I use ultimate De-frag 4 but doesn't the one that comes with Microsoft tools get the job done just as well? Seems to with less hassle and it seems to work faster and you can set it up to d-frag automatically. Is there really any advantage to using the payware?

Knowledgeable advice appreciated.

Thanks,

Vic Green

You're referring to mechanical hard drives of course as SSD's should not be defraged.

 

Well this is something that will get the third party defrag tool fans raging but no, in my opinion not at all.

 

I don't sim any more but when I did and had mechanical drives I never, ever used those tools and guess what, my sim ran great.

 

A friend and I did carry out some experiments with a VERY popular tool that the sop called "sim guru's" raved about and we found no objective evidence whatsoever that there was any difference between that and the basic Windows 7 defrag tool.

 

Of course, you will get lots of people swearing blind that they work and work well, but none of them ever produce any definitive evidence that it's the case. All you get is "my sim ran better" and "it looked smoother to me" and "it felt better to me". Well feelings never tell us anything about reality, we need objective evidence and I've never seen any.

 

The placebo effect is very powerful and it's easy to fool ourselves into thinking there's an improvement when there isn't in reality. Especially when people who we regard as being in authority "tell us it's the case". well don't listen not unless they provide, not just hypothetical means by which they work, but provable, definitive fact, repeatable, measurable and capable of being replicated. 

 

Stand by for the defag utility fans to arrive and berate me.  :smile:

From a performance perspective, it's almost impossible to establish if any of the payware defraggers are better than the one that comes with Windows. I used to use the O&O version and couldn't see any difference. It had a lot more bells and whistles but didn't seem to noticeably speed up my system. I schedule the Windows 10 defragger and it seems to work well enough. You certainly get less HDD activity after defragging the first time so it should help loading the sim a little. Remember not to defrag any SSDs.

Solid State,,got two, never will go back to mech drive. 

I think that there was a time and a place that the right paid defrag program could have done a better job than the system provided defragger.  What I see happen relatively often is people neglect to consider changes that occur when new OS's are released.  Since Vista, the OS handles fragmentation differently than previous systems. When you think that hardware has also significantly changed (there was a day when HDD size was measured in Megs), and processor speeds have changed, and memory speeds and the way they function has changed, and it is no longer a world of "fragments are all that matter." 

 

To be succinct, on a Vista OS and above and specifically a W10 system, I would not pay for a 3rd-party defrag program or use any other defrag other than that provided. Cost vs. performance improvement (if any) isn't worth it, and if you get the wrong program, you are likely to make things worst.

I use ultimate De-frag 4 but doesn't the one that comes with Microsoft tools get the job done just as well? Seems to with less hassle and it seems to work faster and you can set it up to d-frag automatically. Is there really any advantage to using the payware?

Knowledgeable advice appreciated.

Thanks,

Vic Green

 

Ultimate Defrag 4 is far better than any defrag tool Microsoft has ever offered (and probably ever will).  Simply because UD4 is so much more configurable than the MS generic tool.  If UD4 isn't offering any sort of advantage over the MS tool then you should do yourself the favor of taking more time to study UD4 and how to configure it the way that is best for you.  I definitely would not mix the two tools... the MS tool will always make a mess of a well defragged, well managed UD4 drive.

 

Having said that... no spinning drive tool can ever come close to the performance a quality SSD offers.  And SSD's are becoming so cheap they're hard not to use.

 

Greg

Ultimate Defrag 4 is far better than any defrag tool Microsoft has ever offered (and probably ever will).  Simply because UD4 is so much more configurable than the MS generic tool.  If UD4 isn't offering any sort of advantage over the MS tool then you should do yourself the favor of taking more time to study UD4 and how to configure it the way that is best for you.  

Greg

 

 

 

And what does this "configurable" nature do for you? How does it improve the performance of your PC? If it doesn't improve performance then it's configurable nature is of little interest.

 

If it does improve performance then we would need to see proof. Not subjective opinion, definitive evidence. It's also worth remembering how good companies are when it comes to marketing. They often use all kinds of pseudo technical babble to fool us into thinking their products are awesome. Again, why proof is required.

 

Human beings are easily fooled. 

 

I use ultimate De-frag 4 but doesn't the one that comes with Microsoft tools get the job done just as well? Seems to with less hassle and it seems to work faster and you can set it up to d-frag automatically. Is there really any advantage to using the payware?

