Sunday, June 10, 2007

The Great Defrag Shootout, and all the defragmentation utilities I can find

The new defrag web site is under construction, and all this information will eventually land up there. It takes time to get these results, because testing is done on Windows XP, Windows Vista 32-bit and Vista 64-bit environments, and numerous tests are carried out. Windows 7 testing will be added only once the final product actually ships.
Check below for information on other packages, and the 2007 winners of the previous "Great Defrag Shootout".

I have listed all the utilities below, as they fleetingly appeared on the Wikipedia defragmentation article before they were removed by the Wiki trolls.

Boot time defrag programs (explained):

Commercial defrag utilities for Windows:
Freeware defrag utilities for Windows:
* Combined setup for these excellent utilities available for download on my new defrag page.
Defrag t-shirt design @ SplitReason.com
Update: Having tested all the freeware packages listed, and the majority of the commercial ones, I have concluded the shootout and announced the "winners". Also check out the Disk Defragmentation Utilities page.

Disclaimer: None of the products reviewed were supplied as "freebies" by their respective companies, and they were not aware of the fact that I was reviewing the product until the review was posted. I have not solicited any financial favours from anyone during this process either. I write this because of the comment posted on the Paragon review, and because Raxco has provided a discount coupon code for blog readers. I have not reviewed defrag products where you have to buy them first in order to see if they actually work. All the commercial products listed have a free trial period.

The Great Defrag Shootout: Part I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII | XIV | XV | XVI | XVII | XVIII | XIX | XX | XXI | XXII | XXIII | XXIV | XXV | XXVI | XXVII | XXVIII | XXIX | XXX | XXXI | winner | all | why | digg this article
Posted by Donn Edwards at 12:31 AM 64 comments
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Saturday, June 09, 2007

The Great Defrag Shootout XV: Paragon Total Defrag 2007

Splash screen image when you launch the programParagon Total Defrag 2007 (PTD) is a new product for the German Paragon Software Group, who make a string of products relating to drive partitions, backups, and so on. The trial version lasts for 30 days, and the full version costs US$29.95. I plan to buy a copy, but do not expect to use it every day. It is primarily a boot-time defrag program, and has capabilities that few other programs have.
The best way to describe it is: PTD is to Defrag what Spinrite is to Chkdsk or Scandisk. And in much the same way that you have to reboot your machine to run Spinrite, you have to reboot your machine to run PTD. The full version comes with a special WinPE boot CD, (BartPE setup coming soon), so you boot from the CD to run the program. The trial version runs from your hard drive, but needs to reboot to do the actual processing.
The graphics interface is functional, but not particularly stunning, and the drive display lacks any meaningful detail. It can't show you what files are associated with a given block on the screen. So the display is a bit basic, but effective.
What got me interested in this product is its unque ability to shrink the size of the Master File Table (MFT). While Diskeeper, PerfectDisk and others claim to be able to defragment the MFT, and Diskeeper can increase the MFT size, I needed to reduce the size of the MFT on my hard drive because it had grown to be the third largest file on my C: drive. PTD can move all the valid entries to the start of the MFT, and then delete the remaining entries.
It's also a good idea to set the MFT reserved space parameter, outlined in a Microsoft KB article before shrinking or defragmenting the MFT, so the space set aside for the MFT to grow does not end up being too massive.
After doing the "Shrink MFT" option and rebooting, the MFT grows as temporary files are created, and this causes the MFT to be fragmented, so it is then necessary to defragment the MFT once you have worked on the drive for a while. I used my DiskFiller utility to create a quick 2048 extra files, deleted them, and then did a full comprehensive defrag of my drive. If you use the full version and do a full defrag after shrinking the MFT this problem is eliminated.
This is what the screen looks like while the trial version of PTD is busy. I took this screen shot with a camera, because Windows is in "boot mode" while the defrag runs. A complete defrag of my 30GB partition took 2 to 3 hours, and your PC is "off-line" during this time. That's why I don't plan on using the software every day. You can set it to shut down the machine once the defrag is complete, so you could start the defrag running when you leave the office or go to bed, and the drive will be clean and fresh in the morning.
PTD has a few wrinkles, like many 1.0 products: You can't select several drives to defrag at once, or several operations to perform. You have to do them one at a time, and some of them can take a long time. The main control console runs easily in the boot environment, and everything is clearly laid out and organised.
Another problem is that PTD doesn't set aside any free space after the MFT, which causes it to fragment as soon as it grows. Another problem is that the trial version wipes out other entries in the "BootExecute" registry entry, so I had to reinstate some of the other entries by hand. I'm sure all these bugs will be fixed in time.
Another function which I didn't test is a complete surface scan of the hard drive. I use Spinrite for this kind of thing, but if you can't afford Spinrite or it doesn't see the drive (such as with Penny's HP Laptop), this may be another option. The boot CD worked perfectly on Penny's laptop.
There is no screen saver option, or command line option, and you can't use your PC while it is running. This seems like the kind of program used by technicians or support staff to fix up a highly disorganised or problematic drive. PTD claims to be able to defrag a nearly-full hard drive, something Diskeeper notoriously can't do. I put this to the test by leaving less than 1GB free, and PTD worked fine, even though it ran for 3 hours on my laptop.
Of all the products reviewed, this has the most comprehensive boot-time facility, and is the only product I have encountered that can shrink the MFT. It can run in a BartPE environment, a feature it shares with JkDefrag, and can thus be run from a boot CD. Because it boots from its own WinPE system it can make changes to files and sections of the hard drive that would normally be locked. The Paragon Software Group is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, something it shares with Diskeeper Corporation and Raxco, so its products are properly certified to work with Windows.
WARNING: you absolutely must must make a complete backup of your drive before using this product, and preferably run it on a machine with a UPS. See comments.
Aside: Partition Logic, a free GPL-licensed utility can defragment a drive partition from its own boot disk, but it is primarily a partition manager, and should be used with care. Version 0.68 wouldn't run on my Acer laptop, and it encountered a defrag error on the FAT32 partition of Penny's old ThinkPad. It also gave a message to say the defragmentation code has not been thoroughly tested. Wait for version 1 or later, if you're brave.
Update: I tried out Paragon Partition Manager Pro v8.5 to see what kind of defrag support it offers: MFT shrinking, defrag, hard drive testing and partition management ($99.95). It's a linux-based boot CD.

