Defrag freespace before or after defrag?

[DanielJG]

Which is better or does it not matter?

[redhawk]

You must defrag before defragging freespace, the reason being files that are defragged are moved about to become contiguous this process would ultimately lead to a decrease in freespace.

 

Richard S.

[Aethec]

I don't see your point, redhawk.

I think the opposite is better since defragging free space usually ends up in having a lot of fragmented files

[redhawk]

It depends on whether you use Defraggler's option "Defrag freespace" or "Defrag freespace (allow fragmentation).

Obviously if you use the latter option then yes fragmentation would increase but I'm talking about defrag freespace (don't fragment).

 

Considering a file system which is 50% used but due to fragmentation data is scattered from start to end of the disk at 80%

If you defrag freespace then 80% of scatter maybe compacted down to 50% but the problem remains that files are still badly fragmented.

When you defrag files the Windows API looks for areas of the disk that contains enough contiguous space for them to be moved into.

It's this moving of files as part of the defragging process that create gaps and impact on the overall percentage of freespace.

 

Now if you defragged first all file fragments are aligned and there are gaps between each file.

You defrag freespace, Defraggler (I assume) looks at all the gap sizes and calculates the best files to be moved into these spaces.

Once Defragger has finished the task all files are contiguous and the gaps are filled to the best of what it could find to fill them.

It's never possible to fill the gaps completely since it's unlikely to find files to fit them exactly, this is why Defragger has the option "Defrag freespace (allow fragmentation)" filling the gaps at the expense of fragmentation.

 

So as you can see for a smarter organised file system you should always defrag first then defrag freespace later not the other way around.

 

Richard S.

[Aethec]

Having a fragmented free space will not reduce the amount of free space available

[redhawk]

It depends on your definition of freespace I personally see it as the space that can be used to store large files without causing fragmentation.

If your files are scattered around the disk but not fragmented then you're making it harder for Windows to store files contiguously resulting in higher file fragmentation than if you defragged freespace.

Personally I never really bother with it however it can be useful in situations such as having low disk space and trying to defragging c:\pagefile.sys

 

Richard S.

[Tasgandy]

It depends on your definition of freespace I personally see it as the space that can be used to store large files without causing fragmentation.

If your files are scattered around the disk but not fragmented then you're making it harder for Windows to store files contiguously resulting in higher file fragmentation than if you defragged freespace.

Personally I never really bother with it however it can be useful in situations such as having low disk space and trying to defragging c:\pagefile.sys

 

Richard S.

So Redhawk are you saying that you don't defrag freespace?

 

Are you also saying it is not necessary?

 

The reason I ask is that I do not know anything about "defraging freespace", I for many years have simply defragmented all my hard drives on a weekly basis.

[Aethec]

Well, defragging free space should prevent files from being too much fragmented. Theoretically

[redhawk]

So Redhawk are you saying that you don't defrag freespace?

 

Are you also saying it is not necessary?

I do defrag freespace I just don't make a habit of it because it's time consuming and doesn't offer really any performance benefits.

It does however help to defrag large files such as c:\pagefile.sys that would normally fail if you're low on contiguous freespace.

 

Richard S.