minotaur
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Posts posted by minotaur
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^ yup no better or worse than others.
Anyway, the religious/political/idealogical backgrounds of manufacturers is not a criteria when I purchase stuff, otherwise I'd literally be living like a caveman.....
Diskeeper simply works great only my systems, and I shall continue to use it.
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I've often run Ccleaner right after running the native windows disk cleanup utility, and CC hasn't found much more to remove, which leads me to believe that the windows utility itself does a decent job.
I never use it or any other app for registry 'cleaning'.
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If you perform a full format then the write head magnetize all the data bits on the platters.So if they where not properly magnetized it can restore them.
This means that it's good idea to perform a full format especially on a new or old drive.
I don't think that is true. If any program claims to be able to 'refresh' the 'grains' (collection of magnetic domains) of the magnetic thin film coating of the platter, then it's a false claim. The magnetization of the grain (corresponding to the 'bit') is a materials property and the fields strengths required for that are carefully calibrated by the drive manufacturer and precisely applied by the read/write head. No software can change this, to the best of my knowledge.
As for defrag, once the files are defragged, then there is no 'too much defrag' since there is nothing to defrag, so there is no wear & tear on the drive. A defragmented file will not fragment unless it's modified and cannot expand contiguously.
I too use Diskeeper 2009 auto defrag, and it doesn't defrag every single time the system is idle, only if it's necessary i.e. usually for a few minutes a day. Hardly any stress on the drive, and it reduces the number of seeks for reading the same file (compared to the fragmented state). Ofcourse, I have added temporary file directories such as my Opera browser cache to the file exclusion list since there is no point defragging those; so Diskeeper ignores those.
Remember, the drive is always working as soon as the system is turned on. The platters are always spinning, and something is always going on in the background...indexing, superfetch, pagefile, log files etc etc., yet drives don't die because of this. Drives die either due to construction/QC problems (early failure) or due to poor environmental conditions like dust, heat, vibration, shock etc. So ensure that the drive is running cool and stable, to get some decent life out of it.
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Yes, defrag times are highly unpredictable. Some of the variables are
-speed of the drive itself
-volume of fragmented files
-size of the fragmented files (moving larger files obviously takes longer)
-type of fragmented files. eg ...system files like the page file (and MFT for most defraggers) cannot be moved online, and they also form barriers to other file movements.
-disk activity from other applications
-CPU usage
-fragmented free space
-available free space.
-and very importantly, the defraggers algorithms. Some are clearly faster than others.
So predicting defrag times is a hit or miss affair.
That said, I use Diskeeper 2009 Pro on my XP machines, and it's always left on auto defrag (defrags only in the background using idle cycles) so defrag times are not an issue for me. It's a great set and forget solution.
BTW, defragging an external HDD will take a long time because of the slow USB interface that is much slower than the internal IDE/SATA standard, so expect long defrag times. Another factor is that unless the external drive is heavily fragmented, the USB interface is more likely to be the bottleneck than anything else.
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If you install Diskeeper, you don't need to worry about the built-in XP defrag, it is automatically superseded.
I use Diskeeper 2009 Pro, and all defragmentation tasks have been taken over by Diskeeper on my system...even when I right-click->tools->defrag, it's diskeeper that pops up.
To the OP: don't bother with removing the xp defragger, you can just choose not to run it.
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I am not sure I understood some of the stuff because SSDs are generally *much* faster than HDDs for sequential/random reads and sequential writes. Where they falter is at random writes, and some software solutions are already available to address that to an extent.
http://downloads.diskeeper.com/pdf/HyperFast.pdf
Operational longevity of SSDs is ofcourse yet to be determined.
The OS has no hand in organizing data physically on the disk...that is done by the disk's controller. OS organizes data only at a logical level.
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Does anyone play UT3 anymore? I still have my retail copy that I bought as soon as it was released...I must have spent a grand total of 10 hours on it before putting it aside due to the dull maps and lack of servers (at that time).
Maybe time to revisit it....
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I voted for Diskeeper. Would have specifically selected the 2009 Pro version if that option was there. It's the best defragger I've come across..set and forget...never worry about defragging.
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I voted for COD:MW on the PC.
COD4 was one of my most played MP games of all time, second perhaps only to Day of Defeat (the original).