The Great Defrag Shootout: Part I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII | XIV | XV | XVI | XVII | XVIII | XIX | XX | XXI | XXII | XXIII | XXIV | XXV | XXVI | XXVII | XXVIII | XXIX| winner | all | why
Posted by Donn Edwards at 11:20 PM 19 comments
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Wednesday, June 06, 2007

The Great Defrag Shootout XIV: Abexo Defragmenter Pro Plus

Scam Alert! Abexo Defragmenter Pro Plus 5.0 costs $34.95, and its lesser cousin Abexo Defragmenter Lite 5.0 costs $19.95. It offers a hard disk cleanup facility, as well as defragmentation, but uses the built-in WDD for this purpose.
You start off selecting a set of options and which drive letters to process. When done, the program will reboot the PC and perform the tasks required, and then on completion reboot the PC to give you control back. So it's quite disruptive.
Unfortunately a lot of these options are ill-advised: deleting all the prefetch files doesn't speed up anything, and can actually make matters worse. Rather use the free CCleaner product which has better options and doesn't damage your system.
The next list of options again offers some weird options, and doesn't explain what these do. Documentation is actually quite weak for a $35 product. The "defragment" option uses the built-in Windows Disk Defragmenter, similar to the free SpeeDefrag product. And ScanDisk is also built in to Windows. The only "added value" is the ability to select all these actions in one place.
When I saw this screen I thought that some of these ideas were remarkably similar to those offered by the free JkDefrag program.
I was shocked to see that the "defrag" option uses the Windows defrag.exe, and even more shocked when the final "Optimise" screen (see top graphic) appeared, because it is obviously using the GPL-licensed JkDefrag libraries without even acknowledging the author or conforming to the license agreement. The screens refer to the "top" of the drive, but show the "top" of the drive at the bottom of the screen, the way JkDefrag does. A lot of the other aspects are also unique to JkDefrag. Why, then, should you pay $34.95 for this package? I cannot think of a single reason other than because ripped off, or you're willing to pay a lot of money for a cute logo.
In an email to me they deny using the JkDefrag code, even though they got some "ideas" from the product. They say the screen display is a "quick and dirty" [sic] method, to be refined later. I guess I won't be paying $35 for a quick and dirty product.
I could find no information on their web site for the location of their offices or any other contact details. I eventually traced their domain name details to: 179 Osborn Avenue, Brantford, ONTARIO N3T 6S7 Phone +1-519-774-0498. Don't bother to even download this product, let alone buy it. It offers nothing you can't already do for free. If you already paid for a copy, demand a refund, on the basis of copyright violation and fraud.
Another program that does this (although it is free) is SpeedItUp FREE 4.0, published by MicroSmarts LLC, 700 Commerce Dr, Suite 500, Oak Brook, IL 60523. Phone +1-708-748-7558. Both of these programs are in violation of the LGPL and GPL licenses. I guess "imitation is the sincerest form of flattery".

