- Price: £20 ($39.99: Single Licence); £93
($179.99: 5 Licence Pack); £165 ($319: 10
Licence Pack)
- Supplier: Raxco Software
- Web:
http://www.raxco.com
System Requirements: Windows
2000, XP, 2003, 32-bit x64 and Itanium platform;
64MB RAM (128MB recommended); 20MB Disk Space;
FAT16, FAT32 and NTFS file system
One major contributor to the downgrade in PC
performance is disk fragmentation. Put simply
when files on your hard drive are not stored
contiguously the drive heads have to work harder
trying to locate the individual file components;
this, inevitably, results in delays and
consequently the requested file is not delivered
to the desktop as fast as it could be.
Files stored contiguously, on the other hand,
have each portion of the file following on from
the other, therefore, the drive heads are not
bouncing over different parts of the hard drive
platter desperately trying to seek the file’s
component parts.
Incontiguously stored files are said to be
fragmented and in order to restore the files to
their original contiguous order the drive needs
to be defragmented. While Windows has its own
built in defragmentation software this,
unfortunately, is only a ‘light’ version. For a
full and professional optimisation of the hard
drive you need the heavyweight defragmenting
power of PerfectDisk 8.0
Effortless Defragmenting
While PerfectDisk can boast both Single and
Enterprise users the interface is surprisingly
user friendly. As standard PerfectDisk ships
with a client interface, however, for Enterprise
customers there is a free Command Center
Management Module that enables an administrator
to see at a glance a summary of fragmentation
issues on managed computers.
Fig: 1 PerfectDisk User
Interface is extremely user friendly
Think Smart
To ensure perfect optimisation PerfectDisk
uses the SMARTPlacement™ optimisation strategy.
This effectively places files on the hard disk
according to the user’s unique usage pattern. By
using this strategy both time and resources on
future defragmentation runs are greatly
reduced. While many defragmenters simply move
all of the files on the hard drive around during
the defragmentation process, PerfectDisk only
moves the files that do not conform to the
user’s usage pattern, consequently resulting in
faster defragmentation of the hard drive.
Lost In Space
A valuable asset of PerfectDisk is its
Consolidate Free Space defragmentation option.
This allows the user to not only defragment the
part of the disk containing files, but also to
defragment the free space on the hard disk too,
thus creating the largest piece of contiguous
space.
Fig: 2 To defragment free
space use the Consolidate Free Space option
This option can be particularly useful prior
to re-sizing partitions or, in an Enterprise,
when compressing virtual hard drives in a
virtual machine environment.
Offline
With most defragmentation software, Windows’
own defragmenter being a case in point, files
such as Page file, Hibernation file and files
that are currently being used are never touched.
With PerfectDisk's Offline Defragmentation
option PerfectDisk will first try to unmount the
drive. If this is not possible then you will be
prompted to schedule an offline defragmentation
pass the next time you boot your PC. The
defragmentation of these files will then take
place in the pre-Windows environment (DOS
environment).
PerfectDisk can also be scheduled to run this
offline defragmentation on a regular basis every
time you boot the PC.
Fig: 3 PerfectDisk
defragments MFT, Metadata, Hibernate file and
Page file.
Power to the People
With PerfectDisk’s new Power Management
feature you don’t even have to worry about
running the system on battery power. PerfectDisk
can instantly detect whether the system is
running on battery power and can decide for
itself whether to start defragmentation or, if
defragmentation has started when battery power
kicks in, whether to stop the defragmentation
process to save battery power.
This option is a God send for those users
with laptops or Enterprise users who rely upon
Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) batteries
during power outage.
Verdict
PerfectDisk requires around 5% free space to
operate and can defragment a hard drive using a
single pass. Because PerfectDisk is capable of
defragmenting the Master File table, page file,
hibernation file and all metadata no file or
directory is left unfragmented.
CPU usage is extremely low, with PerfectDisk
able to automatically detect if the drive is
busy and adjust the I/O usage accordingly, so
defragmenting in the background doesn’t then
impact upon other applications you may have
running.
Disk defragmentation is a fact of life, but
it needn’t be a burden. PerfectDisk is a feature
rich defragmenting application and regular use
will not only keep your file system in tip-top
condition, but will also keep your PC running at
optimum performance.
Of all the defragmenting software I’ve used
PerfectDisk is by far the best. So much better
that it is simply Brilliant!
Rating
- Ease Of use: 10.0
- Features: 10.0
- Value for Money: 10.0
- Overall: 10.0