All sorts of pros have been coming out over the past couple of years about how user-driven defragmenting is not nearly as important or even useful as it was many years ago. Mac OS X has on-the-fly defragmenting and clustering to help along as well.
So, I ask again: are you sure you need something that defrags?
I would add that DiskWarrior rebuilds your disk directory. It does NOT defrag the files on the disk. To do that you would need something like TechTool Pro 4. And as Brad said, with Panther's on-the-fly defraging (on files <20 MB I believe), the need for such a utility is pretty much nil. I basically run DIskWarrior once a week for maintenance purposes, and I run the diagnostic tests on TechTool Pro just to check the other system components. Thats it. My Mac is almost 2 years old and it has been running with virtually 0 hiccups (I can count maybe 3 kp's in that whole time...2 of them because of a bad USB keychain drive).
say what you want, but i just picked up a peachpit book for some video stuff, and it said if you hear the "clicking and jigging" from your hard drive (which i do hear) you need to defragment the hard drive. so there.
whats that for??? when i load up big files, i hear it clicking away (more so than before). say no all you want, but i'll trust the people from peachpit.
Norton has never been good. In X it can ruin your system. DiskWarrior has always been good. It is particularly good in X. You decide. You don't need to defrag anymore since Panther. Ever. Just turn JFS on and forget about it.
You do need to worry about rare screwups and software/hardware crashing disks. In this case I recommend:
1. Data Rescue
2. DiskWarrior
3. DiskUtility (Apple's own utility in the Utilities folder in Applications)
4. More for messing around and testing things, TechTool Pro 4
5. Luck. you can't buy it but you'll probably need it! For everything else, there's MasterCard
Norton has never been good. In X it can ruin your system. DiskWarrior has always been good. It is particularly good in X. You decide. You don't need to defrag anymore since Panther. Ever. Just turn JFS on and forget about it.
i've said it before, and i'll say it again: there is no earthly good reason for a disk repair utility to install kernel extensions to do its mojo. period. and that's what norton does (and is the root of any serious malfunctions it has had in the past).
you can certainly buy it, and NEVER install it (i.e. JUST run it from the CD when repairs need to be made) in case diskwarrior can't do what you need it to, but diskwarrior has never failed me. ever.
and micromat has just gone schizo with their product "line" -- drive10 and now techtool pro 4. drive10 got massive points on style, but never DID anything. and when they finally got around to updating it to optimize a disk, it crashed and panicked and hung far too often (AND you had to pay for an upgrade AND had to get a new CD).
i have not played with techtool pro 4 yet, so i have no idea how well (or not) it functions. lots of people gave them crap for not shipping when they said they would, but apple released the friggin' G5's as the CDs were leaving the building. what did you expect them to do? i guess i am more shocked that they didn't see the updated hardware coming down the pipe, but i think apple is more to blame for keeping everyone in the dark to maintain surprise.
it's a shame, too, because micromat used to be the upstart company that gave norton a run for their marketing dollar. i'm betting symantec buys out micromat by the end of the year to acquire their assets and make norton an even bigger 800 lb. gorilla than it already is.
say what you want, but i just picked up a peachpit book for some video stuff, and it said if you hear the "clicking and jigging" from your hard drive (which i do hear) you need to defragment the hard drive. so there.
Comments
Originally posted by ipodandimac
i just need something that defrags.
Are you sure you do?
I honestly doubt it. Seriously.
All sorts of pros have been coming out over the past couple of years about how user-driven defragmenting is not nearly as important or even useful as it was many years ago. Mac OS X has on-the-fly defragmenting and clustering to help along as well.
So, I ask again: are you sure you need something that defrags?
Originally posted by DMBand0026
I will echo what Torifile said. If you do indeed need something to defrag, go with diskwarrior. Don't touch norton with a ten and a half foot pole.
ditto.
Originally posted by ipodandimac
it said if you hear the "clicking and jigging" from your hard drive
Originally posted by Brad
whats that for??? when i load up big files, i hear it clicking away (more so than before). say no all you want, but i'll trust the people from peachpit.
You do need to worry about rare screwups and software/hardware crashing disks. In this case I recommend:
1. Data Rescue
2. DiskWarrior
3. DiskUtility (Apple's own utility in the Utilities folder in Applications)
4. More for messing around and testing things, TechTool Pro 4
5. Luck. you can't buy it but you'll probably need it! For everything else, there's MasterCard
Originally posted by Aquatic
Norton has never been good. In X it can ruin your system. DiskWarrior has always been good. It is particularly good in X. You decide. You don't need to defrag anymore since Panther. Ever. Just turn JFS on and forget about it.
whats JFS?
you can certainly buy it, and NEVER install it (i.e. JUST run it from the CD when repairs need to be made) in case diskwarrior can't do what you need it to, but diskwarrior has never failed me. ever.
and micromat has just gone schizo with their product "line" -- drive10 and now techtool pro 4. drive10 got massive points on style, but never DID anything. and when they finally got around to updating it to optimize a disk, it crashed and panicked and hung far too often (AND you had to pay for an upgrade AND had to get a new CD).
i have not played with techtool pro 4 yet, so i have no idea how well (or not) it functions. lots of people gave them crap for not shipping when they said they would, but apple released the friggin' G5's as the CDs were leaving the building. what did you expect them to do? i guess i am more shocked that they didn't see the updated hardware coming down the pipe, but i think apple is more to blame for keeping everyone in the dark to maintain surprise.
it's a shame, too, because micromat used to be the upstart company that gave norton a run for their marketing dollar. i'm betting symantec buys out micromat by the end of the year to acquire their assets and make norton an even bigger 800 lb. gorilla than it already is.
anyway, all in all, go with diskwarrior.
Originally posted by ipodandimac
whats JFS?
journaling file system-logs what you're system is doing, in case there is an error, then you know where something went wrong
Originally posted by mattjohndrow
journaling file system-logs what you're system is doing, in case there is an error, then you know where something went wrong
More specifically, the OS watches the log and automatically fixes the errors.
It's really fantastic. I've used it since 10.2.2 and practically never have any sort of filesystem errors.
Select your drive from the left side.
Click the green 'Enable Journaling' button in the toolbar.
That's it.
Oh, and with 10.3... the disk defrags itself over time.
Dobby.
Originally posted by ipodandimac
say what you want, but i just picked up a peachpit book for some video stuff, and it said if you hear the "clicking and jigging" from your hard drive (which i do hear) you need to defragment the hard drive. so there.
GO Ahead, waste your money
We will all just save ours... SO THERE....