UltimateDefrag - is this the best defragger ever?

Yes, but that then override any positioning set by UD (which leads me back to the question of having any benchmarks to see any improvements...)

 

The layout.ini optimization done by the OS can be turned on or off with a registry tweak (also in TweakUI). I'm not sure if it's on by default or not.

 

Prefetch for me in XP never really lived up or proved for me to offer any noticable performance gain so i killed it off and am 100% pleased with DiskTrix UD where you the user can draw up your own personal performance gains and keep them there.

EASTER

 

Just came across the following

"Cleaning the Prefetch folder in Windows XP/Vista is a Myth and will reduce performance. The Prefetch folder is self cleaning at 128 entries by Windows. When the 128 limit is reached Windows will keep the 32 most used prefetch files. Cleaning the folder before this will cripple Windows load and all application load times. The Prefetch folder is not a cache. Prefetch files are NOT loaded at Windows startup and unused files do absolutely nothing but take up a ridiculously small amount of disk space. The folder is rarely over 5 MB. Prefetch (.pf) files are merely REFERENCED when an Application loads so Windows can optimally load the application to RAM. There is NO negative performance hit from Prefetching. All recommendations to clean the folder or tweak Windows Prefetching in ANY way are Myths and spread by those who do not understand how Windows Prefetching works."

when you say "so I killed it off" I assume that you don't mean that you cleaned the Prefetch folder but rather removed/disabled it in some way so as to avoid the type of problems mentioned above ?

Could you advise how to kill it off ? would be interested to do some tests.

 

Here's the key to turn the bootoptimize feature on/off:

(Enable = "Y", Disable = "N")


The behavior of the Prefetcher is controlled with this DWORD registry key :

EnablePrefetcher = 3 (Disabled = 0, Application = 1, BootUp = 2, Application AND BootUp = 3)

Some sources recommend to use a value of 5 or 6 but I can find no official documentation on these values.

 

Thanks - will see what happens. Can't see how turning it off can improve things , but you never know.

 

You need to add this reg key and set to 0 to prevent built in defrag running every 3 days to optimise files as listed in layout.ini:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\OptimalLayout

This is how diskeeper, perfectdisk etc disable this.

IMHO you should not touch prefetch settings (which instruct the OS what parts or files are needed to boot or launch app x, y, z and loads them into cache (like an intelligent read ahead), but instead use the setting I have mentioned above.

 

not sure what you mean by "built in defrag every 3 days" I sill have OptimalLayout set to 1 and UD2008 seems to work fine. Nothing happens every 3 days that I can see.

@ Peter - have just run Perfectdisk and the OptimalLayout figure remained at 1

 

Prefetch is nothing more than all the other myths Microsoft runs down user;s thoats to trick you into believing your machine will run faster. Add some memory modules, a super-defrag and watch it really take off.

 

Yes its a myth to get rid of prefetch in order improving peformance,its basically a container with shortcuts(references) to app.and OS uses it for performance reasons to speed things up so disabling would not be the best thing to do.M$ OS's are not the thing of all things but its a well thought out system .

 

If I disable prefetching my system starts slooooowly on startup...

 

You must be myth-taken

 

Obviously, he needs to apply "NUCLEAR STRATEGIC COUNTERMEASURES" immediately.

 

I been disabling prefetch on numerous machines for months and in all honesty with absolutely no ill effects. I highly suggest stop taking various M$ bait just because they say something is so because they ARE NOT experts as they would have you believe. They are reasonably good at fashioning a skeleton O/S but one only need see the massive security business to arrive at a logical decision at what they are good at and what not.

 

Do you think prefetching as a general technique is not valid (Intel and AMD in their CPUs, Linus torvalds in his Linux kernel all employ prefetching techniques) or that prefetching in Windows does not work (there is lots anecdotal evidence and benchmarks from reputable sources that show it makes a easily measurable improvement to boot times.

 

I have one problem with UD 2008 2.0.0.51: I created a scheduled defrag job (to be executed at system start) and selected in "Options" "Least Frequently Used Data To Inner Tracks" - but this setting is NOT saved! Every time I press the "Edit job" button and go to "Options", "After most frequently used data" is checked instead.

Since I've selected "Least Frequently Used Data To Inner Tracks" in the manual AUTO mode options (here it IS saved), every run of the scheduled job would nullify the results of a manual defragment. Result: The scheduled job feature is unusable for me.

I had informed Disktrix about this bug, and in the meanwhile an update was installed - but nothing has changed I got no response to my second mail ...

Anybody else with this problem?

 

I did have this problem some time ago. The solution was to delete the Udefrag xml doc file I think. I fairly sure it just rebuilds but make an image first in case I'm more senile than normal this evening.

 

Computer software science is a juggling act at best. Some companies are better and more efficient at recovering and correcting imperfections then others, DiskTrix is no exception.

It;s a constant waiting game for many of us to finally realize when that ultimate satisfaction is reached IMO.

 

Thanks for this tip - didn't help, though. I deleted Udefrag.xml and Backup of Udefrag.xml and created a new scheduled job: Same result as before

Then I edited the xml file by changing

<AutoGoesToInner INT="0"></AutoGoesToInner>

to

<AutoGoesToInner INT="1"></AutoGoesToInner>

for the scheduled job (identical to the entry for the manual defragment), started UD anew - same result as before. When I opened the xml file again, the "1" was reverted to "0".

I'm getting sick of this software

 

Just another thought. I don't use schedule any more. I think the order in which you click on things makes a difference. Sorry to be vague but suggest you start again and try to click in a different order - if you see what I mean.

 

I've tried that but to no avail. Funny thing is, that I even write-protected the xml files after editing them - but even that didn't help ... Strange, very strange.

 

For those that are interested, UD's Boot Time module has been released:

http://www.disktrix.com/DTNews.htm