I don't own consoles and I haven't played COD:WAW. I don't think I have the strength to play another WW-II shooter.
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..or Diskeeper which it's based on (they strat to freak out at 15% free space or so)
Probably on the older versions; the new Diskeepers don't have that issue. I am currently testing the trial version of Diskeeper 2009 Pro and it fully defragged a 250GB drive with only 5% free space when I tried it. I created some fragmentation by deleting some files and adding new files until the space was only 5% and turned on the auto defrag before going to bed. Next morning the drive was fully defragged!!
This was on a drive with relatively static files (photos/torrents) but I would not recommend that any OS drive be filled up to the 90-95% mark though. Performance is bound to suffer regardless of fragmentation.
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I agree 71 C on the CPU is on the hot side. The south bridge also seems to be running hot at 66 on idle.
Have you checked if the CPU's HSF is correctly installed and the fan cable is plugged into the mobo?
Could be a problem with insufficient cooling in the case. Open up the case and test the rig once again with a desktop/pedestal fan blowing air at the components.
As for the PSU, FSP used to be a decent brand atleast a few years ago. I used one of their 350W units for a couple of years without any problems.
I don't know if the 9800GT uses more power than the 8800GT but as a rough guide I ran a E6550 + mobo + 2GB + 2 HDDs + DVDROM + soundcard + 8800GT on a coolermaster 450W RealPower unit for more than a week without any problems, last year.
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I am not sure if this'll work but if if your video card has a Video-In/Video-Out function port, you may be able to connect the output of the VCR to the card and watch/transcode/capture the video? Back in the day, I had a Leadtek 7800GT with the VIVO function; and it was claimed in the manual that I could connect an external source like a TV box and capture the video. But i never used it even once so I don't know how well it worked.
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I've never used it on Vista 64-bit personally, but Diskeeper 2009 Pro may do the job, since it supports x64.
http://www.diskeeper.com/diskeeper/home/dk...chart-home.aspx
I have v2009 installed on XP Pro 32 bit, and it's excellent.
I used to run the older 2008 Pro version back when I had Vista 32-bit and used it's VSS defrag option to avoid conflict with restore points.
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I am at level 10, and I am loving every minute of this game. It's easily my game of the year.
Oblivion with guns and frickin "laser" beams, yeah!
EDIT: I just got the flamer, and I am having fun toasting the supermutants with it.
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N97 would be better if you go by the hardware specs, but since it's not released yet, there's no way of knowing. Wait for a few more months, and then we can find out if the touchscreen implementation of S60 on the N97 works properly or is buggy.
From what I heard, the Storm's UI is nothing to write home about.
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Indeed, what tool or command did you use to get that information?
if your defragger is not defragging the MFT even after multiple passes, then download and use the free limited-time trial version of Diskeeper from http://www.diskeeper.com
I use the full version on my XP desktop and it defrags the MFT without any problems whatsoever, and rarely is even a boot-time defrag required. The output it gives is quite different from the one you posted though...more like a conventional defrag analysis.
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Hi, thanks for all the replies.
I have tried defragmenting and it's currently set to do it every Wednesday.
Here are the specs:
Vista SP1
Home Premium
1.83GHz Core 2 Duo
2GB RAM
120GB 5400 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 1.5Gb/s
Mobile Intel 965
Now, I've turned on Aero basic so it's not taxing the GPU so much but what else can I do?
Those are decent specs to run Vista. When I had Vista 32 bit HP, I used to run it on a similar system, but with recent upgrades to 3 GB RAM and 500GB drive.
The extra 1 GB of RAM was very beneficial.
The larger drive was also very helpful since it was faster. But 120GB should be more than okay.
As for the rest of the stuff, some simple system maintenance may help.
-Disable unwanted background startup applications and processes that use a lot of CPU/RAM as suggested by the posters above.
-Run a full virus scan with latest definitions files. Same for spyware/trojans. I used to use AVG 8 and Spybot S&D on Vista, both worked great.
-Run a disk cleanup using the built-in utility. This won't help performance wise, but may clear up some disk space which is always good.
-Run a full disk defrag including defragging the MFT and page file if they are fragmented. Use a good defragmenter like Diskeeper. The free trial versions for the 2009 editions can now be downloaded from their site. Use it and defrag the drive....Diskeeper will do it really well.
