Increasing Performance by Defragmenting Your Disk

Another way to improve performance is to defragment your disk. To understand how this process improves your disk performance, you first need to have a short introduction to how data is stored. Basically, when you defragment a disk, you rearrange how the files are stored so that Windows XP can open and display a file more efficiently.

Understanding The Basics of Disk Storage

When you store a document, the data in that document is written to your disk and saved as a file with a specific name in a specific location on your disk. To keep files organized, your disk is divided into sections called sectors, which are broken down into smaller sections called clusters. Each cluster can hold a certain amount of data.

note

Probably the biggest complaint and most noticeable performance issue is with online connections. Logging on to the Internet or displaying Web pages can take a long time, but this slowness is related to the type of Internet connection you have. For instance, dial-up accounts are limited to the speed of the modem, and modem speed is also limited because of phone lines.

To get better Internet performance, you usually need to get a different type of connection, commonly called a broadband connection. The most common broadband connections for home users are cable connections (through your cable provider) and DSL connections (through a special type of phone line). You can learn more about connection types in Chapter 8, "Browsing the Internet."

When you give a command to save a file, Windows takes the file and stores it in a cluster. However, a file is often larger than one cluster. If the file is too big to fit in one cluster, Windows goes to the next available cluster, stores more of the file in that cluster, and so on until the entire file is stored on the disk.

Windows keeps a little cheat sheet that tells it where all the chunks of each file are stored.

When you want to open that file again, Windows checks its file system (its map of the disk) and collects all the pieces of the file. Basically, this involves putting all the pieces together again and displaying the file onscreen.

Initially, this storage does not cause performance problems because your disk is empty and files are usually stored sequentially. However, over time your disk files become fragmented and you might find that it takes a long time to open a file or start a program.

To speed access to files and to help prevent potential problems with fragmented files, you can use Disk Defragmenter to defragment your disk. Defragmenting basically reorders the files on the disk, putting file parts next to each other if possible and putting all the empty, available clusters together so that when new files are saved, they get a block of clusters together. Defragmenting your disk is a general maintenance job that you should perform every few months for best results.

Running Disk Defragmenter

You can run the defragmentation program on your hard disk by following these steps:

1.	Open the My Computer window by double-clicking this icon on your desktop or by clicking Start and then clicking My Computer. tip Here's a little history note. Older Windows versions used a file allocation table (called FAT or FAT32) for file management as the "cheat sheet." Newer Windows versions, including Windows XP, use a more advanced file system called NTFS. This new file system lets you use huge storage media and long filenames. This file system also automatically replaces bad clusters.
2.	Right-click the disk you want to check and select Properties. You'll see the General tab of the Properties dialog box for that disk.
3.	Click the Tools tab. You'll see the available system tools for disks (see Figure 18.8). Figure 18.8. Use the Tools tab to access disk tools.
4.	Click the Defragment Now button. You'll see the Disk Defragment window. tip For information on checking a disk for errors, see Chapter 17.
5.	To see whether the disk requires defragmenting, click the Analyze button. Windows analyzes the data on the drive and makes a recommendation on whether you should defragment the drive (see Figure 18.9). You can view the report, start defragmenting, or close the recommendation alert box. Figure 18.9. Before you defragment, analyze your drive to see whether defragmenting is necessary.
6.	Click Close so that you can view a detailed map of the drive. You see this map in the Disk Defragmenter window (see Figure 18.10). The legend at the bottom of the Disk Defragmenter window helps you understand the map and identify the various file types (fragmented, contiguous, unmovable, and free space). Figure 18.10. In the analysis, you can see how the files are stored, which ones are contiguous (next to each other), and which ones are fragmented. You can also see where you have free space. tip You can also run this program from the Start menu. Click Start, All Programs, Accessories, and then System Tools. In the System Tools menu, click Disk Defragmenter.
7.	Click the Defragment button to defragment the drive. As the files are rearranged, you see the progress of the defragmentation (see Figure 18.11). Figure 18.11. You can view the progress of the defragmentation.

Disk Defragmenter may take a while to defragment your disk, depending on the size of the disk, the number and size of files on the volume, the extent of fragmentation in the disk, and the available system resources. Disk Defragmenter's progress is indicated by the progress bar in the Disk Defragmenter window.

When the process is complete, Disk Defragmenter displays the results. You can also choose to display a report on the process; this report displays detailed information about the disk that was defragmented. Click the Close button to close the report and then the Disk Defragmenter window. Otherwise, you can click OK to close the Disk Defragmenter window without viewing the report.

tip

Performing back-to-back defrags can reclaim additional space. The first defrag is so busy cleaning up the mess that it doesn't do a perfect defrag, only a good defrag. If you've got time to defrag again, you'll have better results.