Customer Reviews

Raxco PerfectDisk 7.0 Disk Defragmentation - Single User

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

If you are new to or nervous about computer utility programs you will feel comfortable with this one. This is especially true if you are tired of the limitations of Window's defrag program but are afraid to venture "off the farm". Pefect Disk 7 will reward you with improved perfomance, ease of use, and peace of mind.

I would consider myself an intermediate user and pretty comfortable with tinkering with computers and computer programs. Fortunately, Raxco's PerfectDisk (PD) requires none. PD6 got the Editor's Choice award from PC Magazine. So when I found out Raxco had a free full-program trial of their newest version on their website I downloaded it immediately.

I was not disappointed. The download site even lets you choose the appropiate version of PD7 to match your operating system. It operates completely independently of the Windows OS (operating system; i.e. Windows XP). Opening and Installing the program was a walk in the park (I recommend Mozilla as the browser of first choice because it make downloads very easy)and required no extra knowledge of the user.

In order to extend the life of my Pentium III 866 Mhz system, I got the RAM up to 512mb (XP's sweet spot) and then wiped my disk and did a complete reinstall. It was fantastic, but soon fragments began to show up that XP could not repair. I didn't want wipe my disk again (wipe = completely erase all data and programs from disk).

I had earlier tried O&O's defrag utility which is the only comparable defragger, but it required more tweaking than a novice, or anyone else, should have to do. Without a more thorough comparison I would be tempted to say that O&O's program is the most complete and truly industrial strength defrag program available. But again, the tweaking is not for novices.

The good news is that PD7 is very close to that level, but incredibly easier to use. Just do what it tells you.

If you are the tiniest bit adventurous you can use its menu options to tweak the program. These are options within the program and none of them require you to go outside the program to complete them. You just toggle (choose) the options you do or don't want. I did opt to have the program try to consolidate all the free space on my drive, but that was it.

For the only the second time ever, I have all my free space in one place and no frags on my harddrive. With PD7 you will have to defrag your boot files - but it tells you how to do that as well. It will then take 2 or 3 passes to fully align all your files, but the program is very quick. O&O's program is the only other program that I know that can do this and does this in one pass automatically. It is more thorough in its file reorganiztion than PD7, but also about three to four times slower.

If you have tinkered with your Virtual Ram (VR) I would suggest you reset it to 2mb (the minimum allowable), defrag, and then reset the VR to the level you wish and then defrag again. This will ensure you get continuous free space on your drive.

Bottom line. If you are going to spend your money, get quality stuff. Perfect Disk 7 is second only to O&O's Defrag in execution, and first above everyone in ease of use. So if you are a first-time utility program buyer I can guarantee you will have no worries with this one and should be quite happy with it.

I have tested various defrag utilities.

For me, it was sort of a "tie"; between RAXCO's Perfect disk and
"O and O" 's defrag.

[...]

As far as Raxco goes, they offer a 30 day demo on their website.
So if you want to test drive the software, you can do so.
From everything I saw in the "demo", it contains the exact same features you'll find in the full-version.
So you get a "real deal" test drive.


Features:
-online mode
-offline mode
-scheduled mode

LEVELs of defragging:
-defragment only [basic level]
-SMARTplacement [a higher level of optimization than just defrag only]
-aggressive mode [highest mode - adds consolidation of free space]

I like having the choice of doing any of 3 modes:
1. an online mode
2. offline mode of defragging
3. or both


The PROs :
everything listed above

The Cons:
- this can run a lot longer than MS builtin defrag does,
based upon your choice[s].

Conclusion:
- if you do the most indepth defrag that Raxco's PD& is capable of, you will definitely feel the difference [when compared with the basic MS defrag or norton's speed disk].
- You can't go wrong with this product. Works great.

2 thumbs up !

This defragmenting software beats Diskeeper hands down! Unlike Diskeeper, it allows control over every aspect of file reorganization. Offline directory consolidation and defragging can be done on non-system partitions without a restart. On the system partition, a restart is required and produces a very fast defragging including the pagefile and hibernation file which are moved outside of the file areas and in one piece. Files are grouped on the drive from least often changed to the most often changed with boot and program startup files up front. This helps prevent fragmentation and speeds up the boot process and program startup. The directory areas, either NTFS MFT of FAT32, are moved to the middle of the partition to reduce fragmentation and provide the fastest overall access to all disk requests. The graphical interface is much more informative and the processing lightning fast. There are many scheduling, reporting, statistical, and trending options as well. This is an excellent product for those who know the importance of file system maintenance, don't want to wait eons for completion, and want a great tool for that purpose.

The user interface isn't as polished as the full version of diskeeper and it lacks some defrag options that I'm used to like the option to defrag hard drive while screen saver is on.
However, I was very impressed at PerfectDisk's defrag performace. I was previously using diskeeper lite 7.0 on my kids computer and after running one defrag with PerfectDisk I was blown away at the difference it made.

I guess I am the only computer professional that thinks Windows XP's build-in defragger is better. I've always thought after PerfectDisk, the system runs SLOWER, but everyone seems to rave about how good it is. Finally, I decided to put my concerns to rest. I imaged my drive, and tested both Windows' build-in defragger and PerfectDisk on the same imaged drive. Windows' runs a lot faster but probably did not fully defrag every file. PerfectDisk took almost 3 times longer to complete, AND made the system SLOWER. I benched my system after the defrag, and the PerfectDisk defragged system is signficiantly slower and had a significant increase in random full-seeks. I believe in an attempt to defrag completely, PerfectDisk moved the files around too much and completely screwed up Windows' prefetching ability and cause prefetching to be ineffective. I also concluded that related files are moved a part, which caused potential full-stroke access to read files that were neighboring prior to defrag. I have stopped using PerfectDisk. I realize that it defrags more complete than Windows' build-in utility, however, the reason to defrag is to increase system performance and reduce disk access delays. Unfortunately for PerfectDisk, it actually slowed the system down and increased average disk access time. Unless you defrag only once a year and have a really fragmented file system, you will not notice any improvements.

This program does a great job of defragmenting the harddrive quickly and keeps it defragmented. You can schedule it to run on any schedule you like. I am very pleased with it.

This product works so much better than the Windows delivered defrag program. I have not used many other defrag programs but this one is wonderful, easy to use and does a smart placement to help the efficiency of the hard drive. There very well could be other products out there, but I'm not sure how they could defrag the drive any better.

I'm a home user running Windows 2000 SP4. I have been using this program since version 5.

Prior to choosing PerfectDisk the first time I did research on the net, and tested the trial versions of a few other defragmentation programs. Recently I got an e-mail from Raxco offering an upgrade from the version 6 I was using to version 7. I thought I would go ahead and again try some of the other programs out there before upgrading.

I tried two of the other programs popular on the net. Had no problem with them but they either didn't work as well or as fast as PerfectDisk, so I upgraded to version 7.

I recommend it highly and doubt I will ever need another defragmentation program besides PerfectDisk, I think that highly of it. If you want in-depth review of why I chose PerfectDisk search for version 5 reviews.

General a great product. I'm running it on both my desktop and a laptop without any problems. I looks like the startup and disc access has improved.
The only downside is when you set it up to run automtically it does not notify you when it runs.

Otherwise a great product.

I tried both programs and found the Perfect Disk did well even when the free space on the disk was below 10%. It is hard to tell how much it has speed up the 200MHZ old computer.