Good luck.
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I recently bought Diskeeper 2008 Home Edition.
I'm sick and tired of manually (or even scheduling) a defrag.
Diskeeper created the original Windows Defrag API for Windows which is used by every other defragmenter.
If they made the foundation for defragmentation of the Windows operating system and they've been doing it since Windows came to be, then they obviously know the best way to do it.
I installed a couple games the other night and analyzed my drive with the (now freeware) UltimateDefrag 1.72 and everything is placed sequentially and contiguously from the outer-to-inner tracks and not one file is fragmented.
The only thing that may make me switch to PerfectDisk is that Diskeeper Home Edition has a HDD GB limit of 750GB and my OS drive (C:) is 500GB.
When the days comes that I have a 750GB or 1TB drive, I'd need to upgrade to a more expensive version of Diskeeper or switch to another.
PerfectDisk doesn't have any limits in this regard and does perform automatic defragmentation / file placement so I'll see what happens.
Diskeeper 2008 Pro user here, and happy with it's performance. Once again, I have been able to defrag another of my partitions (~160 GB) which holds thousands of mp3s, and digicam photos with less than 5% free space. I really like the background defrag feature too....don't ever have to think about defragging after installing DK. All the drives are nicely defragmented when I check up on them. The other apps advertise 'automatic' defrag, but none do it so smoothly or transparently as DK.
My largest drives currently are 500 GB each, and they are partioned into 250GB volumes, so I haven't hit the 768 GB volume limit yet. In fact, I am going to be putting in a 1 TB Samsung next month, but I am going to partition that as 2x 500GB. I find anything larger than 500GB a bit risky regarding file-system related data loss (yes, if the drive itself fails, everything goes, but that's a different story), so I am okay for the moment. Let's see what happens in the future..
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Yes, you need to have the Event Log Service running (left on automatic) to be able to use Diskeeper.
In any case, turning ELS off will not get you any noticeable performance benefit, as it takes up hardly any CPU time and memory.
My approach is to not disable any service unless it specifically gives trouble or eats up too much in the way of resources. I too hate resource hogs. In fact, Diskeeper itself runs as a service, but barely takes up any resources ..quite amazing considering what it does...a very tightly written program IMO.
BTW, is there any advantage in connecting the camera directly to the PC for file transfers? I haven't gone that route in a while....I always use an SD card reader...seems to be much faster that way.
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Remember: the longer the degramentation takes, the better the application is.
Well, not really- it also depends on the defrag engine. Windows XP defragger is dead slow but doesn't defrag all that well either. Also, I don't like to wait around for defrag to end before I can use the computer. My system has 1+ TB in it right now and will soon be 2TB, so defragging that on a schedule or manually is too much of a hassle for me. My automatic defragmenter does this stuff in the background, and I can use my PC simultaneously too. I like the auto defrag concept..very slick and convenient.
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I don't know if this meets your requirements, since I haven't used it myself, but I've heard good things about it.
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Wow, those are some awesome new features!
1% free space defrag
I suppose this is for the enterprise server editions. Any word on whether these new features will make their way to the desktop versions? I wandered over to the Diskeeper site, but there is nothing about DK 2008 yet. I would love to see a DK Pro 2008 with these new features!
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On a side note, I lost some data after UD - but that might be my fault - i did some other things at the same time.
GL
Wow! That's scary!
It shouldnt matter that you use the PC while defragging. The defragger should be intelligent enough to back off, and short of a catastrophic power failure or mechanical HDD failure while defragging, you shouldn't lose your data.
Thats why I like Diskeeper so much, it has never given me any headaches of any sort so far. I use my PCs normally (at home, and at work) with the autodefrag enabled, and DK doesnt do anything wierd or of concern at all, but defrags the drives whenever it gets the chance. Everyone has their preference of defraggers, and mine is DK by far.
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My Far Cry 2 benchmarks
in Gamers Hangout
Posted
'Fess up, you're an AI bot, aren't you.
Man...I usually give up as soon as the fps drops below 20. I almost gave up playing Oblivion the first time around because my system wouldn't run it above 20-22 fps. Had to spend hours tweaking it until I got it to run smoothly.