3 hours ago, ICPilot said:
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I have noticed when I also start this process the de fragged hard drive, becomes more fragmented. Probably just let the drive defrag and not work with free space de fragmentation. I wonder why this is a feature set. What is it useful for?
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That's correct - because you have specified "Defrag Freespace (allow fragmentation)" .
That is known as a consolidation (or compaction) defrag where the purpose is to cram all of your files into the smallest number of clusters possible, to free up as many full clusters as possible.
To do that and totally fill up the least number of clusters some files have to be split across clusters, ie. deliberately fragmented to squeeze them in.
And that is what you are doing by using Defrag Freespace (allow fragmentation).
(You could also use Defrag Freespace without the "allow fragmentation" which would do the best it can to fill the clusters without fragmenting files).
It is what most people generally tend to think of as defragging, because it is what was wanted in the 'old days' when we all had much smaller drives.
But nowadays as we all tend to have much bigger drives then consolidation/compaction is not realy needed so much. There are lots of free clusters anyway.
Although there are times when you still might want to do it.
And of course with a large drive a full drive consolidation will take a long time because the defragmenter has to look at every cluster on the drive.
So with todays lage drives many of us tend to use a 'File Defragment' to simply get each of our files into one piece each so that they load a tiny bit faster, without bothering just where they are on the disc.
It's also a lot quicker with large drives to do a file defrag than a whole disc consolidation.
By default Defraggler does a mixture of both types of defrag - but you can specify one type or the other.
A consolidation defrag is what you are currently doing by using Defrag Freespace, especially with the "(allow fragmentation)" option.
To do a file defrag instead of a consolidation defrag:
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Open defraggler and analyse the drive.
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Click on 'View Files' or click on the 'Files' tab.
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Select the tickbox at the top of the list to select everything found.
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Click on 'Defrag Checked'.
That will just defragment the files without trying to consolidate the whole drive.
So it will be much quicker and use less resources.
Like any tool that can be used in multiple ways what you get out of Defraggler depends on knowing how to use it in the best way to suit you.
I think in your place I'd probably continue with the Defrag Freespace, just so it's been done. (although I'd probably do it without the "allow fragmentation" option).
Then once that consolidation/compaction is done I'd do a file defrag to get the fragmented files back into one piece each, and then only do file defrags from then on.