Keep a Tidy Disk: Do the Defrag

15/10/2009

The ‘typical’ office worker’s filing cabinet is not dissimilar to a hard disk – the more things that get hastily thrown into it, the harder stuff gets to find. Lucky for us, computers can have a tidy up without us rifling through them.

The computing concept of files and folders exists mainly for our benefit – so that we can store and locate files in a similar way to how we might do so in real life. But the way the files actually get stored on the hard disk drive could be completely different – we only control how things appear to be arranged, not how they’re really arranged.

So the good news here is that if you have a messy desk and a “My Documents” folder to match, it’ll have no impact on how messy your actual disk is. It may be harder for you to find files, but not the computer.

However, over time, as files get created, edited and deleted, their arrangement on the disk starts to get disorderly. The system finds space where it can to add new data, sometimes splitting files up into chunks that are spread across the disk; an effect known as fragmentation. The more a file is fragmented, the longer it takes to locate and fetch it. It’s like ripping up a document and scattering it throughout a filing cabinet, only to locate each piece later and stick them back together… and that would be silly (trust us, we did it once and it was silly, so very silly).

The solution to fragmentation is a process called – wait for it – de-fragmentation. “Defragging” is the process of looking at the arrangement of files on a disk and moving them around so that files are all in one piece and located in the most sensible place on disk. This often includes moving the most commonly used files to the fastest part of the disk.

Sounds great, right? There are two catches. Firstly, it can take a while – moving hundreds of files around on a disk isn’t the speediest of operations. Secondly, it’s a bit of a chore – you have to remember to do it! The good news is, the more often you defrag, the less time it takes, so a regular defrag regime makes things quicker at little cost.

So, how to defrag? Windows has its own defrag utility. There are several ways to get to it, all of which are explained by Microsoft. But there are other programs too – some paid for and others free – that offer defrag, plus extra features.

MyDefrag is a free de-fragmentation tool that runs on just about any Windows version and any type of disk. It provides options that let you trade off time taken against performance improvement, so it can handle a quick tidy-up or a lengthy optimisation.

Another free and popular tool is Defraggler, which has a similar feature set and supports scheduling, so you can stick to a defrag regime without even having to think about it. It can be run from a USB flash drive too, which is useful if you have more than one computer and want to clean them all up in a jiffy.

If you’re after a paid-for program then one option is O&O defrag. It’s been around a while and is now at version 12. It’s got 8 different ways of defragging and can run in screen-saver mode, meaning whenever the system is unused, it sets to work on speeding itself up.

The performance boost from a defrag is rarely earth shattering, but a badly fragmented disk can make applications load slowly and make for a sluggish system. A tidy disk combined with a few simple upgrades can give you a speedy machine that gives you some spare time in which to tidy up those folders… or your desk… or the filing cabinet… or maybe just go for a coffee…