WORKSHOP

A regular reordering of your hard disk can improve performance and reduce the chance of PC problems

If you've had your PC for a while, you may notice that it seems slower to respond and to load programs than it used to. One of the reasons for this is a fragmented hard disk. It sounds awfully serious, but fragmentation just means that the information on your disk has become separated into scattered chunks rather than being in one continuous area of the disk. The Disk Defragmenter, included with Windows, can cure this.

David Fearon

STEP 1

Before you start the Defragmenter, restart your system in the normal way by clicking on the Start button and choosing Shut Down, then Restart. You'll see why this is necessary later on. When your PC has restarted, start the Defragmenter by clicking the Start button, then Programs, Accessories, System Tools, and select Disk Defragmenter. A small window will appear asking which hard disk you want to defragment. The default option of Drive C is the correct one for the majority of cases, so click OK.

STEP 2

At this point, Windows 95 will give you a dialogue box saying whether it thinks you need to defragment the drive or not. Windows 98 generally won't do this, it will just start. This is because the Windows 98 version contains some extra routines to organise the applications on your disk so that the most-used ones start faster. So it's always worth running it, whether the drive is badly fragmented or not.

STEP 3

You'll notice the illustration from Step 2 suggests you can continue using your computer while the defragmenter is running. This is true but the trouble is the defragmenter will never finish! Every time another program writes data to the hard disk ­ and 99.9 per cent of programs do ­ the defragmenter has to restart. This is why we restarted the system before starting the defragmenter ­ to close down any other programs.

STEP 4

The best thing to do when you've started the defragmentation process is to leave the computer alone, go away and have a cup of coffee. Actually, have several, because it can take a long time to complete ­ several hours for a large hard disk that's full of stuff.

STEP 5

If you want to see how the process is going, click the show details button. You'll be presented with a bizarre screen full of boxes. Click the Legend button if you want some idea of what's going on. When the defragmenter reaches the section of the disk you're looking at, you'll see the boxes changing colour as the data is moved around.

STEP 6

If you find the process never completes, check your system tray at the bottom right of the screen. Things like Task Scheduler can cause trouble, so right-click on them and stop them by choosing Disable, Pause or Exit ­ whichever is available for the icon in question. They should all start next time you restart your PC. Screensavers can affect the defragmenting process. If you have one, right-click on the desktop, choose Properties, then click the Screen Saver tab and choose None in the list in the Screen Saver box.