Hi Glenn, What does it do??? It interrupts FS and that's bad! :-) No, seriously, I wouldn't have the slightest idea! :-) All I see is a periodic call to the HDs - I guess? You can kill the process in the OS' Task Manager. If it's running, you'll quickly see it (it's OO-something). You might have surpressed it already using msconfig? Kind regards Jaap

I did kill it using MSCONFIG, but then O&O refuses to start.I think I will just add it into FSAutostart to shut down and restart when FS is running.Thanks!Glenn

>>I think I will just add it into FSAutostart to shut down and restart when FS is running.<< There ya go, Glenn. And welcome. :-) You could always start the module prior to your weekly/monthly defrag or whenever you installed a lot of data. Control Panel --> Services, should be there. HST, I don't understand why O&O doesn't allow this option to be set the other way around (calling the service when you want to run the program instead of running it permanently)? It's a bit in contrast to what buyers will want to achieve IMHO. If you want to experiment, leave it running and you'll see the HD-LED flash every 60 seconds. RegMon or ProcessExplorer by SysInternals will reveal when it's triggered. The more partitions, the 'harder' the interrupt. FWIW, I wouldn't defrag too frequently as there's always a risk and this puts a lot of strain on the disk(s). Cheers and kind regards Jaap

Thanks for all the info.I have now set the paging file size to twice my ram, and all seems good. I have been running O&O for quite a while and it is GREAT. Instead of using msconfig to stop the service, I found services.msc to be the way to get it stopped for good. Just go to start, run, and then type services.msc - arrange the processes by name, click on the O&O one and select stop service, I also change it to manual so it only runs in the backround when I want it to.Thanks again, the overall smoothness was what I was after, and thats what I got.BTW I just went from 1 gig of ram to 2! What a difference, this sim was made for 2. I have not managed to use over 1300megs of ram at one time, so no need to go 3. All is good, and im not touching a thing!!!happy flying...Danon

Just my two cents on pagefiles. I've always used the same general setup.I have three 80GB drives, all SATA. Here's how I partitioned them.Drive 0:c: "XP" 30gbd: "Programs" 45gbDrive 1:e: "Storage1" 30gbf: "Games" 45gbDrive 2:g: "Storage2" 70gbh: "SWAP" 5gb (swap file locked at 4gb min and max)Here, when running FSX, all three drives would be utilized as the os, game, and swap partitions are all active. Notice too, that the swap file is AT THE END of the drive. By keeping the all important swap file near the end of the drive, your maximizing data throughput.I can't fully explain how this is so, but if you imagine an old vinyl LP spinning on a record player, how much 'data' was the needle actually seeing in a single revolution on a track near the middle as opposed to near the edges? The needle sees much more surface space per revolution on the outermost tracks. Vinyl compromised, the outermost tracks were shallower (the sound data) and less compact, spaced out. The inner tracks had tighter data with larger angled peaks and crests. As the disk played from start to finish, the actual sound data compressed more and more so that the record didn't have to keep speeding up as it got closer to the middle.... to maintain the same amount of area the needle covers per revolution.Hard disks don't compromise. The amount of data held on an inside track is a whole lot less than an outer track. Therefore in a single revolution you are able to read a whole lot more data on an outer track.Anyways, I hope part of that made sense. I'm pretty sick with the flu and this Nyquil thing is taking it's toll. If you study Hard Disk operations, drive geometry and all that you'll get the idea. Again, this is why I have my swap file at the END of a free drive, it's only other use is to store backups of any important documents.

but if you imagine an old vinyl LP spinning on a record player, how much 'data' was the needle actually seeing in a single revolution on a track near the middle as opposed to near the edges? The needle sees much more surface space per revolution on the outermost tracks.That sounds logical... until one takes into account the time it takes for the "needle" to travel out to the outer tracks. That travel time is alot longer on a hard drive than the rate of travel during platter spin.Greg

Actually, it travels to the outer tracks faster than it does the innermost tracks, simply because any time the drive is idle, the heads will move off the platter or towards a predefined nulled edge of the platter. The 'needle' is already at the outside of the disk.When you talk about hard disks, the first data is stored on the innermost areas, moving outwards. When you install Windows on a blank drive it actually writes the data to the innermost tracks first (start of the drive).... this means that the read head actually has to travel from the edge of the drive all the way to the center pretty much to read the data.So yeah, basically keeping data at the end of the drive (outermost tracks) you are keeping that data near where the heads 'park' themselves when idle.... response time is heightened here.

>>I have three 80GB drives, all SATA. Here's how I partitioned them.Drive 0:c: "XP" 30gbd: "Programs" 45gbDrive 1:e: "Storage1" 30gbf: "Games" 45gbDrive 2:g: "Storage2" 70gbh: "SWAP" 5gb (swap file locked at 4gb min and max)<< That looks like a pretty adventurious setup, Kev. Apart from Greg's speed mention, slicing harddrives is in contradiction with at least 2 further things (as far as I would dare to judge). First item, the OS calculates the MFT in relation to the free space (= nice to have a lot of free space). ;-) The other is XP's prefetch function. AFAIK, it doesn't work on D-X. Maybe there's a workaround? Another thought might be, Vista is peeking around the corner? Vista = less user control and it might be time, that users get used sticking to default locations? Personally, I think this has some very practical side-effects. I'm for example cautiously optimistic, that screw-ups through user intervention will decrease. :-) Windows security comes at a price too. If Vista updates don't behave like this http://forums.xbox.com/7864073/ShowPost.aspxit's probably going to be a nice OS... ...in a years time. :-) Cheers and kind regards Jaap Edit, just saw the PDMG MD11, much too complicated for me... :-) One thing missing at flightsim conferences over and over... and we do have in FSX.... ....birds!! :-) My bird thinks we're total nutters! :-)

>>Actually, it travels to the outer tracks faster than it does the innermost tracks, simply because any time the drive is idle, the heads will move off the platter or towards a predefined nulled edge of the platter. The 'needle' is already at the outside of the disk.When you talk about hard disks, the first data is stored on the innermost areas, moving outwards. When you install Windows on a blank drive it actually writes the data to the innermost tracks first (start of the drive).... this means that the read head actually has to travel from the edge of the drive all the way to the center pretty much to read the data.So yeah, basically keeping data at the end of the drive (outermost tracks) you are keeping that data near where the heads 'park' themselves when idle.... response time is heightened here.<< I fear it's the other way around, Kev. Kind regards Jaap Edit, sorry for cross posting.

it's probably going to be a nice OS... ...in a years time.LOL Jaap. I'm anxiously awaiting the change over to Vista... in a years time. Hopefully they'll have it sorted by then.Greg

I ran RC1 for a month or so and was very happy with the OS and it's performance in comparison to XP. The only reason I pulled it off this machine was because I thought I could achieve better frame rates with the XP NVidia backbone... which didn't help any. I'll be going back to Vista Dec 5th though :)btw: Poster was right, I was drunk or something.... tracks start on the outside and work their way in.