Best Defrag app for MAC

Question

Level 1

9 points

Best Defrag app for MAC

Hello, I need to defrag my Hard Drives
but I'm not sure wich software would be the better.
I use Disk Warrior to rebuilt the directories but I don't know
if it also defrag the Hard Drives.
Thank you in advance for your input.

Power Mac G5 Dual 2.0 GHz, Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Posted on Jul 9, 2007 8:38 PM

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Answer 1

Jul 10, 2007 1:04 AM in response to digimont

Hi

As Allan says OS X automatically defrags files below a certain size on the fly. I believe it also uses hot clustering and migrates the most frequently accessed files to the fastest parts of the disk. Third party defrag apps aren't normally necessary, and I guess may even slow things down.

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Answer 2

Jul 9, 2007 9:12 PM in response to digimont

Hi digimont;

Diskwarrior does not defrag disks.

Why do you think that you need to defrag your disk?

OS X defrags files that are 20 MB or less hence the need to defrag is greatly reduce over Windoze.

Allan

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Answer 3

Jul 10, 2007 4:03 AM in response to digimont

Hi digimont-

As the others have mentioned there generally is no need to do so. Are you having issues?

Luck-

-DaddyPaycheck

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Answer 4

The hatter

Level 9

61,031 points

Jul 10, 2007 5:15 AM in response to digimont

A. always have a current backup first.
B. erase your drive and do a restore with superduper.
C. Intech SpeedTools Suite has a file defgrag utility BUT watch out if it tries to defrag a 20GB+ file! ( have those on their own partition anyway, mostly backup images of other volumes that run 16-65GB).

D. Keep your drive to 65% or less, even more so for boot drive.
E. do some cleaning of temp and cache folders, which is something that SuperDuper does for you, it skips backing them up because those are best recreated fresh by the OS.
F. when you restore, SuperDuper organizes directories into a "smarter" order.
G. It does improve performance.
H. While at it, install a new 500GB drive why not.
I. Use the old drive for backups and emergency boot drive.

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Answer 5

digimont Author

Level 1

9 points

Jul 11, 2007 4:26 PM in response to Allan Eckert

This is what Digidesign says about drives.

"Hard Drive Configuration and Maintenance"
It is recommended that you start with a newly
initialized audio drive. You should also periodically
defragment your audio drive to ensure
continued system performance.

That's why I need an app to do this.

Thank you for your input.

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Answer 6

The hatter

Level 9

61,031 points

Jul 11, 2007 4:35 PM in response to digimont

The app you need to do so is backup and erase and then restore.

You should NEVER EVER do a program defrag unless and until you have a backup.

What they say is true, but it isn't the best or only method.

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Answer 7

maclover

Level 4

3,850 points

Jul 11, 2007 4:45 PM in response to digimont

Hi. Well - there is this

http://www.coriolis-systems.com/iDefrag.php

and some light reading before you buy

http://www.macfixit.com/article.php?story=20070301091515843

Good Luck.

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Answer 8

Jul 11, 2007 10:34 PM in response to Allan Eckert

OS X defrags files that are 20 MB or less hence the
need to defrag is greatly reduce over Windoze.

Over half of my files are larger than 20 MB so I would definitely be interested in a good defraging program. I have noticed that my larger files seem to open and edit slower than when my computer was new.

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