The Great Defrag Shootout: Part I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII | XIV | XV | XVI | XVII | XVIII | XIX | XX | XXI | XXII | XXIII | XXIV | XXV | XXVI | XXVII | XXVIII | XXIX| winner | all | why
Posted by Donn Edwards at 5:35 PM 4 comments
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Tuesday, June 05, 2007

Swimming and Maths help fitness

I'm not a great swimmer, although I have done the Midmar Mile (1600m) a few times. I get lost counting lengths in the pool, and I battle to stay motivated, let alone fit.
But I do understand maths, and I use it to my advantage when training. In a 25m pool it takes 40 lengths to swim 1km. Most people assume that if you want to swim 40 lengths its best to do 4 sets of 10. That may work for them but if I try doing that I battle to swim the last 10 and get completely demotivated for next time.
Instead, I do 5 descending sets of 10-9-8-7-6 lengths. That's 4 breaks instead of 3, but the last set of 6 isn't as tiring. If you don't want to look spare resting at the "wrong" end of the pool, do a descending set of even-numbered lengths, like 10-8-8-8-6 or 12-10-8-6-4. If you're doing even steps then the middle number multiplied by the number of sets gives the total no of lengths.
At present I'm not even managing that number, but if you're unfit and start a 5-4-3-2-1 set you've already done 15 lengths. Next time do 6-5-4-3-2 and that's 20. At present I'm doing 10-8-6-4-2 (30), and then I add a couple more at the end to keep motivated.
In order to stop getting lost when counting lengths, I do 2 lengths of crawl followed by 1 length of breaststroke. If you are swimming 10 lengths, start and end with breaststroke. Then lengths number 1, 4, 7 and 10 are breaststroke, with 4 and 10 in the "back" direction and 1 and 7 in the "away" direction. It's easy to tell where you are in the set simply by knowing what stroke you did in the previous length and which direction you are swimming.
When I was training for Midmar and wanting to keep count of 64 lengths, I used coins at the far end of the pool. I moved 16 coins from one tile to the other, and then moved them back again, i.e. 32 moves for 64 lengths, swum in pairs. That's 15-14-13-12-10 if you're doing 5 sets, but I was trying to do the entire lot without a break. After all, there are no "sides" at Midmar dam.
Posted by Donn Edwards at 5:35 PM 0 comments
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MTN Direct breaks the law again

If they weren't so clearly inept I would have thought it was deliberate they way they keep sending me marketing SMS messages even though I have informed both MTN themselves and MTNSP that I don't wish to receive these messages. They are breaking the law, and they arrogantly assume they can get away with it because the ECT Act is largely unknown or ignored.
I'm wondering whether I should go to the trouble of getting one of their directors thrown in jail for a year because of this ineptitude. Eventually I spoke to someone senior at MTN Direct (0832127138) who assured me this would be passed on the the "developers". I sure hope so.

Posted by Donn Edwards at 9:36 AM 0 comments
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Monday, June 04, 2007

AccessOpener 1.11 gets a boost

If you're an Access programmer you need this free utility. I use it all the time, and it saves me a lot of trouble. It's only when it isn't there that I miss it the most, like when my laptop had to be reinstalled, or when I'm working on a client's machine.
Recently I learnt a lot more about the Windows Prefetch system, and encountered the DiskTrix SystemBoosterXP product, which got me thinking: why not use AccessOpener to read the msaccess.exe file from the disk and place it into cache memory while the computer is booting up? Once it's there it will speed up the time it takes to load Access and open a file.
So I added a /LOAD option to work with the /SET option at startup, and it's all packaged and working, thanks to Inno Setup.
Posted by Donn Edwards at 7:28 PM 0 comments
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The Great Defrag Shootout XIII: DiskTrix UltimateDefrag 1.52

