Thread: Auslogics Disk Defrag v 1.5

If you are a PC user running Windows XP or an earlier version of Windows, then you will have noticed how the computer slows down with time. One of the reasons for this is that the new and constantly 6pdated file information is not consolidated on the file allocation system table. Vista solves this problem since it runs a defragmentation tool quietly in the baekground that gets to work after a period of no computer activity. Of course, Windows comes with its own defragmentation utility, but CHIP finds out if the one under test is any better.

Features

There is not a whole lot to say about Auslogics Disk Defrag. It is a disk defragmentation tool that supports FAT 16, FAT 32, and NTFS volumes. With an installation file sized at 1.7 MB, it is an easy program to download and install. But it doesn't offer a lot of functionality or options for the user to tweak. For instance, there is no registry defragment option, and if the user want to defragment the computer's registry, she will have to download another application from the Auslogics official website Similarly, the program is also missing the option to defragment systems files, such as the page file. Functions like this usually require a computer restart though, and should not be done by beginners.

The main defragmentation settings include an option to remove temporary files before the defragmentation process, and defragment USB flash drives and other removable hard disks. The user may also adjust the CPU usage from low to high, where the default value is normal. There is a Task Scheduler to run the program according to a schedule, create reports and defragment only the system disk, which is the disk where Windows is installed.



Performance

We installed and ran the program under two different operating systems, namely Vista SP1 and XP SP3. The time that the applicatt9n took to defragment the hard disks on both machines is inconclusive, especially when you consider the fact that the Vista system had a hard disk ~apacity of 70 GB, and the XP system only 5 GB. Furthermore, since Vista defragments continuously, it didn't require the same level of defragmentation that the XP system did. After a defrag session, results are shown in a nice HTML report.

The report summarizes the total files and folders defragged and helpfully lists the defrag outcome for each file. It would have been nice to have a map of the hard drive showing the fragmentation level before and after running this tooL Because it is simple to use yet effective, everyone will love this defrag program.