefrag, which I use on my laptop and my wife's laptop. At $19.95 for one, or $29.95 for two, it is great value.
Now the news got even better: you can take PuranDefrag home and install it on your home computer(s) at no cost, provided it is for private and/or non-commercial purposes only. Just go to the download page and choose the Free edition.Update: I installed the free edition on my trusty FRAGG testing computer, which I am currently using to access the eFiling web site to fill out my tax returns. There is no difference between the free edition and the commercial edition, other than the license. It has all the features, the same cool layout, and the same ease of use. The guys at Puran Software are being incredibly generous to home users. There are no "nag screens" or irritating sales nonsense. This is a big win for the home user and non-commercial organisations.
For some reason, defragmenting my C:\ volume with PuranDefrag makes my computer (running Win7) boot and application launch slower. Defragmenting with Windows built-in defragmenter return boot and application launch times back to normal. Weird.
ReplyDeleteHow does the optimization that Puran Defrag does differ from Diskeeper Pro-Premier 2010?
ReplyDeleteIn a nutshell, it works. ;-)
ReplyDeleteDiskeeper PP costs $99 which is a complete waste of money. Have a look at previous Diskeeper benchmarks and reviews.
Heh, too late, Mydefrag is now godlike!
ReplyDeleteLast Time I checked MyDefrag doesn't do any kind of boot-time defragmentation.
ReplyDeleteBoot-time defrag is not necessary if you are running Windows 7, because metadata files are now movable while Windows is running.
ReplyDeleteSo boot-time defrag is only necessary for Windows Vista/XP or earlier (anyone running Windows 2000 or NT4?).
Well... most Windows users would still benefit from a working boot-time defrag feature. Unfortunately, as of February 2010, Windows XP still retains a dominant 65% market share (compared to Vista at approx 16% share, Windows 7 with only a 9% share, and the remainder with Mac and Linux).
ReplyDeleteI just tried Puran Defrag Free (Version 7.0, released January 7, 2010) on an "old" Windows XP SP3 box that has a 35gb drive. It seemed to do a reasonably good job. However, the boot time defrag would not eliminate the fragmentation of my MFT... and the outcome appears to be no better (or worse) than the native Windows Disk Defragmenter. After running Puran Defrag, the MFT remains with "Total MFT Fragments" of three (3). I performed the "Boot Time Defrag" option multiple times... with and without ChkDsk. I also tried the "Boot Time Defrag" option before and after performing a normal "online" defrag. It never eliminated the MFT fragmentation. (For reference, Windows reports MFT percent in use is 73%, 95mb, record count of 71,841 with 3 fragments). I was hoping that Puran would consolidate the MFT into a single (1) fragment. Also, I'm not sure if the 73 percent MFT "in use" would benefit from enlarging the MFT region, or if it is sufficient to leave "as is". I mistakenly thought that Puran would increase the region, or make a recommendation, if a RegEdit was necessary.
Is it normal that Puran leaves the MFT in 3 fragments? Puran indicates that the "FREE" version (for non-commercial use) is identical to their v7.0 product. Has anyone successfully eliminated MFT fragmentation, entirely, using Puran Defrag? Which version? Is there a better product that will entirely eliminate MFT fragmentation (and suggest an appropriate MFT region size).
Apologies in advance for a similar duplicate post (associated with a much older Puran review). The site navigation doesn't make it clear where the latest Puran Defrag review is located. (GREAT WORK on the reviews! Thanks for the help!)
Don't worry about a fragmented MFT if there are only 3 fragments.
ReplyDeleteI have noticed that PuranDefrag doesn't *always* defrag the MFT or hiberfil.sys. That doesn't mean it *can't* it just means that the benefit gained is not worth it.
I use PuranDefrag and it can and does defrag the MFT at boot time. Usually.
You could try PerfectDisk, which was the first program to offer effective MFT defragmentation, or UltraDefrag which also does boot time defrag processing.
I must say your defrag reviews are entertaining and very informative! Well done!
ReplyDeleteI've had better results with Puran than any defragger I've yet tried. Its optimizer actually helped my system performance, and it its boot time defrag gets at files on my system that others miss.
Thank you!
DiskTune is capable of moving the MFT 'online': There is no need to reboot Windows and run MFT defragmentation in offline mode. DiskTune will move the MFT under the following circumstances:
ReplyDelete- In defrag mode DiskTune will leave the MFT as it is unless fragmentation of the MFT is 'significant'. A MFT that is fragmented in a few large chunks does not affect performance. To move a fragmented MFT on a filled disk may force DiskTune to place the MFT towards the end of the volume, which is undesired. So this is why DiskTune prefers to leave the MFT as it is during a defragmentation pass.
- In optimize mode DiskTune will move the movable part of the MFT to the system area is creates during the 'preparing volume' operation.
DiskTune will not move the first 16records of the MFT because the Windows defrag API does not allow this (probably because it can not modify the boot sector which contains the first cluster number for the MFT, but that's my guess). These first 16 records hardly are hardly ever updated anyway so that's not a big loss.
The entire MFT apart from the first 16 records (normally 4 clusters on a volume formatted with 4KB clusters) is placed in the fast system area in one chunk.
I,ve used perfectdisk 2008 to Perfectdisk 11 on a couple of XP systems until i found Puran defrag free.
ReplyDeleteeverything feels "snappier" than with Perfectdisk.
In most cases Puran won a couple of seconds in bootup compared to PD.
Perfectdisk is a good program compared to the other defraggers i,ve used.
But in comparison with Puran i think it's bloated with servises/processes running in the background even when the program does not need them at that moment.
And look at the size of both pd +/-40Mb against 2.6 Mb for Puran wich for me does a better job for free.
Thank you Puran software.