UltimateDefrag is probably the closest program yet reviewed to being the "ultimate" defrag software, particularly if you're a power user. It gets a "Thumbs Up" rating in spite of its flaws.
The first good thing about UD is the manual. It's a well-written PDF file that explains a lot about hard drives, how they work, and how defragmentation can improve the performace and responsiveness of the drive.
Another good thing is that it's easy to install, and fairly intuitive to use. When you do the trail download you supply your email address, and over the next week or so you get 5 short tutorial emails explaining how to get started and use UD to it full potential.
It doesn't do any "on-the-fly" defragmenting, but you can schedule it to run when the PC isn't busy (almost the same as a screen saver option), or at pre-defined times. It also has a boot-time option to defrag system files, and it respects the information in the "layout.ini" file.
The speed of a hard drive varies from the "outside" to the "inside" of the drive, and UD has numerous options and techniques to capitalise on this fact. You can "archive" files or file types by relocating them to slower areas of the disk, and prioritise other files or folders by moving them to the faster areas of the disk.
So with a bit of tweaking you can improve the layout of the hard drive and make performance gains in the process. Of course you could also make bad choices and slow things down, and so there are numerous automatic and recommended settings that assist. What I don't understand is why a lot of the recommended options aren't already checked, or even marked with an asterisk or something.
Another good idea is to move the directories close to the Master File Table (MFT) because they are often used together anyway. I haven't seen any other programs do this.
The on-screen display of the hard drive as a circular disk is unique, but not always entirely helpful. You can change the granularity of the display by adjusting the "zoom" settings. You can also set limits on the maximum % resources used, although it doesn't always honour them. There is a colour for files being moved, but it only shows where they are being moved from, not the new location, so if you are watching the way UD works, you are often still in the dark as to what is going on. Usually the current file name is displayed at the bottom of the screen, but not always, yet the program seems to be busy anyway.
For the first few days I allowed UD to operate on its "AUTO" setting, to get a feel for how the program would improve my drive without much user intervention. The results were OK. If that's all you need then UltimateDefrag Lite (US$11.97) will save you some money, but in my opinion it's too crippled, because it offers no boot-time defrag, something that is still important over the long term.
The optimisation strategy relies on the "last accessed date" of files. This is theoretically fine, except that compressing a file changes its last accessed date, and I found that the entire "media" directory and subdirectories from OfficeXP, consisting mostly of clipart that don't use, was moved to the faster area of the disk. I guess I could use filetouch.exe or something to change this, but it was a bit disappointing. I guess Microsoft broke its own rules.
You can override these settings by specifying files or file types to treat as high performance or archive types. I found the interface at this point somewhat clunky. Certain common extension types are left out, such as mp3 (although mp1, mp2 and mp4 are listed), and you can't jump to a particular extension such as exe or rar easily. I found it quicket to click on "Custom" and type in the file type, and then scroll to the bottom of the list to find my custom entry. Since this is such an important part of the optimisation process, I would have expected these options to be pre-filled with common extensions to be treated as high performance (exe, sys, dll) and archive (zip, cab, rar) by default. It would also be nice to be able to copy settings from drive C: to D:.
Unfortunately I will not be using UD because it failed my "torture test" and my "large files" test. It chokes on big files. The moment I created my two large SQL data files on drive C:, the analyse time went from a few seconds to 14 minutes. When I decompressed these files to their full size and then requested a defrag, it failed, or at least didn't do anything to defrag the file. I should point out that WDD failed to defrag them either, and contig.exe complained about not enough free disk space. But a US$39.95 program should be able to defrag any file that isn't locked, IMHO.
I re-compressed the file and used contig to defragment it again. Then I left my laptop running on the "Consolidate" option overnight. After 12 hours it hadn't finished and the drive looked in a bit of a mess.
On my D: drive I have a 4GB file used by TrueCrypt, and when I asked for this file to be placed on the outside of the drive. After an hour or so it had moved the file, but the free disk space was disorganised. I changed a few settings in the file preferences, and a more thorough "consolidate" pass eventually sorted it out.
It seems to be a weakness that the MFT can land up anywhere on the drive and UD simply has to work around it somehow. I realise it could be difficult if not impossible to move the MFT, but this has to be considered when allocating free space and moving files around. I could find no mention that this is being done, and the drive diagrams appear to confirm this.
My overall impression is that this program is sluggish and vulnerable to giving up when large file are involved. If your files are all smaller than a few GB in size then I think this program will be a serious contender. Despite the good ideas and mostly good implementation, I can't rely on it for my needs. It's a pity, because this is a good product.
Next, I'm taking a break, and will return next week with another review.
Update: Both UltimateDefrag and UltimateDefrag Lite require an opening in the Windows firewall, which has to be closed manually once the programs are uninstalled.
Update 2: Version 1.72 is now freeware, following the release of UltimateDefrag 2008

The Great Defrag Shootout: Part I | II | III | IV | V | VI | VII | VIII | IX | X | XI | XII | XIII | XIV | XV | XVI | XVII | XVIII | XIX | XX | XXI | XXII | XXIII | XXIV | XXV | XXVI | XXVII | XXVIII | XXIX| winner | all | why
Posted by Donn Edwards at 3:49 PM 11 comments
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