How often I should Defrag?

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Jun 22, 2018
137
Briefly explain your current issue(s)
How often should I defrag?
Steps taken to resolve, but have been unsuccessful
PerfectDisk
How often I should Defrag?

My DefragSoftware is Perfect Disk

Specs:
i7 4770k
GTX 1060 6GB
16GB DDR3 Memory
1x 60GB SSD DREVO X1 (Windows)
1x 500GB HDD WDBlack (Games)
1x 500GB external hard drive (Pictures - Videos - Etc)
 

xSploit

Level 1
Jul 7, 2012
38
Probably don't need to do it very often. However, it depends on use-case. Any drives that frequently get fragmented your efforts would be to use larger drives than continually defragmenting them. Defragmenting was always a catch-22. Drives that need defragmenting often are also flawed in that they refragment faster. Drives not needing defragmenting usually have lots of available space.

Note: Defragmentation does not improve performance on an SSD. So, make sure that you DO NOT defrag your SSD!
Why? Because defragmenting your SSD puts chunks of the same files next to each other to reduce access latency between "fetches". Access latency on SSDs is ~0 and they are susceptible to heavy writes.
 
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BoraMurdar

Community Manager
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Aug 30, 2012
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I think you should ditch any third party defrag tool as Windows 10 handles HDDs and SSDs very well. If defrag schedule is in place it will defrag and optimize (sort and consolidate frequently used files), and Microsoft suggests weekly defrags for HDDs. Again, it's individually dependent.
 
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Lightning_Brian

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Sep 1, 2017
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As @SumTingWong has said do not defrag SSDs. Never ever ever ever defrag SSDs as it shortens the life of those SSDs big time.

@BoraMurdar Is correct as well. Couldn't have said it better myself. I left Windows 10 do its thing. Only once in a great great while do I use a third party defrag utility, but even now I use that third party far less. Windows 10 is pretty good!

~Brian
 
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show-Zi

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Defragmentation has a slight improvement in use feeling and, in some cases, a risk that can become fatal injury. In recent circumstances where SSDs are prevalent, I feel that defragmentation is becoming a heritage act. I run defragmentation once a year, but that is not a practical intention, it's like an old custom.
 
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I

illumination

I think you should ditch any third party defrag tool as Windows 10 handles HDDs and SSDs very well. If defrag schedule is in place it will defrag and optimize (sort and consolidate frequently used files), and Microsoft suggests weekly defrags for HDDs. Again, it's individually dependent.
Agree with this 100%

Although would like to add, if the main GUI does not provide you with enough options that you would prefer, using the same Windows built in Defrag via cmd with Admin, allows for more granular control of defrag and types of.
 
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D

Deleted member 178

I think you should ditch any third party defrag tool as Windows 10 handles HDDs and SSDs very well. If defrag schedule is in place it will defrag and optimize (sort and consolidate frequently used files), and Microsoft suggests weekly defrags for HDDs. Again, it's individually dependent.
+1

You can defrag HDDs not SSDs....
SSD can be trimmed, which is the defrag equivalent
 
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Digerati

Level 7
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Mar 2, 2017
318
I agree with BoraMurdar - Windows knows how to manage and maintain disks (HDs and SSDs) just fine. 3rd party defrag programs just wastes disk space.

So just let Windows manage it. More important is to keep a big chunk of free disk space available on your drives. Don't pay attention to any advice that says you need some percent of the entire drive. That's a silly arbitrary number that has no basis in fact. You often seen people advise keeping anywhere from 10 to 30% free. That's just dumb! Note with inexpensive monster drives common today like this 4TB WD costing ~$100, that would mean setting aside a whopping 400GB to 1.2TB :eek: of space! What a waste! :rolleyes:

I generally recommend 20GB to 30GB, regardless the over all disk size. That is plenty of room for Windows to manage open files, temp files, the page file, and still have enough room to keep fragmentation (on HDs) in check.

SSD can be trimmed, which is the defrag equivalent
TRIM is a SSD optimization routine (which is why it is managed via Windows "Optimize Disk" feature, along with HD defragging routines) but it is not equivalent to hard disk defragmentation. TRIM is implemented as a "wear leveling" routine to distribute the number of "writes" across the entire SSD instead of just repeatedly writing to (and potentially wearing out) the same storage location over and over again. So TRIM will move file "segments" around, but it does not assemble those segments in any sort of defragged order. It just does not need to because of the way data is accessed on SSDs (electronically instead of mechanically).

So again, just to avoid confusion, SSD TRIM and HD defragging are both disk optimization procedures, but they are nothing alike in their purpose.
 
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SumTingWong

Level 28
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Apr 2, 2018
1,702
I agree with BoraMurdar - Windows knows how to manage and maintain disks (HDs and SSDs) just fine. 3rd party defrag programs just wastes disk space.

So just let Windows manage it. More important is to keep a big chunk of free disk space available on your drives. Don't pay attention to any advice that says you need some percent of the entire drive. That's a silly arbitrary number that has no basis in fact. You often seen people advise keeping anywhere from 10 to 30% free. That's just dumb! Note with inexpensive monster drives common today like this 4TB WD costing ~$100, that would mean setting aside a whopping 400GB to 1.2TB :eek: of space! What a waste! :rolleyes:

I generally recommend 20GB to 30GB, regardless the over all disk size. That is plenty of room for Windows to manage open files, temp files, the page file, and still have enough room to keep fragmentation (on HDs) in check.

TRIM is a SSD optimization routine (which is why it is managed via Windows "Optimize Disk" feature, along with HD defragging routines) but it is not equivalent to hard disk defragmentation. TRIM is implemented as a "wear leveling" routine to distribute the number of "writes" across the entire SSD instead of just repeatedly writing to (and potentially wearing out) the same storage location over and over again. So TRIM will move file "segments" around, but it does not assemble those segments in any sort of defragged order. It just does not need to because of the way data is accessed on SSDs (electronically instead of mechanically).

So again, just to avoid confusion, SSD TRIM and HD defragging are both disk optimization procedures, but they are nothing alike in their purpose.

I have to disagree with you. A full space SSD will not going to last long than an SSD with 10% space left. TRIM is only needed when your SSD is full, other than that, you don't need to TRIM your SSD at all if it is not full.
 
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Azure

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Oct 23, 2014
1,712
Guys, if the OP already bought Perfectdisk, then let him keep using it if he wants to.

Though, I would advice to be careful with the boot-time defrag, there was some issue with it in the past. Don’t know for certain if it was fixed but looking at the changelog, it seems it was.
 
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Question

Level 3
Thread author
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Jun 22, 2018
137
I have to disagree with you. A full space SSD will not going to last long than an SSD with 10% space left. This is why you see a lot of people installed OS on an SSD and storage data on HDD. TRIM is only needed when your SSD is full, other than that, you don't need to TRIM your SSD at all if it is not full.

So I should just uninstall PerfectDisk?
 
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