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#56 Background defragmentation
An ultra defrag program that would run in the background and optimize the files one by one, slowly, WITHOUT using much resources would be great!
It would even make windows look better!
I dont think this would be much difficult to implement?
suggestion: just put a limit on the speed on the file handling..
thanks!
Don't know how resource-hungry this would be but one way of doing a smart background defrag could be to monitor disk activity and if a sufficiently large deletion/alteration/addition etc. occurs then activate the defrag process.
This feature will never be implemented because it will force your disk to die quite soon. Remember, less disk activity you have longer lifespan of the disk you have ;-)
So, instant background defragmentation isn't a good thing.
Another reason against it is a fact that any defragmentation requires noticeable amount of system resources. Let's imagine a situation when a homemade nuclear reactor requires to be stopped as soon as possible by moving special bars inside active zone. But, ... background defragmentation started accidentally and took a lot of system resources on the computer managing the reactor. What we'll have as a result? Right, BANG!, B-A-N-G!, B-A-A-A-N-G!!! ;-D
More realistic scenarios include music recording and other tasks when the computer should avoid run of unnecessary background tasks consuming noticeable amount of resources.
Dmitri,
With due respect, I think people running homemade nuclear reactors would also be aware of things that might drain their computer resources and disable them before going on to full operation --I know I would :)
About the multimedia scenario: Point taken, but as long as background defragging is optional (and can be stopped by the user), I don't see any major problems .
Finally, I think it is a little too much of an exaggeration to call it a doomsday for HDDs if background defrag is enabled.
In the long run, background defrag should cause a lot less disk IO (if it continuously monitors the file activity and acts accordingly) than compared to full defrag where nearly ALL files are moved out to somewhere else then in to their correct places.
And, this is done in one go --which is likely to stress the HDDs far more than background defrag which only acts on a few files at a time.
In any case, as long as this is optional, and people are warned of the potential consequences, I don't really understand why you should be so against it.
After further thoughts upon the subject I see two major disadvantages of the background defragmentation:
Both things will reduce the lifespan of the disk because of lots of useless data movements.
As for me, the best defragmentation is when you run it on idle system and when you cleaned up all the disks before it.