Knowledgeable advice appreciated.

 

No, you don't, Windows is doing that job for you (assuming you are running any Windows like Vista and above). And it's doing that job based on the statistics it took from your File/HDD usage in order to improve your access times on files and folders.

Using any 3rd-party defragger will just spoil this optimization. Save the money.

 

Cheers

Frank

I've had my HDDs fragment over time without caring much about it, have defragmented them with the built-in tool in Win7, and have used UD3 as a payware. Unable to spot any differences in start-up time, fps or blurries, despite the fact that UD allows to define which folders you want to be placed on the "faster" outer tracks (your sim installation, for example), and which ones on the "slower" inner tracks (archives, for example).

 

Reminds me of the bloating stuff some antivirus apps display.

May I suggest to have a look to IOBit SmartDfrag.

 

Freeware, but powerful. Scheduling, optimization, MFT defrag at boot time and more.

Just be careful during installation process, to check which options are selected (which would force other utilities to be installed without further notice).

Thanks for the replies. One more question for my techno ignorance. Is it possible to replace your C hard drive to an SSD? In other words install an SSD and just down load your C drive to the SSD? Or I guess it would be best to uninstall and reinstall your sim to the SSD with all the agony that involves. My last reinstall took me weeks to get all my addons working again.  

If it does improve performance then we would need to see proof. Not subjective opinion, definitive evidence.

 

Human beings are easily fooled. 

 

You're right, human beings are easily fooled.

 

I've been drawn into this debate numerous times in the past, and it always ends the same.  Those who believe they see a benefit in a product like Ultimate Defrag will believe, and those who don't won't.  I've reached the point of not caring anymore, and will simply manage my system(s) the way I see best... and of course you are free to do the same.

 

But if all you're interested in is a debate this one is currently in full swing: https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/all-benchmarks-are-unscientific-and-invalid.230403/  Maybe there's some definitive resolution at the end of that discussion.

 

 

Greg

 

One more question for my techno ignorance. Is it possible to replace your C hard drive to an SSD? In other words install an SSD and just down load your C drive to the SSD? Or I guess it would be best to uninstall and reinstall your sim to the SSD with all the agony that involves. My last reinstall took me weeks to get all my addons working again. 

 

Well, yes you can ... but it requires good preparation. Most of it has to do with Windows optimizing itself either for an HDD or an SSD on first install.

If you migrate it from an HDD to an SSD it needs to get told the first time you boot if from its new SSD. You will find plenty of good descriptions on the Web if you google for e.g. "migrate windows to ssd". For the move any good backup program can be used. You do not need a special migration tool.

On the other hand, if you consider getting an SSD you may want to consider your disk setup/partitioning completely and eventually go for a complete reinstall. I did both, I started with a migration, and it worked surprisingly well. But then later, convinced by the speed of SSDs I added more of them into my old PC, first for my sim, then for my applications and I ended up with a fresh install of Windows separating OS from Apps, from Simulation and from data. With my new PC I started with this configuration from scratch and I earned structure and pure performace.

 

Cheers

Frank

Well, yes you can ... but it requires good preparation. Most of it has to do with Windows optimizing itself either for an HDD or an SSD on first install.

If you migrate it from an HDD to an SSD it needs to get told the first time you boot if from its new SSD. You will find plenty of good descriptions on the Web if you google for e.g. "migrate windows to ssd". For the move any good backup program can be used. You do not need a special migration tool.

On the other hand, if you consider getting an SSD you may want to consider your disk setup/partitioning completely and eventually go for a complete reinstall. I did both, I started with a migration, and it worked surprisingly well. But then later, convinced by the speed of SSDs I added more of them into my old PC, first for my sim, then for my applications and I ended up with a fresh install of Windows separating OS from Apps, from Simulation and from data. With my new PC I started with this configuration from scratch and I earned structure and pure performace.

 

Cheers

Frank

Thanks Frank. If I decided to use the SSD just for my sim,(fsx-steam) would I have to first install Windows 10 to the new drive even though it's already on my system?

No, if you have already Win10 running on your current HDD then there is no reason to install it again. Adding another hard drive, in your case a new SSD, is very easy. After installation and the next reboot Windows will detect the new drive and offer formatting and it will assign a drive letter to it (usually the next available one ... D, E, whatever).

After it's formatted you can use the new drive for installation of FSX-SE as you desire.

 

Cheers

Frank