Free space u have...

How much free space do u have in each hard drives?

Coz I was then thinking that it might affect drive performances...and also to defrag efficiently, default xp says tht it should have at least 20% free space. But, with O&O Defrag pro says it still can be defrag with 5% free spaces..

As of now, I have 15% free spaces in each hard drive. What's urs?

 

Hello,
I have many computers with many partitions. All have more than 50% free space, most have 75% free space. In all my life, I've never had a hard disk taken up more than 50% or so. And if less, only temporarily for a few weeks between backups or so.
Mrk

 

Yep, I normally have 50-60% free space on my various hard drives as well. I've always felt that it enhances system performance by adopting a strategy for what a specific hard drive is used for. For example, I use my C:\ drive primarily for Windows and the main third party programs. Any large data bases (pics, music, videos, etc.) that are not routinely accessed by programs I use are allocated out on to other drives.

 

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/5462/avf8.png

http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/2821/bfi4.png


Why such difference?Cause i use the first disc as "stable" and clean as possible,while i use the second disc for p2p and all kind of stuff i save from internet,pics,articles,new versions of programs (setups) etc.So i don't even bother to defrag the second disc,it's always fragmented,while the 1st one is always in pretty good shape.

 

75, 95 and 98 %

Gerard

 

Really, hummn....

Does the bigger the free space in the HD the more better performance of the pc? Is that really what u mean?

Then, why some paid defragger out there could still insists that there defragger can still defrag even with 5% left free space...and while xp says 20% free was just fine.

Are the difference in performance really big, if someone has a 50% free space compared to just 20% free space left in the drive? Any technical explanations to this...?

 

Typically 85 to 90 percent free space (on 35 gig partition), depending on what I've decided I just "have" to add or no longer want. I usually run defrag once a week anyway, even though it's usually showing only 1 to 3 percent fragmentation, as part of my weekly housekeeping.

 

everything else being equal kinda
in reality depends on what kind of access to the disk is taking place
and only if the disk is the actual bottleneck


consider this image
http://i16.tinypic.com/2enawrq.jpg
(from The PC Guide and mirrored as the reference section at Storagereview)

Hard drives spin at a constant velocity, the read write head therefore has more data passing under it for the rotational speed when its closer to the outer diameter of the disk than when its near the inner diameter of the disk. Above is a schematic of Zone Bit Recording each arc section represents identical capacity
(A corollary to that is a disk platter with a higher areal density [meaning it contains more bits of info per square cm] will have better performance than a disk a generation back with a lower areal density.)

Of course all things are rarely equal
and Id highly recommend reading Dr Michael Schuette's As the Hard Disk Spins Series.

what kind of disk access is occurring, partitioning, filesystem\file placement, fragmentation, command queing ect all play a role in your actual performance.

Might also want to see this thread

I have disks vary from highly dynamic and changing data near 50% to storage disks that are pretty much never changing near 100%, more often I'll have partitions with appropriate data for their location on a disk with an overall storage effciency near 90%

as a single disk example the first 20% for your OS, and the last 20% reserved for a rescue image of your OS (which you rarely ever access unless restoring) inbetween a data partition (percentages are arbitrary considering the vast differences in the possible size of a disk)

the read write head will stay within the OS partition most of the time for the best performance as it needs to traverse only a proscribed degree of arc (seek time), as you direct it to open data it will have a much longer seek time traversing inward to the data partition, but "generally" be able to load all or a substantial portion of it into memory and quickly return to other tasks in the OS partition. With data very rarely accessed near the inner diameter fleshing out your storage efficiency.

the added benefit here is that with the aps and OS separate from the data, reimaging in the event of a broken OS or infection is easy with all the data intact (need to point My docs, email ect to storage folders on the data partition), you then backup your data separately.

with multiple disks you can get more creative, with special applications (real time video editing, heavy pagefile hits, multiuser environment ect) other factors become more prominent. There can be substantial differences between one average user and another, then there is a vast gulf between them and say a multiuser database.

 

Hi sweater,

Interesting topic!

Back in Win95/98 days, I played with lots of utilities.

Cluster size, free space, swap file, defragmentation were hot topics. It was fun to fiddle around with these things.

