defrag equivalent does mac os x have a defrag equivalent? win xp has defrag does mac os x have something built in to optimize the hard disk? i know there's disk warrior but i can't afford to buy it just yet. thanks.
Been using the one included in Tech Tool Pro 4. Could be my imagination, but I do detect a slight speed improvement after a good defragging.
Mac OS 10.3 comes with built-in defragging for small files, in a behind-the-scenes technology called Adaptive Hot File Clustering. So there is no need to explicitly "defrag" as you would in Windows. Also, there is a distinction between the defragmenting capabiilities of AHFC and Window's defrag with disk optimizers. Products like Norton's Speed Disk or Micromat's TechTool Pro offer disk optimization, of which defragmentation is one part. Disk optimization may also include directory rebuilding, file relocation, and the like. If you get a product like TechTool Pro, note that you will have to temporarily disable file system journaling which is enabled by default in later Mac OS X releases. A short description of journaling: If I recall correctly, TTP4 has the ability to move the journal to a separate drive. [Edited on 7-6-2004 by ginoledesma]
No, of course not. It's a third-party utility by Micromat, recently remade from the ground up to run natively in OS X. $98. :dry:
I know TTP 4 is good as well as Disk Warrior, I just don't have the spare cash right now. So what can I do to help improve the disk speed of my beloved Powerbook? I really noticed a reduction in speed when I transfered old files from a pc that was conking out and burned them to dvds. At the same time I installed sidetrack. So I'm not sure which one really had more effect. I also noticed it took a lot longer to boot up.
To get some speed boost here are some things you can do if you have not done so already. • Finder>Preferences>Advanced>Languages for searching file contents> select only the language you use (normally english) • System Preferences>Accounts>Startup items>remove all items in startup you don't need • System preferences>Dock>uncheck animate opening applications ( probably an insignificant speed boost but hey, every bit helps.} • Bigger empty hardisk space and more RAM usually means a faster computer • System preferences>startup disk>Make sure you have selected the right startup disk( this minimizes starup disk selection time. Delay is greatest when you select network startup by mistake.
Is there away I can get an overview of my hard disk? how much space is consumed by this and that so i would be able to removed or put them onremovable media? I was surprised yesterday when my book said it run out of diskspace, I remember I still have 20G free disk space. What caused this probably? Added: just checked Finder/System Profiler/Contents/Logs and i noticed this Console Log created an hour ago, about 27.59 GB in size. could this be the reason? should i keep it or delete it? Please help. [Edited on 9-9-2004 by super_ed]
it's just the log file of the console.app (located in the Applications/Utilities folder)... deleting it will not affect your system... however, i'm quite curious how it reached that size... maybe some buggy application pumping out error messages like there's no tomorrow?
Best way to defrag a drive? Gurus, need your help. Have been using my PB for a few months now, especially for video editing, and I've gotten an external hard drive to help me out with the large files I work with. Just finished a loooong video edit and now that I'm done I'd like to properly delete, defrag, and optimize both my drives before I start with the next project. I don't have Norton Utilities or anything like that, any other way? My system- 15"Powerbook 1gig RAM, 80gig HD, Maxtor 250gig external HD. Edits are done using Final Cut Pro HD. Would appreciate a step-by-step guide on how to do this properly. Have a dodgy history with hard drives. Thank you!
Reformatting (or reinitializing) erases the directory information so that the drive is made essentially a blank disk. The data is technically still there but since the accounting and tracking info is lost, the sectors might as well be erased. A type of secure reformatting is to write over all the sectors with zeroes to ensure that the info remaining on the disk (but scrambled and disorganized) cannot be pieced together. Defragging is to reunite all the fragments that compose a file and put them together on a contiguous, or continuous portion on the disk. Over time, the Mac saves files in fragments all over the hard disk when there is not enough contiguous space to write the file in one place. This makes assembling and accessing a file again a little more time consuming and slows the Mac down. Hence the need to de-fragment the hard disk and reorganize the pieces and keep them together, which also leaves large clear areas when new files can be written and kept together. Defragmenting improves performance greatly. Defragging takes a long time, and it makes more sense to erase the drive (which takes a few seconds) to create a clean, unfragmented hard drive (which is the end goal of defragging anyway). Downside is you lose all the files that you wanted to keep. So backup everything you need to another medium, reformat, then write back the data. Quicker, more reliable.
ummm... how about for us who can't afford to backup everything and reformat? I only have one internal disk, and i don't think I want to undergo the hassle of backing everything up, reformatting, reinstalling OS X and all the applications, updating to the latest patches, and customizing. sigh. If I have no choice but to defrag... should I? Hmmm... curiously... OS X is Unix-based... do you really need to defrag?
I use TechTool Pro 4 to defrag my drives when needed. It comes in a bootable CD so you can even use it to defrag your system drive. Good stuff. Yup. Panther's built-in defrag routine only looks for files that are less than 20MB in size. And it only works for the system drive. Not enough, IMHO. ~Henjie
Defrag only when needed. Why BackUp? It would be a disaster if in the middle of defraging and your Mac hang/freezes! yikes!!! that's is why i dont defrag if your in a habbit of copy,erase,copy,erase..... i suggest, get an external drive. For me, digital files are far more important. Well, then again, that's me.:2cents:
