Boot Quicker

Hybrid drives and do I need a hybrid drive defrag

Tuesday, July 13, 2010 by Joe Abusamra

Hybrid drives use the fundamentals of a hard drive, but add additional capability with RAM or an SSD for increased performance. Wikipedia gives the following definition:

A hybrid drive, hybrid hard drive (HHD), or hybrid hard disk drive (H-HDD) is a type of large-buffer computer hard disk drive. It is different from standard hard drives in that it integrates a cache using non-volatile memory or even a small solid-state drive (SSD). Although the cache typically uses non-volatile flash memory, some drives use battery-backed volatile RAM (a hybrid RAM disk). The flash memory buffer can speed up repeated reads to the same location; a RAM buffer speeds both reads and writes, but must be written to backup storage when power is lost.

Benefits of hybrid drives can include decreased power consumption and heat generation, the ability to boot quicker via faster boot times and faster PC startup, decreased noise, improved reliability, and improved performance.

But there are drawbacks too. Such as lower performance for non-cached data and small disk writes. They are more expensive than regular hard drives and don't last as long. There may actually be more noise and power usage in some cases. And importantly, recover-ability of data can be problematic.

Hybrid drive, hybrid drive defrag or SSD defrag

Well, once you've look at all the considerations and do your research, if you do end up with a hybrid, what about defragmentation - do you need a defrag program for your hybrid drive? The short answer is -- yes.

As for the why, it's due to the fact that at the core of a hybrid drive is a good ol' fashion hard disk drive. So just think - if you need to a defrag utility to defrag hard drive, defrag metadata and defrag, you'll need to defrag a hybrid drive -- because a good portion of it is a hard drive. The reading and writing - and therefore the modifying, adding and deleting that causes fragmentation -- ultimately occurs on the hard drive itself. And that had drive is where the NTFS file system resides, along with all its peculiarities and problems.

A lot of activity may occur in a RAM drive (or now, SSD), but when this happens, periodically the data is moved to the hard drive. This periodic flushing of the data occurs within the controller and is determined by the drive manufacturer. But once it ends up on the hard drive, it's prone to fragmentation just like a non-hybrid drive.

Hybrid drive defrag? Yes, and use your best defrag software, as always.

Related Posts:

SSD overview and do I need an SSD defrag -- Part 1
SSD overview and do I need an SSD defrag -- Part 2

New life -- for your laptop and your laptop's battery: smart defrag and more

Monday, June 14, 2010 by Joe Abusamra

I admit, in the day-to-day living of running around and trying to get things done here in the midst of travel and other comings and goings, it's often a challenge to do all the best practices to keep my laptop living as long and efficiently as it can. Of course, I defrag system files and defrag Windows 7 with the best defrag software I know of. That's like getting a PC tuneup every day so my laptop runs as fast as possible and I boot quicker.

But what about the life of the battery itself? I always need to be reminded of the many tips there are to extend battery life, so when I was looking through the new July issue of PC World, the article Breathe New Life Into Your Laptop's Battery got my attention. The usual reminders were there to nag me:

don't run it down
keep it cool
give it a rest
and more, including a nice set of "myths" debunked.

It also made me feel good that my choice for best defrag software includes a Power Option that allows me to stop a current defrag pass, as well as not even start a defrag pass, if my laptop is on battery power. My selections get checks for those boxes! So if it seems like you're constantly coming and going, and starting and stopping, it's a wise move to follow extended battery life practices.

And keep it cool.

From Motorola -- Windows 7 defrag -- real world, real family...real money saved

Tuesday, April 20, 2010 by Joe Abusamra

Kevin Maharaj, of Hayward, California, is a business consultant at Motorola. He has a 5-year old Dell Inspiron 9300 laptop, which is used by his entire family. With all that use over all those years, it became slower and slower. Kevin writes: "I tried everything I could, even defragged but nothing worked...it was just to slow."

Slow PC problems were getting the best of the Maharaj family. He needed to try something new to speed up PC performance. Time to look for the best defrag tool. Kevin "found out that PerfectDisk 11 was released so I tried it. PerfectDisk 11 has this enhanced SMARTPlacement feature. The thing is, that it defragged my laptop SO WELL...SO WELL!"

Not only did he improve PC performance and the laptop can now boot quicker, perhaps the best news is that Kevin can hold on to his laptop. "This is a 5-year old laptop and absolutely no need to upgrade."

Improve PC performance. Boot quicker. Defrag Windows 7 a better way. Protect your investment and save money.

Get smart.

IT warming up to Windows 7 -- remember to auto defrag XP and Windows 7

Thursday, April 8, 2010 by Joe Abusamra

Dimensional Research recently surveyed 923 IT professionals about their Windows operating system adoption plans, and the indication is that the trend away from XP and towards Windows 7 is at least starting. Gregg Keizer, writing in Computerworld (April 5, 2010), states that "business are finally prying their hands from Windows XP and they warm to Windows 7. The feeling about how great XP has been is beginning to fade.

In Dimensional's new study, 40% of the respondents said that they're worried about the hassles of maintaining XP as it gets more and more outdated. That's up from 28% almost a year ago. And while 60% of the respondents said they're worried about the cost and overhead of migrating to Windows 7, that number is down from 72% last year. The study stated that "IT is still more worried about Windows 7 than XP, but the trend is favoring Windows 7."

As I and many others expected, it's just a matter of time. And in terms of defragmenting computer, PerfectDisk has it all covered. From auto defrag XP to a certified Windows 7 defrag, you can get the best disk defrag from PerfectDisk and speed up PC performance and boot quicker.

From the past to the present...and whatever is to come.

Boot quicker -- Speed up boot times with smarter boot time defrag

Thursday, January 21, 2010 by Joe Abusamra

Want to speed up your boot time? We're often asked how to make people's PCs boot quicker. There are a couple of options within PerfectDisk to do so:

Let PerfectDisk Manage:

This option is the recommended option and is selected by default . If selected, PerfectDisk optimizes the location of the files needed to start your computer. This decreases the time necessary to reboot your computer, so you boot quicker. If not managed by the Operating System or PerfectDisk, your computer could become unbootable if a file needed to boot the system is moved beyond the BIOS limit of your computer. This is a subset of the files listed in the layout.ini file (i.e. only those needed to boot the operating system).

Let PerfectDisk Manage all layout.ini files:

The file stores every file that is accessed from the moment you power up your computer to one minute after the desktop appears. By placing files on the disk in the exact order recorded in the layout.ini file, your machine boots faster. With all Windows versions starting with Windows XP through Windows 7, Microsoft includes a prefetch routine, which reads this file and loads the files in memory prior to them being needed. In this way, the operating system can access the files faster during boot up. If selected, PerfectDisk defragments and places all the files listed in the layout.ini file in order, starting at the beginning of your disk. This list contains all files loaded by Windows from the second you turn on your computer until about 1 minute after the desktop appears. This list not only contains the files needed to boot, but also the applications you routinely start after the system has booted.

Boot quicker and get to work...or play.

Defrag of system files

Wednesday, December 2, 2009 by Joe Abusamra

One way PerfectDisk stands out is its ability to defragment all system files (including all NTFS metadata). System files are the designation that PerfectDisk uses to identify important files that the operating system uses at runtime to operate your PC. These include the Windows paging file (pagefile.sys), the hibernation file used to support sleep mode on desktop Windows PCs (hiberfile.sys).

Depending on whether or not the drive is a system drive, or some other drive that PerfectDisk can’t lock, offline file defragmentation may or may not run on the drive(s). As long as PerfectDisk can lock a drive for exclusive access at runtime, it will defragment system files immediately. But for a Windows system disk or any other locked drive — one, for example, where a paging file might reside in a whole or in part — attempts to defragment system files at runtime will usually fail.

These files are then defragmented if the drive is not locked. Otherwise, this occurs at boot time. PerfectDisk locks the drive for its own exclusive use, so it can then defragment and move files the operating system would otherwise not allow to be altered. So, a boot time defrag is really only mandatory for drives that cannot be locked at run time.

Occassionally when you schedule a boot time defrag pass in PerfectDisk, it doesn’t work. This is because PerfectDisk is unable to lock the drives during boot time, so the system gets booted without the defrag pass getting executed. When this happens, it is almost always because a third-party program has modified the BootExecute registry key so that PDBoot.exe (the name of the PerfectDisk boot time defragmentation executable file) is no longer the first entry in its value string. This entry must occur first in that key for boot time defrag to run correctly. Another possibility is that a third-party software product has opened the drive for write access before PDBoot.exe can mount the drive for exclusive access. If the drive is open for write access, PerfectDisk will not run a boot time/offline defrag in order to avoid potential damage to or corruption of system files.

All system files…to complete the drive and boot quicker.

Defrag for Windows 7 -- "Raxco Software has outdone itself again"

Thursday, November 5, 2009 by Joe Abusamra

It's what we try to do with every release of our software. It's what our entire company -- from development to technical support to customer service to account managers -- sets out to do every morning as we walk through the door. Do better than we did yesterday.

For defrag downloads, today I came across a new PerfectDisk 10 Pro editor's review on the Windows 7 Download website, which provides "the best free Windows 7 downloads." The review states that with PerfectDisk, "whether you are downloading movie files or manipulating jpegs on your machine, you will find that the speed of your computer stays at its maximum performance level. If you are tired of your programs hanging or your software coming up with countless errors, PerfectDisk 10 Professional can assure you of optimum execution."

The editor continues: "...Raxco Software has outdone itself again with this nifty piece of optimizing software. Installation is simple and navigation is uncomplicated and straightforward. PerfectDisk 10 Pro is a follow-up to its predecessor that was released in 2008 that is proving to be faster and more reliable in its functionality. The fact that it has included compatibility with Windows 7 is already a plus to many since it is obviously up-to-date and at par with other developments in the tech world.

"PerfectDisk 10 Pro also offers a defragmentation system that accommodates mini applications that maximize space management by effectively taking care of temporary and duplicate files in your PC. Perfect Disk 10 Professional is definitely a big improvement from the last release, which was already impressive when it was introduced back then. For those thinking of an optimizing defragmenter for their PC, you can be sure never to go wrong with this Raxco product that will take care of your PC internal optimizing needs."

To defrag Windows 7, there's the Microsoft defrag and the other usual suspects. But as the review points out, a basic disk defrag program doesn't give you all the power, flexibility and thoroughness of PerfectDisk. And when you then add capabilities like disk space management and the ability to boot quicker, you end up with a whole lot more.

You will have outdone yourself. You can see the full review here.

Windows 7 defrag certification -- only here

Tuesday, October 27, 2009 by Joe Abusamra

When looking to Windows defrag software for Windows 7, there are various defrag programs to choose from and decisions you need to make. Do you want to be able to do a boot time defrag in order to defrag metadata? Is free space consolidation important? Do you want to boot quicker? Are you running any disk cleanup tools? Are you going to defrag Exchange databases?

There may be many more questions and requirements. Or your list for choosing between defrag programs might be short and sweet - you want a faster computer. One criteria that many people look for is certification from Microsoft. To some, it's just a "feel good" thing. To others, it's critical. And to some, it means nothing.

To us, it's important. We know there are many people that look to certification from Microsoft. And we know that many businesses have a requirement that they will only run certified applications. So PerfectDisk is certified by Microsoft for Windows 7.

In reviewing a disk defrag program, you might ask yourself why a particular product is not certified by Microsoft. For example, one area that Microsoft focuses on is overly-intrusive installations and snap-ins to the operating system - if a disk defragmentation tool is overly intrusive, Microsoft won't cerify the product. Look, with all the positive feedback Microsoft has garnered from Windows 7, it is not about to put a stamp of approval on an application that takes away from the positive user experience people are receiving from the new OS. Microsoft also made changes to the boot process in Windows 7, and we modified PerfectDisk to address these changes.

So one can choose to tell the world that certification doesn't matter and the fact that a program just works with Windows 7 is good enough.

We choose a different path for our users -- no risk.