How to defrag our hard drives?

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lethe, are you a compulsive gambler? that's what using speed disk is - a big crap shoot.

i recommend Plus Optimize from www.alsoft.com or Techtool Pro from www.micromat.com

also see this thread for a more complete description of each.

the best value is getting diskwarrior/plus optimize on disk and waiting for it to show up. techtool pro is much slower but is much more informative about what it does and when it is doing it. I would guess that hard core techies might prefer this. just don't trust your disk to norton unless you have nothing to lose.

feel free to ask more specific questions.
 
hehee. yeah i ve heard that about norton. i ve never had troubles with it, but people who konw better have told me that it should not be used unless absolutely necessary. anyway, i gotta get back to AC. later
 
Originally posted by Ed Spruiell
techtool pro is much slower but is much more informative about what it does and when it is doing it. I would guess that hard core techies might prefer this. just don't trust your disk to norton unless you have nothing to lose.

feel free to ask more specific questions.
Click to expand...

... interesting, actually techtool is much faster than disk warrior for me ... :D
but i certainly agree with you on norton. don't use it if you can avoid it - it totally wrecked my system last time i used it... i had to reinstall ... and that certainly was the last time i used norton utilities! :D
 
Norton works fine with me, but I have classic 9.2.2
I guess all the problem with Norton is because of OS X. I better get this TechTool Pro, when I upgrade to OS X.

I have also heard, that one shouldn't have to optimize drives, when having OS X. But I guess this is just an urban legend... Right?
 
The UFS file system does not need to be defragmented. The problem is that
1. OS X normally installs on HFS+, so if you got your OS X installation from Apple, it's HFS+.
2. OS 9 can't read UFS, so you're out of luck if you're not running an X-exclusive box.
3. HFS+ does in fact need to be defragmented, and
4. UFS is reportedly dog-slow for OS X.

So even if you did wipe your hard drive and re-format it as UFS to avoid fragmentation, you'd be running so slowly that it probably wouldn't matter.
 
Ok, thanks Wonder Tortoise..

But how about that thing, when you have 2 partitions:
•First you move everything from Partition 1 to Partition 2
•Then you delete all files from Partition 1
•Then you move the files back from Partitioin 2 to Partitioin 1

I know that it even sounds stupid, but is his a way to optimize? Or just a waste of time?

I guess that system doesn't even like this kinda draggin thing? Nor the programs... I guess this works only with documents. Right?
 
just a guess to your drag and delete question, but i think that would pretty much be a waste of time. the system would not bother sorting out which fragments of files belong together and would keep them more or less as is. you would be copying blocks of info, not file a, then file b, then c, etc. I could be wrong about this, but since defragging takes so much longer to do than copying an entire drive, it is logical to me that it works as i have described.

wonder tortoise, any clarrification on this?;)
 
Originally posted by nkuvu
The UFS file system does not need to be defragmented. The problem is that
1. OS X normally installs on HFS+, so if you got your OS X installation from Apple, it's HFS+.
2. OS 9 can't read UFS, so you're out of luck if you're not running an X-exclusive box.
3. HFS+ does in fact need to be defragmented, and
4. UFS is reportedly dog-slow for OS X.

So even if you did wipe your hard drive and re-format it as UFS to avoid fragmentation, you'd be running so slowly that it probably wouldn't matter.
Click to expand...

MacOS X runs much faster under UFS within 8GB of hard disk space in both my PowerBook G4/500 and my Beige G3 with G4/500 upgrade card.

Yes, I had to use MacOS X system in my Beige G4/500 to recall the UFS partition on my PowerBook G4 with OS X died on me. But still, the target disk function worked wonderfully.

My suggestion is still install OS X under Unix File System within the first 8GB of hard disk space. The reason is the same why Windows 2000 should be installed into NTFS (NT File System) instead of FAT32 or worst, for security reasons.

Partition your hard drive into 3 partitions if you have 20GB drive, 4 partitions if you have 30GB drive and so on, as long as OS X resides in the first 8GB of the hard disk space.

Just my suggestion.

Regards,
George Lien
 
Originally posted by Charon
Ok, thanks Wonder Tortoise..

But how about that thing, when you have 2 partitions:
•First you move everything from Partition 1 to Partition 2
•Then you delete all files from Partition 1
•Then you move the files back from Partitioin 2 to Partitioin 1

I know that it even sounds stupid, but is his a way to optimize? Or just a waste of time?

I guess that system doesn't even like this kinda draggin thing? Nor the programs... I guess this works only with documents. Right?
Click to expand...

Charon,

I wouldn't do that with OS X, even though I'd do that with OS 9. It's the cheapest way, if you factor out the time and labor required for this task. OS X has yet to be this user-friendly.

Regards,
George Lien
 
For anyone considering George's suggestion, I would like to point out a few things about Mac OS X first (after that, if you still want to use UFS, don't blame Apple for system performance and problems).

Mac OS X is not like any of the other operating systems that came before it (Mac OS X Server 1.x, Rhapsody, OPENSTEP and NEXTSTEP). All the parts of those operating systems were designed to work on UFS, their applications were designed (in what is now Cocoa) to work with UFS, but this is not the case for Mac OS X. Mac OS X has three different application environments (Carbon, Cocoa, and Classic), and two of them (Carbon and Classic) are designed for HFS+, not UFS. Even if you no longer use Classic apps, and enjoy Cocoa apps more than Carbon, the Finder is still a Carbon app. The Finder of Mac OS X is much like the Finder in the old Mac OS, it relies on information stored in hidden files and resource forks to move from directory to directory. If this was just another version of the Workspace Manager, we wouldn't be able to have aliases (something special to the Mac OS) and custom icons that can just be assigned with cut and paste (yes I have tons of custom icons in my pre-Mac OS X systems, but they are all tiff files that I had to physically put into place).

