hershey
Albuquerque,(fulltime) NM, USA
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Joined: 06/04/2003
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Jim & Joan wrote:Download CCleaner and clean windows and registry. HERE
What a fantastic utility. I downloaded it and ran it thru its paces and my ole Toshiba laptop with XP is running like a deer. Instead of that nasty row of a dozen startup programs at the bottom, I have only 3 now. Thanks for the info.
hershey - albuquerque, nm
Someday Finally Got Here
My wife does all the driving - I just get to hold the steering wheel.
Expedition - Suzuki Grand Viagra
NASCAR 20 - - 99
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camperbuds3
Pennsylvania, USA
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Joined: 08/23/2003
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rvten wrote:Disk Clean Up also Defragment.
This is where I would start. Both utilities are already on your computer.
Defraging will take quite some time to go through the process. You can start it and walk away from your computer for awhile.
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JMTTS
52.1122 N, 106.5625 W
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Joined: 11/19/2004
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Jim & Joan wrote:Download CCleaner and clean windows and registry. HERE
Great Program - I used it to clean up quite a few PC's for fellow "Winter Texans" this past winter.
J & M
2005 Cardinal 33TS LX with TrailAir
2004 Chevrolet Silverado 3500 4x4 DRW D/A (LLY) Crew Cab
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2oldman
WA
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camperbuds3 wrote:Defraging will take quite some time to go through the process. And is rarely needed.
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2oldman
WA
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camperbuds3 wrote:Defraging will take quite some time to go through the process. And is rarely needed.
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Kamphiker
South Florida (this 'aint paridise anymore)
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2oldman wrote:camperbuds3 wrote:Defraging will take quite some time to go through the process. And is rarely needed.
After you clean you computer of all the "bloat ware", Garbage, Unused and un-installed programs & applications your hard drive is going to be very fragmented. This will increase seek times and slow your computer down.
The larger the hard drive the longer it will take to defrag.
I suggest (and this is what I do) clean up your computer (look at my previous post in this thread for some suggested programs) then do a complete defrag. of the entire hard drive, Next obtain a program such as Partition magic to create multiple partitions on your hard drive.
I then move programs to specific partitions like this:
"C" partition contains the operating system (Windows XP) and all applications that have to run from the same partition as the operating system. Usually 25 Gig is enough for the "C" partition and still have proper room to run Windows recovery.
Other partitions normally are laid out as such
"D" Music, MP3 etc.
"E" Videos (also usually contains temporary file storage for NERO)
"F" For documents including "My Documents" that windows defaults to the "C" drive
"G" Downloads storage for let say Bit torrents or other attachments
"H" free space unused disc space that can be given to other partitions when applications have out grown the designated drive
By using partition magic (or other similar programs), when it's time to defrag your hard drive all you need to really defrag is usually the "C" partition and will take a fraction of time. This is really a time saver when you start using hard drives over 100 gig. I would hate to try and defrag a 500 gig or a 1 terabyte hard drive. What a pain that would be.
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hershey
Albuquerque,(fulltime) NM, USA
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Kamphiker wrote:2oldman wrote:camperbuds3 wrote:Defraging will take quite some time to go through the process. And is rarely needed.
After you clean you computer of all the "bloat ware", Garbage, Unused and un-installed programs & applications your hard drive is going to be very fragmented. This will increase seek times and slow your computer down.......snip.....
To partition a hard drive, don't you have to completely start with a reformatted drive? Not practical if you alread have a computer loaded with programs and data, or not????????
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Kamphiker
South Florida (this 'aint paridise anymore)
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hershey wrote:Kamphiker wrote:2oldman wrote:camperbuds3 wrote:Defraging will take quite some time to go through the process. And is rarely needed.
After you clean you computer of all the "bloat ware", Garbage, Unused and un-installed programs & applications your hard drive is going to be very fragmented. This will increase seek times and slow your computer down.......snip.....
To partition a hard drive, don't you have to completely start with a reformatted drive? Not practical if you alread have a computer loaded with programs and data, or not????????
No you do not. As long as the drive is not 100% FULL (Partition magic needs some space to move data around) AND NOT DEFECTIVE (PM will check for errors etc.) You can create partitions on a exisiting hard drive. Partion will ask if you want NTFS or FAT (Even mix & Match ) and walk you through the process.
I like Partition magic only because It's the one I have been using for around 10 years or so. There are plenty of others that may be better, I just have not used them to try them out.
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Rick Jay
Greater Springfield area, MA
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hershey,
"Partition Magic" and other programs allow you to repartition "on the fly". However, there is always a chance of losing data, so repartitioning should only be done after fully backing up important data/programs/etc.
I believe Vista (at least some flavors of it) have a repartitioning utility built in. Mac OS X does as well. 
As for defragging: I believe Vista (again, some flavors) can do the "defragging" in the background during normal PC operation. Defragging is not necessary on OS X.
I would caution about segmenting up a drive too much, however, as it's possible it can limit "growth" of the system. You also want to make sure that whatever partition the OS is put on that this is plenty of space available for future updates.
~Rick
2005 Georgie Boy 3625 DS on a Workhorse W-22 (Class A)
Rick, Gail, 1 girl (12-Angel), 1 girl (7), 2 boys (8 & 5), 1 plump Golden Retriever.
2001 Honda Odyssey with Demco Aluminator tow bar & tow plate, SMI Silent Partner brake controller.
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2oldman
WA
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hershey wrote:After you clean you computer of all the "bloat ware", Garbage, Unused and un-installed programs & applications your hard drive is going to be very fragmented. Removing programs doesn't fragment a HD, adding them does. When the system can't find large blocks of contiguous space on which to place new files, it breaks them up into fragments.
In all my years of computer use I think there's been maybe once when the defrag utility said I should do it. There are way more likely causes of slowness than a suspect fragmented harddrive.
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