When I switched to Win2K I decided to pare down the "housecleaning" to the bare minimum. I looked closer at the free space and defrag issues, and decided to run some tests. I would let the partitions become heavily fragmented, yet, unlike what others reported, I noticed no difference in computing speed: programs opened just as fast: (MSWord still opens in about 5 seconds). Files are accessed just as fast across two other partitions.

Photoshop is on F:\ and the photographs on E:\ and photographs open in 1 - 3 seconds, depending on the filesize. I never notice a slowdown, no matter how fragmented E:\ becomes.

My system specifications aren't all that great by today’s standards, but plenty fast for my work:

AMD Athlon XP 2400+
WD 7200rpm IDE Hard drives​

Then, I questioned why I needed so much free space. I let the data files and photograph files partitions fill up almost to maximum before archiving to my external HD - again, unlike what others had reported, I noticed no changes in performance.

C:\ had about 80% free space, and I wondered if even that was a waste of space. The only way to know is to test myself.

(It's an old habit of mine learned from a photographer-friend: "Careful photographers run their own tests")

So, I repartitioned to leave just 1GB free space on C:\ which has just the OS and stuff that forces itself to install in Program Files. The partition includes a fixed 512MB swap file. I never noticed any performance difference. Everything is still almost instantaneous.

In the past, unlike what others reported, I never noticed any significant performance difference having the swap file on a separate partition or drive. Today, I have enough RAM so that the swap file doesn't have to work much, so it's a moot point anyway.

Another housecleaning change came later with installing Deep Freeze and freezing C:\

This means the partition never changes, since it restores to previous state on reboot. Hence, it requires no "hands-on" maintenance: the swap file doesn't fragment; all temp and MRU junk goes away on reboot. No manual housecleaning required on C:\

This is the way things are this afternoon:

http://www.urs2.net/rsj/computing/imgs/dskmgmt.gif

http://www.urs2.net/rsj/computing/imgs/defrag-E.gif

Tonight I will do my six-month archival of my photographs to other storage media. This will free up about 80% of my E:\ partition, which will serve another 5-6 months of images.

I defrag everything (execpt C:\) at this time, about every six months.

In conclusion, my own tests showed no advantage in keeping a lot of free space on a partition, or very frequent defragmentation, and I’ve run this way for a number of years.

regards,

-rich

 

its been quite awhile since the disk was the actual bottleneck in most applications

multitasking can do it, heavy read and writes (multitrack music editing, video, intensive graphics ect) But its gotten better with each increase in areal density, better command queing and firmware algorithms. Of course most people have also seen a substantial increase in their system memory.

Fragmentation however is an insidious evil whether you notice a performance hit or not, basically making your hard drive flail around like a hooked fish isnt in its or your best long range interests

Optimizing disk access may or may not be something you see a performance increase from, however it is likely something that will impact the MTTF of your drives, which likely saves you money and enhances your data security.

 

I can see that as a problem if there is continuous daily access to the drive over long periods of time. My usage is not that much.

Some WD Hard drives now purport to have 1 million hours MTTF- I'm not sure about mine. Averaging 10 hours per day running here, that's a lot of days/years, and I would probably upgrade the HD before that happens.

(EDIT: I was trying to find how to estimate real-time hours; I can't find my notes)

However, your points are well taken, and I'll do some reading on this.

Thanks,

-rich

 

Should be the other way around - the classic example is the page file, much more efficient if on another HD.

Same with

I think you mean constant data access, not the executables themselves.

 

MTTF \ MTBF figures always need to be taken with a grain of salt
its statistics and we all know the famous quote attributed to Mark Twain

there are three kinds of lies
Lies, damned lies, and statistics

 

He, he!

Have a look at this! I suppose that you can get the message even if the picture is encrypted in Swedish.

Total 377 GB and 9.3 GB Free!
I suppose that I soon will have to invest in another hard drive.

http://donmartin.se/HardDrives.JPG

Regards / Don

 

a devilishly clever security measure

( I wonder if I can alter my language pack to pig latin?)

 

I have only one computer, one hdd.
Drive C:\
-----------
62.7 GB free space