Defrag Question
Posted: 23 Dec 2008, 19:37
I have O&O defrag and was wondering what is the best method of defrag for my Drive with FS9 on it.
Over on avsim, NickN made the following recommendation for max performance/benefit for FSX.
1. Delete all Internet Explorer temp files.
2. Empty the Recycle Bin
3. Reboot - immediately stop all unnecessary processes via Task Manager
4. Space Defrag ensuring that neither keyboard nor mouse is touched.
(His reasoning there is that any interaction with either of those may cause a slight loss of continuity/processor cycles dedicated to the defrag and thus result in less than optimal defrag. IOW, every little bit helps.)
5. Repeat steps 3 and 4 once each//reboot and Space defrag.
6. Reboot (Step 3 again)
7. Name defrag.
NickN says that if you do this after any MAJOR disk file modification/software installation, you get the best benefit and only need to do periodic updates via SPACE defrags. He goes on to say that the "full Monty" procedure only needs to be done once a month at most under normal circumstances.
There are at least three threads over there discussing the methodology, reasoning and results. Most seem to feel that it DOES result in a noticeable improvement in FSX-performance. The dissenters mostly argue that this is an example of overkill and/or an example of the placebo effect (you only THINK you see an improvement).
I'm in the "this works for me" camp and have been using this method since he first posted about it. I think that I've seen an increase of 5FPS in the Manhattan ATC area - it's definitely flyable for me even with my sliders at the 71% level for both commercial and GA aircraft.
He noted that FS9 performance would be improved, but the results/gain would probably not be as significant as in FSX because past a certain point, FPS improvements aren't really visually noticeable, only numerically so.
YMMV.