Defraggler fragmented more files than when it started

[2MC]

Hello all, and Happy New Year...

 

 

Defraggler v1.15.163 fragmented more than when started (Move Large Files to End of Drive option)

 

Before I started a defrag, I had about 2Gb fragmented files on the drive.

I set Defraggler option to Move large files > 1Gb to end of drive, which it did overnight, but is now reporting 40Gb of fragmented files.

Some of those now have more than 100 fragments each.

So, it looks like its actually made the drive much worse.

 

So, I un-ticked the Move option, and Selected ALL those fragmented files in the list and clicked Defrag Checked, and it completed a full 100% defrag with zero fragmented files and not a red square in sight.

Everything looked ok but had moved these files back into various contiguous free parts of the map.

 

So, I thought I would do the Move Large files option again > 1Gb, and sure enough it did move the large files but again, left them in a massively fragmented state again just like before with BLOOD RED squares strewn all over the end part of the map.

 

I dont really understand the behaviour of the Move Large Files option if it leaves them in a fragmented state.

I hope I have explained what I did, and hope you can see the results, so is this normal ?

 

many thanks

 

2MC (XP SP3 200Gb MAXTOR SATA drive with 80Gb Free)

[norel]

Fragmentation at the end of the drive isn't really anything to worry about. It doesn't look very nice, but theoretically those files are never used so spaces and fragmentation aren't as big of a deal. But it sounds like yours is pretty excessive. You might try running two or three cycles with the 'Move' option left on; sometimes it takes that for it to figure out exactly where everything goes. Each successive run should be faster than the one before it.

 

To me moving large files to the end, 'archiving' as it's sometimes called, is more trouble than it's worth; it never seems to work quite as well as if you just let Defraggler do it's thing and put everything where it wants to on the outer tracks. Just because files are large that doesn't necessarily mean they're never used. Putting them at the end can actually worsen performance.

 

Good luck.