wanting a defrag utility

In article <nospam-77D12B.09111529102005.RemoveThis@ip-lcc.supernews.net>,
Luke <nospam.RemoveThis@nospam.org> wrote:

> I'd like to restructure several large directories which will result in
> moving several GB worth of files. I'm thinking my hard drive is alreay
> pretty fragmented and this will make it even more so. Has anyone had
> good experiences with a defrag utility? I don't have a lot of faith in
> Norton, so which one might you recommend?

If you're just restructuring a single volume, moving files around
doesn't cause any real file movement, only directory entries will be
changed.

--
Tom Stiller

PGP fingerprint = 5108 DDB2 9761 EDE5 E7E3
7BDA 71ED 6496 99C0 C7CF
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

Entity TaliesinSoft spoke thus:

> I haven't noticed any change in performance.
Same here, I haven't defragged in years and everything works just fine.

-- Gnarlie
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

In article <nospam-77D12B.09111529102005.RemoveThis@ip-lcc.supernews.net>, Luke
<nospam.RemoveThis@nospam.org> wrote:

> I'd like to restructure several large directories which will result in
> moving several GB worth of files. I'm thinking my hard drive is alreay
> pretty fragmented and this will make it even more so. Has anyone had
> good experiences with a defrag utility? I don't have a lot of faith in
> Norton, so which one might you recommend?

I'd backup, wipe the drive, and restore. That will perfectly defrag the
drive, and you'll have a backup.

In general, defragging really isn't a big concern and is rarely
necessary.

Backing up, on the other hand, iis a huge concern and should be done on
a regular schedule determined by how many hours/days/weeks worth of
data you are comfortable losing.

djb

--
"I don't like dealing with people. I'd rather be back working in Human
Resources."

My wife, Oct 27 2005 after having to fill in at another department.
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

In article <nospam-77D12B.09111529102005 DeleteThis @ip-lcc.supernews.net>,
Luke <nospam DeleteThis @nospam.org> wrote:

> I'd like to restructure several large directories which will result in
> moving several GB worth of files. I'm thinking my hard drive is alreay
> pretty fragmented and this will make it even more so. Has anyone had
> good experiences with a defrag utility? I don't have a lot of faith in
> Norton, so which one might you recommend?

Are you moving files between disks and/or partitions, or are you
just moving the names from one directory to another?

If just moving names, this is not going to do much in the way of
fragmenting your disk.

If moving between disks/partitions, then the target disk (assuming
it has the free space) will just carve out sufficient space for
the new files in a moderately contiguous manor, and leave hold
behind that are the size of the files removed.

Of course if you do this back and forth enough it will most likely
create a lot of fragmentation.

Then again, Mac OS X will defragment files as it reads them,
unless they are huge files. Those it lets alone.

Bob Harris
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

On Sat, 29 Oct 2005 09:11:16 -0600, Luke wrote
(in article <nospam-77D12B.09111529102005 RemoveThis @ip-lcc.supernews.net>):

> I'd like to restructure several large directories which will result in
> moving several GB worth of files. I'm thinking my hard drive is alreay
> pretty fragmented and this will make it even more so. Has anyone had
> good experiences with a defrag utility? I don't have a lot of faith in
> Norton, so which one might you recommend?

The fasted defragmenting method I'm aware of is to use such as SuperDuper! to
create a bootable clone backup onto a hard drive and then repeat this process
in reverse, booting from the just created clone and backing up that onto the
original drive after reformatting it.

--
James L. Ryan -- TaliesinSoft
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

In article <1h599jw.1et8w0x1hychnfN%hairy.biker@gmail.com>,
hairy.biker DeleteThis @gmail.com (Andy Hewitt) wrote:

> Tim Lance <lance_1012 DeleteThis @hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> [Snipped Text]
>
> > > Yes, there are some sectors of the disc reserved for the boot process,
> > > boot up files are put here to speed up the startup process. If you move
> > > things around you *can* slow the Mac down.
> > >
> > > If you do a defrag on Windows and watch the graph as it works, you will
> > > see that some files are locked in position, as that also has a similar
> > > trick.
> > >
> > >
> >
> > Hmmm. Thought that only applied to early machines (original G3s and the
> > like)
> > needing the boot volume to be in the first 8 GB of a drive.
>
> That's a totally different matter. This is about optimisation for speed.
> The 8GB bug actually stopped OSX installing IIRC.

