Question about Recordings fragmentation (2 Viewers)

[K1lo]

Depends on your system, at best you get some slowdown on your defragging, at worst you can cause framerate drops in your recording (i.e. stuttering) or further fragmentation (i.e. you move one chunk out and Mediaportal records the current program straight into that space causing further problems.)

The framerate problem was the one I was worried about. Further fragmenting wouldn't hurt that much, since this would just get fixed next time it defragged.
The problem would be minor, because I was planning on running defrag at night time where I rarely watch or record stuff´, but sometimes it happens that a show or movies is aired, or if I missed the first airing, the rerun is at some weird time.
Guess I'll just have to try it defragging and then recording something at the same time, to see what happens.[/QUOTE]

Ha! Funny you should bring that up because that is exactly what I was grappling with last night I in the end decided to schedule my defrag software for between 4-5am every Monday morning, as I don't think I have ever recorded anything at that time. Depending on your defrag software, there is also sometimes a 'screensaver' or idle mode which prohibits the machine actually defragging when some activity is taking place. Might be worth considering.

 

[jonaskp]

I think I'll try out that free program that was linked to first and then see what happens. I could also just use windows defrag, but I am not sure what the "features" of that is. Perhaps there are some settings to the programs that could be usefull. I'll have to check it out.

I don't think I will be recording anything at that time either anyway, so it's kind of hypothetical. Just curious what might happen.

 

[jomed]

I would say that windows defrag is more than enough for the task. It might not have some features of other programs, but it does what it says. It defragments large files, and that normally should suffice.

Definitely much more important than the software you use, is to automate this task. Which can also be done without any additional programs:

1. Create a simple one line .bat (or .cmd) file with the following content in any folder you want (i would recommend to use something like c:\bat or similar):

%systemroot%\system32\defrag v: (where v: is the drive letter you want to defrag)

2. Go to the Control Panel and add this .cmd to Windows task scheduler for automatic execution. I set it to execute every two weeks at 3am, but you can set pretty much every time and interval you want. Be sure to check that the task is able to wake up the system from standby.

3. If you use the TV-Server Power Scheduler there is one last thing to do: add the defrag program to the Power Schedulers exception list. This prevents the Power Scheduler plugin from sending the computer to standby while a defragmentation is running. This can be done in the TV Server setup (Plugins/Power Scheduler/Processes). Simply add ", dfrgntfs" (without the quotation marks) to the list.

That's it. From now on you never have to worry about recordings fragmentation anymore.

 

[K1lo]

I am sorry, I am going to have to respectfully disagree with you. Having used both Vista and XP's built in defrag functionality I do not dispute that they work, however they are slow, cumbersome and inefficient. Believe me the difference between the buit-in utility and some of the ones suggested in this thread is night and day.

 

[Paul Shirley]

Depending on your defrag software, there is also sometimes a 'screensaver' or idle mode which prohibits the machine actually defragging when some activity is taking place. Might be worth considering.

JKDefrag has a screensaver mode and should so better job than the builtin defrag. The builtin defrag only works effectively when you have plenty of free space but that's also when you're unlikely to have fragmentation problems!

 

[ardvrk571]

Smart Defrag is excellent, and its free Defragment Disk | SmartDefrag | Free Defragmenter for Enterprise, Business and Home

I agree with Paranoid Delusion!

I downloaded Iobit SmartDefrag and I'm very impressed with it. I had considered running a batch file and scheduled task and use the inbuilt XP defrag, but not now. SmartDefrag has an "Auto Defrag" option which will only defrag if resources are below 20% and if the system has been idle for 5 minutes (both can be re-configured). I did a compare before turning on auto defrag and after and it works correctly. SmartDefrag reported 14% fragmentation and XP reported 17%. I checked in a couple of days and both SmartDefrag and XP reported 0% fragmentation. I confirmed this on another computer in a similar condition with the same results. This should mean there will be no problems with recordings, live TV or timeshifting.
SmartDefrag can also be scheduled from within the program.

I don't work for Iobit in case you are wondering. I'm a fan of quality software for the correct price (like MediaPortal). Currently on holidays but plan to donate when I return

Ardvrk571