Right now, many things are probably whirling around in your head:
- Is this true? Yes, it is.
- Does it work? Yes. We will show you charts on hard drive fragments before and after defragmentation.
- This has got to cost money. Absolutely free.
These "certain tools" we will be using are called contig.exe and PowerDefragmenter.
When we used these two programs, the results were as follows:
Hard drive before defragmenting:
8 minutes later:
However, using the Windows Vista Defragmentation tool took longer… much longer. To further exaggerate the comparison, we ran the Vista Defragmentation Tool AFTER we had already defragmented that same drive with Contig and PowerDefragmenter. It took 8 minutes alone to analyze the drive. By now, contig.exe and powerdefragmenter would have already finished defragmenting a drive. On top of that, it took Windows Vista 75 more minutes to defragment the hard-drive. As you can easily see, the new tools we will introduce to you will greatly cut your defragmentation time.
Please note a different tool was used to display the charts above. The charts did not come from the programs used in the tutorial.
Tutorial:
Click on the following programs to download them:
contig.exe
What you need to know about contig is that it is a bit different than the other defragment programs out there - it is a single-file defragmenter. It's strong point is optimizing files that continuously become fragmented. If contig determines that the file can be optimized, it is then moved into the free spaces of the disk.
Once you have finished downloading these files, make sure they are both in the same directory or folder.
No installation is required. The next step is to run Power Defragmenter. Click next, and you will arrive at the screen below:
You may then select from the following options:
Defragment File(s): Allows you to defragment up to 4 files
Defragment Folder(s): Allows you to defragment up to 4 folders
Defragment Disk: Allows you to defragment a disk
PowerMode(TM) Disk Defragmentation: Defragments at a power equivalent to two consecutive defragmentations. Time does not necessarily double.
After you click next, just choose the desired drive, and you're good to go.
When you are finished, the command prompt window will read "Windows Disk Defragmenter…"
This is pretty much the fastest defragment you can ever get with great effectiveness. If you're looking for something that is similar to what Windows Defragment does but at a faster speed, I would suggest Auslogics Disk Defragmenter.
Update: This is the only down-side to contig. It does not really tell you how well the fragmentation process went but as you could see from the visuals above, it is quite effective. If you wait 3-5 minutes before closing the window after the process is finished, the following statistics will be displayed:
- Hard Drive Space
- Free Space
- Largest free space extent
- Percent File Fragmentation
Follow-up:
Many are saying that Microsoft said it is unnecessary to defragment NTFS. While that may be true, many are noticing an increase in performance once they defrag their system, including myself. This article is a tutorial on how to speed up the defragmentation process, not one that is asking you to defragment your drive if you don't think you need to. To defragment or not to defragment is entirely up to you. Sorry for all those confused.
- Albert