That wasn't a bug, it was purposely designed that way.

Long before 8GB drives became affordable, but still on purpose.
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

In article <1h59gy1.1gnja0p1qx1sl6N%hairy.biker@gmail.com>,
hairy.biker.TakeThisOut@gmail.com (Andy Hewitt) wrote:

> Steve Hix <sehix.TakeThisOut@NOSPAMspeakeasy.netINVALID> wrote:
>
> [Snipped Text]
>
> > > > Hmmm. Thought that only applied to early machines (original G3s and the
> > > > like)
> > > > needing the boot volume to be in the first 8 GB of a drive.
> > >
> > > That's a totally different matter. This is about optimisation for speed.
> > > The 8GB bug actually stopped OSX installing IIRC.
> >
> > That wasn't a bug, it was purposely designed that way.
> >
> > Long before 8GB drives became affordable, but still on purpose.
>
> On purpose? Or a known limitation?

On purpose, designed a couple years before the iMac was introduced IIRC.

At the time, multi-GB drives were expensive, not to mention *enormous*,
and how likely is it that anyone would be likely to own such a huge
drive, etc etc. "We've got a lot of time before we have to
change...um...wow, time sure does fly."

Remember that the original Mac filesystem, and even HFS, assumed
"reasonable" drive sizes, the which made assumptions about all the
filesystem housekeeping functions, internal tables and so on. It started
creaking noticeably around a couple GB. One of the answers was HFS+;
another was changes in assumptions about drive sizes (the current design
will break when drives go over a given (granted, very large) size, but
that limit should be a bit in the future.
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

Steve Hix wrote:
> In article <1h59gy1.1gnja0p1qx1sl6N%hairy.biker@gmail.com>,
> hairy.biker.DeleteThis@gmail.com (Andy Hewitt) wrote:
>
>
>>Steve Hix <sehix.DeleteThis@NOSPAMspeakeasy.netINVALID> wrote:
>>
>>[Snipped Text]
>>
>>
>>>>>Hmmm. Thought that only applied to early machines (original G3s and the
>>>>>like)
>>>>>needing the boot volume to be in the first 8 GB of a drive.
>>>>
>>>>That's a totally different matter. This is about optimisation for speed.
>>>>The 8GB bug actually stopped OSX installing IIRC.
>>>
>>>That wasn't a bug, it was purposely designed that way.
>>>
>>>Long before 8GB drives became affordable, but still on purpose.
>>
>>On purpose? Or a known limitation?
>
>
> On purpose, designed a couple years before the iMac was introduced IIRC.
>
> At the time, multi-GB drives were expensive, not to mention *enormous*,
> and how likely is it that anyone would be likely to own such a huge
> drive, etc etc. "We've got a lot of time before we have to
> change...um...wow, time sure does fly."
>
> Remember that the original Mac filesystem, and even HFS, assumed
> "reasonable" drive sizes, the which made assumptions about all the
> filesystem housekeeping functions, internal tables and so on. It started
> creaking noticeably around a couple GB. One of the answers was HFS+;
> another was changes in assumptions about drive sizes (the current design
> will break when drives go over a given (granted, very large) size, but
> that limit should be a bit in the future.

Apple were not alone here by any means; other manufacturers made similar
decisions (or assumptions?).

For example, the early 1990s vintage DEC VAXstation 3100 had a
limitation of 1GB for the system disk. This was because the boot PROM
used SCSI "Group 0" commands, which allow a 21 bit block number - the
first 1fffff hexidecimal blocks (1.073 GB) of the disk.

OTOH, the NT 4.0 installation process had a software limitation of 2GB
max on a fresh install. IIRC, you could preformat a disk or partition >
2GB using NTFS and install to that, but the installation disks could not
format an NTFS drive/partition greater than 2GB.

I am sure others can relate similar restrictions over the years with
various hardware and software products.
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility 

I uses iDefrag (25Euros) on MacOSX10.4.3 (HFS+ Journalled volumes) and
find it excellent. I have also removed the various languages from the
/Applications which also helped a great deal. I personally recommend
defragmenting and optimizing all volumes MacOSX or MacOS9 every 6 months.
I have an 80GB HD divided into 3 volumes with 10.4.3 on one and 10.3.9 on
another

James
 >> Stay informed about: wanting a defrag utility