George is right about the comparison with Windows 2000 and NTFS/FAT32, only he got the file systems for the Mac OS backwards. Installing Mac OS X on UFS is worse than installing Windows 2000 on FAT32 because Mac OS X is designed to take advantage of HFS+. In all the Unix hype, we seem to be forgetting that HFS+ is where many of the features that we know and love are rooted.

This is why Apple does not install Mac OS X on any UFS formatted system.

As for installing on partitions, for most this is simply a judgment call. For those of you with Beige G3s or Wallstreet G3 PowerBooks, installing on a partition that is the first one on the drive and no larger than 8 GB is still something of a requirement. There is still the problem of allocation blocks (which get bigger as drives get bigger), HFS+ is good at dealing with larger drives, but even better if the drives are partitioned to more manageable sizes (any where from 5 to 20 GB).

The only time Apple has suggested using UFS that I am aware of is when using Mac OS X as a web server (Apache and the internet work better with files that are not tied to resource forks).
 
george - all i can say after reading your posts in this thread and your install thread is that i now understand why you are screaming so loudly about speed issues in osx. i absolutely agree that osx speed sucks on your mac.

why, oh why, do you want to run a ufs file system in the face of all evidence that says it does you more harm than good? is this some sort of carry over from being a 'nixer? want to see a mac os zip? run it on the current mac file system.

as for defragging, there are no defraggers for ufs. apparently it doesn't need them. defragging is both a blessing and a curse that is part of mac file systems, not 'nix.

what i find hard to believe is that myself and others argued with you for so long about this speed issue when in fact both sides were right all along. you have, and have had, osx set up to defeat itself. your speed really does suck. but i now stand steadfastly by my assertion that it is not apple that sucks, but 3rd party implementations of osx that suck. in this case, you are your own 3rd party. no wonder my imac screams while your powerbook whines.
 
Originally posted by lethe
norton speed disk
Click to expand...

I used to be a huge fan of Peter Norton's utilities, most notably Norton Commander for DOS :)

HOWEVER Since I shelled out $200 for NU OS X, and ran norton disk doctor, speed disk, etc. it has really wrecked my system. I can't login to terminal, I can't use some network features, and apparently my bTree is corrupted in some fashion.

I would also like to point out that the "Completely OS X compatible" Norton Utilities doens't even include freakin' Speed Disk! You have to boot from the CD and run it in 9.2 for it to even function. That really sucks...

I now really hate Norton Utilities, and I'm gonna try to get a refund from my retailer. If they don't give me one, you can bet Symantec is going to hear from me every day until I do ;)

My $0,02
 
Originally posted by Ed Spruiell
what i find hard to believe is that myself and others argued with you for so long about this speed issue when in fact both sides were right all along. you have, and have had, osx set up to defeat itself. your speed really does suck. but i now stand steadfastly by my assertion that it is not apple that sucks, but 3rd party implementations of osx that suck. in this case, you are your own 3rd party. no wonder my imac screams while your powerbook whines.
Click to expand...

You don't think Apple should make the OS X upgrade as simple as the ones in the Classic? I use UFS (Unix File System) because it is an option provided by the MacOS X installation program.

Now if UFS is such a bad idea, then why would Apple put it in there? Mind you, this is not a MacOS X Server installer, but a MacOS X client installer.

I expect future Mac hard drives to come in Unix File System when Apple decides to leave out the Classic environment and go all the way with MacOS X.
 
yes, one day the finder will be carbonized. and george, just so you know, there is a nice replacement for finder which is fully cocoa, called snax. you can set the system to use this by default and not even launch finder. racerX s statements lead me to believe that switching to cocoa apps would improve your performance.

just a FYI, another job that prefers UFS is building your kernel. it requires that the FS be case sensitive (it has nothing to do with resource forks, i think).

i also believe that the industry will eventually move to journalling filesystems across the board, and observing how apple is moving the developers from resource forks to filename extensions, i think that HFS+ may have a limited lifetime.

of course, when i say that, i am thinking of a timeframe like 2-4 years, not in the next couple of months.... i think right now, UFS for OSX is only available to provide compatibilty with finicky UNIX apps, and legacy NS/rhapsody apps, and for the build environment. Let me say this again: you cannot (or at least are advised not to) build darwin on HFS because it is not case sensitive. now you might understand why it makes sense for apple to give us this option even though it kills performance, and breaks some functionality.

i would like to hear more about what you mentioned before george, security reasons for using UFS.
 
george - choosing a file system based upon the criteria of being "available" is ludicrous!! when i leave home and go to LA from San Francisco, i can take interstate 5 and travel at speeds of around 75 - 80 mph. I'll be there in about 6 hrs. Or i can take highway 1 and go between 25 -60 mph with stop lights and lots of winding road. It will take 12 hrs or more. Both are available choices. Highway 1 is only a couple blocks from my house. Should i choose highway 1 because it is available?:confused: :rolleyes:

lethe states a valid reason for his occasional use of the setup. it is not one that many users will need to do. But you offer nothing more than logical than availability for your choice. you might have well flipped a coin to decide which fs to use.
 
Yeah, I saw that one coming. The option is there, but we don't have to take it. So the option was there, and I took it. Sue me :p .

While what you guys said before may be valid, I still choose UFS, since after all, OS X is based on Unix, right? I just hope I wouldn't have to reinstall my system again later on.

Regards,
George Lien
 
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