Hard Disk Defragmentation: How To Keep Your Hard Drive Healthy

Posted in Computers on December 30th, 2009 by Computers

Many will compare the on your computer to the engine that drives the whole mechanism. It’s the place where all your information gets stored and you need to look after it by knowing little bit about defragmentation and what it does to keep your system running smoothly.

This kind of preventative measure is much preferable to trying to sort through a repair when your system crashes. Everyone’s heard the horrible phrase ’system crash’ at one time or another but not everyone knows there are certain things that you can do to prevent that kind of catastrophic information loss.

First of all, there are several why your computer can crash and you can lose all the information on your and these include:

>>> Voltage Spikes. These occur when the to your home has a temporary jolt that races or your and basically shorts it out.

>>> Physical Damage. When your computer takes a jolt of any kind one of the first things they can be damaged is your .

Beyond that, just using your computer on a tends to have all the mechanisms inside including the wearing down over time. However, there is a solution for this and when you first notice a getting worse, it’s generally time to look into defragmentation so you can get back up to speed.

First of all it’s important to understand how the in your computer works. When you save something so you can see it later it gets stored in the in one tiny spot or cluster. As time goes by these clusters breakup as more information gets stored on them and your computer slows down. Basically this is the that can be slowed down and fixed with defragmentation. It’s a routine maintenance that works wonders.

While there are tools on the market that will help you defrag your disks, most Windows operating systems also come with a built-in option for this that is simple and easy to use. The benefits of using this defragmentation tool include:

>>> Faster access to information. When you’ve run the defragmentation tool the data on your is tidied up again, you’ll find that your computer runs at a better speed than it did before.

>>> You use less power. Using the defragmentation tool for the means that you use less power for your computer. – Your will be less prone to disk failure as it does not have to work so hard to pick up and write information.

defragmentation is a necessary maintenance task and should be seen as important as periodically changing the oil in your car.


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How To Fix Your Slow Computer To Run Much Faster

Posted in Computers on May 19th, 2009 by Computers

Without a doubt today’s home PC is faster than ever, so much so that even the slowest brand of today has more under its hood than all the computing power combined together that was used in running the Apollo Moon Mission! That said, your brand new superfast PC with time will inevitably become a snailing that will drive you up the wall. Here’s why:

Whenever you use your computer, file pieces or file are formed which eventually become dislodged and misplaced from one another. This process of occurs because of the continuous and ongoing activity of the addition and the deletion of files on your whenever your computer is performing a task. ultimately reduces because processing resources must be allocated to what in effect becomes a seek-n-find operation.

Basically when a file is fragmented the computer must search the entire any time that file is opened in order to piece together all the various of that file to make it complete. As you can imagine this is a time consuming and labor intensive process that makes a computer run slow and forces it to run and perform in a sluggish manner.

The Process Of Defragmenting

Defragmentation is the process whereby the various different parts of a file are arranged in a contiguous so that the file connect to one another in sequential order until the file is a complete unit once more. Arranging files in this manner speeds up an otherwise because now that the file are arranged to form a whole the computer can access and retrieve that file so much faster from its or whichever disk has just been defragmented.

Windows Comes With A Basic Disk Defragmenting Tool That Does Little To Fix A

All windows operating systems come installed with a basic defragmenting tool, which although won’t restore your to its former speedy self will help to improve performance. Getting to the inbuilt Windows defragment tool is quite easy. All you have to do is click on Start then go to Programs, find the Accessories tab (click on that) head to Systems Tools and finally you’ll get to the defragment tool. Windows’ default defragmenting tool will be listed as Disk Defragmenter.

Whether you are using a third party disk defragmenter or the Windows inbuilt default tool, the process of basic defragmenting your drive is pretty much the same and couldn’t be simpler. Just choose whichever drive you wish to defragment (assuming you have more than 1 drive) then click “Defragment”. You can choose to analyze the disk first by clicking the “Analyze” button but this is pretty redundant since the defragmenting tool automatically goes through the process of analyzing before defragging anyway.

The Issue Of The Windows XP Paging File

There is a hidden file on your computer called the Pagefile.sys which together with the physical amount of RAM installed on your system makes up the Virtual Memory:

Paging file + Physical RAM = Virtual Memory

The paging file is really a relic of the past and its purpose was to boost the amount of actual physical RAM available on any given computer system. You see back in the day when computers were equipped with a “whopping” 64-128 megabytes (MB) of RAM, as software applications became more advanced and at the same time more resource hungry, an alternative means was needed to accommodate the required amount of RAM, until such time that hardware manufactures caught up and produced greater capacity modules of RAM.

RAM, by the way stands for, Random Access Memory and is a hardware component found in your computer as memory modules. These days however, RAM really isn’t too much of an issue especially on high-end systems that can easily accommodate 16G or more of RAM. Having said that though, for the average PC owner the prudent management of RAM is still an issue, especially when one takes into account such factors as insatiable operating systems like Windows Vista (need a minimum of 1.5 gigabytes of RAM for Vista to perform at a basic tolerable level) and other resource ravenous software that is the norm of modern day computing.

