Can Any Defragger Do This?

Does anyone know of a defragger with an option that allows you to consolodate all files to the inner-tracks?

Why would I want to do this? - I want to move the paging file from my C-drive to the outer-most tracks of my D-drive (which are now occupied).

Thanks.

 

Well, I use UltimateDefrag and while I don't believe it can consoldate files to the inner-tracks, it can move selected files to the outer-tracks of a drive. The procedure would be as follows:

Tools > Options - Under "High Performance" select "Custom". Select the page file in the right pane and move it to the left pane. Then use the "Consolidate" defrag mode and select "Respect High Performance" in the option for that mode.

That said, imho here's a much better way to accomplish what you want to do: Create 2 logical partitions on your D-drive, a small D-partition, just large enough to hold your page file (which I assume is a fixed-size) and a larger E-partition for everything else. That way, your page file will always remain at the outer-tracks of the drive regardless of subsequent defragging of the E-partition.

Hth

 

Thanks appster, that makes good sense. What software do you use to create new partitions on a drive that has data on it?

 

Well I've been using PartitionMagic for years (before Symantec acquired it). However, some members here use PartedMagic, a free partition manager (with a curiously similar name). And there are several others!

 

If your D drive contains merely data, my suggestion would be to temporarily move all of the data off the drive, then use Windows XP's Disk Management feature to partition the empty drive as desired, and then move the data back onto the drive. You won't need to use any special software if you do it that way. (Windows Vista can also do this, in fact it is even better at it.)

If you don't have enough excess storage capacity to move all of your data temporarily off drive D then you will be forced to use custom partitioning software. An alternative would be to acquire some additional storage capacity, which you probably need anyway for backup purposes.

You don't say this outright, but it sounds as though you are planning to create an empty partition on the outer rim of drive D just for your paging file to reside in. Assuming drive D is a separate physical drive, this is an excellent idea. Hopefully C and D are SATA drives, not IDE drives connected to the same channel (i.e. sharing the same ribbon cable), otherwise performance gains will be limited.

Of course, the best way to improve paging performance is to add more RAM, thus minimizing paging in the first place.

 

With 64 bit windows you can add as much RAM as you like,great advantage of these flavors is that Windows can keep the pagefile in RAM,hence massive performance improvement,this is a rough outline why to use 64 bit systems.

 

I can't make much sense of this. To move the paging file to the outer tracks of another drive or partition - why? It will inhibit performance and as for having enough memory so to not need a page file is nonesense - windows will always use it - i don't know about 64bit stuff Huu and does that mean you need Vista, uggg!

PerfectDisk8 has three ways to defrag and it will always move the page file to the optimum central placement using an offline defrag.

Acronis Disk Director is it for partition management.

 

If you move the main paging file to another physical drive then you will typically get increased performance. The outer tracks are the fastest part of the drive and are the preferred location for any data that needs to be accessed frequently. Additionaly, locating the paging file in its own dedicated partition will keep it from becoming fragmented. (Note that Microsoft also recommends keeping a small paging file on the boot drive in order to store memory dump files, thus improving one's chances of troubleshooting the system after a crash).

There is no performance to be gained by relocating the primary paging file onto another partition of the same physical drive, it has to be located on a different drive. Preferably this will be either a second SATA drive or at least a second IDE drive that is plugged into a different IDE channel than the first drive, so that each drive can be controlled independently.

Think about it: If you have two drives and the paging file is located on the second drive, your first drive can be busy accessing Windows programs and data while the second drive is busy accessing the paging file (when needed). Both sets of heads can be moving independently, rather than a single set of heads on one drive being forced to jump back and forth from the data area to the paging file area in order to fulfill all of its read/write requests.

See this Microsoft article:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314482

As far as memory goes, I think we would both agree that the more RAM you have installed, the less paging needs to take place. I don't advocate disabling the paging file. Performance freaks can disable their paging files if they like, but people who use memory and disk-intensive applications such as Photoshop would be much better served by adding more RAM and by placing paging files on multiple physical drives.

As far as Vista goes, I concur: uggg!

 

Placing windows pagefile,and photoshop swapfile,on another drive or more drives gives some improvement cause windows and photoshop at the same moment write and read to different locations[no conflicts as if using same disk,windows pageffile and photoshop swapfile sometimes trying to use same location on disk.but as said gain is not massive only some betterment. main problem with photoshop are memory leaks but thats another story.

 

Jkdefrag? It has many modes.

 

One of the coolest free things !