Anyway back to that dinosaur of yesteryear known as the Paging File; for some reason or other Windows by default still allocates a figure of 1.5 times the physical amount of RAM to the Paging File. In other words:

Physical RAM x 1.5 = Paging File (Virtual Memory)

So in a systewhich has 4 gigs of physical RAM installed, the Paging File would take up a shattering 6 gigs of RAM! And that is not the only problem related to the Paging File here’s the kicker:

By Default The Paging File Cannot Be Defragmented!

The Paging File despite its designation of “virtual memory” is nothing more than reserved space to which data is written to and retrieved periodically. By default the paging file is stored on the boot partition of windows which means that the paging file is housed in that portion of Windows that contains the operating system and its respective support folders. There is a huge problem with this situation and that is:

When the Paging File and Operating System are located on the same drive partition simultaneous access to both systems is impossible and access to the one must by necessity await completion of access to the other. This process naturally makes for a very .

Two Ways To Fix The Paging File Problem And Make Your Faster

1. The Hard Way To Speed Up Your Slow Running Computer

Luckily though there is a way round this bottle-neck situation; by moving the Paging File to a different partition Windows will then be able to handle I/O (input/output) requests faster because the relocation of the Paging File ensures a less competitive environment for reading and writing requests. However do note though that if you completely move the Paging File from the boot partition Windows will be unable to create a dump file (Memory.dmp) with which to write debugging information when a kernel mode Stop Error message occurs.

The way to bypass such an eventuality is to create a paging file that is stored on the boot partition and another paging file that is located on a separate partition. Windows by design will access the paging file located on the non-boot partition first before looking to the paging file housed on the boot partition.

2. The Easy Way To Speed Up Your Slow Running Computer

As you can see the above method is a very complicated and time consuming way to fix a ! Surely there must be an easier and quicker way? Well actually thankfully there is. Click the link below to find out how:

Make Computer Faster

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Computer Backup Solutions – All Systems Go?

Posted in Computers on April 15th, 2009 by Computers

The subject of computer backups has always been a topic of importance when it comes to preserving the data on your computer. These days there are more options available to you in this arena, which can be both a help and a hindrance. On one hand, having more options is helpful because better solutions have been brought to the marketplace from which you can now choose to fit your needs. A hindrance exists in that the of choices might scare off users and cause them to avoid the issue altogether, which can have a disastrous ending.

It does not have to be complicated nor time consuming, so there is no not to tackle backing up your computer.

The Philosophy

We all know that backing up can preserve the information that is stored on your computer, but how far do you take your backup philosophy? It depends on what you can ‘afford’ to lose.

To one , just backing up periodically will suffice. The thought here is that if you lose your data, you can restore it apart from your operating system, and the time that this takes is not a critical consideration. Many fall into this category. It makes sense as long as you are not dependent upon your computer for time-sensitive applications and tasks and/or for accessing and retrieving data relative to finances, etc.

To another user this philosophy is not enough. Those who depend on their data and computer for more than just casual understand that if a fails, their business is down until they can get it back up and running again. who store irreplaceable photographs and home video on their computers will also fall into this category. A more comprehensive backup plan is recommended to help recover from disasters in a timely .

Computer Backup Options

There are to tackle backups of your important data:

Built-in operating system options. Microsoft Windows operating systems provide built-in back up capabilities that allows you to back up your documents or files onto external media. Beginning with Windows XP and its Automated System Recovery feature, each successive Microsoft desktop operating system includes the capability to help recover your entire if necessary. These backup solutions are reliable and provide a built-in way for you to back up your data without having to buy an additional program to do so.

Manual copying onto external devices. You can always resort to the old stand-by method of backing up by manually copying your data onto an external , USB memory stick or other external device such as a recordable CD, DVD or even a floppy drive if you have one. This is cumbersome, but if you do not have a lot of files, it may be an acceptable solution for you. The pitfalls with this method are that if you have multiple files, you have to make sure you get all of them, and you may need numerous target media to save all of your files to.

Online options for backing up over the Internet. The newest option in
computer data backup solutions is provided by online companies that enable backup and restoration of your documents and files over an encrypted high-speed Internet connection to any PC. A small background application backs up and transfers your files to a hosted storage area in a remote datacenter when your computer is idle; however, this is not a comprehensive disaster recovery solution for your entire . This solution works best when targeted at protecting individual files and documents on a PC or a Mac, and is generally a subscription-based service for which you pay a monthly fee for use.

Making an image of your . This is a more comprehensive backup and disaster recovery solution generally performed by technically savvy computer users. This option includes using 3rd-party programs to make an image of your entire , which can then be “re-imaged” in case of catastrophic failure to a new , providing a disaster recovery plan. Using this solution, within a short period of time, you can be back up and running with ALL of your documents, settings, programs and EVERYTHING intact, as if the disaster never occurred.

The way to determine the best solution to fit your needs is to ask yourself how soon you need to be back up and running after encountering a disaster, and how much you are willing to pay. If you can wait several days, then a computer back up program might be right for you. If you need your data files immediately, and you have a second computer that you can copy them to, then an online solution might be the best way to go. Or finally, if your business depends upon your computer and its applications and data, then you must have a more comprehensive solution.

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