Free Space Consolidation – Improved
Diskeeper 2011’s new free space consolidation has been redesigned focus on substantial space consolidation so that file fragmentation can be more effectively prevented and, if required, efficiently eliminated. Leveraging InvisiTasking technology, Diskeeper consolidates about 90% of system free space into less than a dozen large free space chunks, improving file write performance by minimizing the likelihood of new file writes being written in a fragmented state.
Free Space Consolidation works in tandem with Instant Defrag to ensure that free space fragmentation does not prevent IntelliWrite and Instant Defrag from performing their tasks. Together, they handle new fragmentation quickly and efficiently. Free Space Consolidation is available in all Diskeeper 2011 editions expect for Home edition.
Titan Defrag Engine
Developed as the next generation of defragmentation engines, the Titan Defrag Engine surpasses the previous technological leader, the Terabyte Volume Engine. It is the only solution capable of efficiently handling 10TB, 20TB or even larger data volumes.
With regulations such as Sarbanes-Oxley, today’s server environments are overloaded with new levels of information and records, forcing them to accommodate multiple terabytes (TB) of data. Recognizing such an exponential increase in storage and the vital need to keep these systems running at top speed, Titan was designed to defragment volumes with massive amounts of data rapidly and thoroughly. Titan Defrag Engine is found exclusively in the Diskeeper EnterpriseServer edition.
Terabyte Volume Engine
The Terabyte Volume Engine has been designed to rapidly eliminate tens of thousands, or even millions of fragments on volumes with a large amount of data. Recognizing that modern desktops often have volumes exceeding a terabyte, Diskeeper 2011 includes the Terabyte Volume Engine in the Pro Premier and Server editions.
Boot-Time Defragmentation Engine
Boot-Time defragmentation defragments and consolidates directories to improve application speed, eliminating slows, hangs and crashes. Defragmentation during boot-time handles those files that cannot be moved while the system is active.
Completely Automatic Operation
Diskeeper 2011 now automatically defragments all volumes immediately after installation. While previous Diskeeper editions enabled users to “Set It and Forget It™,” Diskeeper 2011 defragments drives automatically. This ensures optimal performance at all times, without user intervention.
Volume Snapshot Service (VSS)
For Windows operating systems that support Volume Snapshot Service (VSS) (also called Volume Shadow Copy Service) including Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista and Windows 7, Diskeeper 2011 includes a feature to provide optimal defragmentation of VSS volumes without filling the space allocated to snapshots. This option only appears if you are running a supported operating system and have VSS enabled on one or more volumes.
Remote Installation
Diskeeper 2011 Administrator edition allows administrators to install Diskeeper simultaneously on multiple computers across a network. Remote installation can be a huge time saver for system administrators, especially on large networks that service hundreds or thousands of systems.
HyperFast solid state drive optimizer (optional add-on)
As the global leader in HDD optimization solutions, Diskeeper offers the market’s first optimization software-based solution for NAND Flash devices, such as SSDs. SSDs offer users a faster and better experience than conventional hard disk drives (HDDs). However, over time, customers of systems with SSDs will experience a very noticeable and dramatic deterioration in performance. HyperFast eliminates performance degradation, delivering the NAND Flash performance promise.
Installation and Configuration
To install Diskeeper 2011 Professional edition with HyperFast, once you have obtained the program files (including the .DAL files), perform the following steps on the computer you downloaded them to:
Double-click the Diskeeper2011_Professional.exe file to start the installation.
Follow the onscreen instructions to complete the installation.
Excellent review! There are some other points to keep in mind though.
When your PC attempts to write a new file (when you save a file after editing, create a new Word or Excel file, or download a new video or song, etc. and try to save it), the disk rarely has enough contiguous free space on it so the file will be broken into pieces, filling in the available free space.
This is standard practice and believe it or not, some files can be broken into tens of thousands of pieces this way.
Later, when you access the file (play the song or video, open the spreadsheet to update it, edit your Word document, etc.) your hard drive needs to find each of those possibly 10,000 or more pieces and piece these together so the file can be used (usually it goes into RAM where it can be quickly accessed while it is open or to a reserved space on the disk if RAM is all used up).
Now look at what just happened here.
IT specialists look at each of these actions as an”I/O”, which means “In/Out”.
The request is made to open or save a file(In) and the action is executed (OUT). You ask for a file (IN and you get the file on your monitor to read (OUT).
Ideally, you should have one or two I/Os to access the file, and one or two to save it (you request it be saved (IN) and it gets saved (OUT). And that is pretty much what would happen if the disk were not fragmented.
However, if you save the file (IN) and then the PC has to break the file into say 1,000 pieces, it first must catalog each piece so it knows where to find it, and then write it to those locations on the disk.
We now suddenly have well over 2,000 I/Os (save request = 1, breaking it up = 1 — probably more — logging where each piece will be = 1,000 if the file is broken into 1,000 pieces, and we haven’t even saved the file yet! Writing EACH of the pieces to the various locations on the disk = over 1,000, completing the task = 1). Now the file is finally saved.
Now most of those I/Os translate into disk motion, that is, the disk has to spin and the head has to go the designated spot and write the portion of the file that will fit on that empty space.
And then, when you later want to access that file, the disk will go through at least 1,000 I/Os to locate the file bits, read each piece, assemble them and finally present the file in a usable format.
And this happens to each file that is saved and then read.
Now the disk is mechanical, so do you see that it’s more than just keeping the files neat and easy to find?
Keeping the disks defragmented continually means A LOT less disk use, which means less wear, which means the disks will also last longer.
And since Diskeeper 2011 now prevents most fragmentation, even more I/Os are saved when the files are written, since they now for the most part will not be written in pieces.
Drastically less I/Os to write them and drastically reduced I/Os to find the files.
This is why Diskeeper is used by more Fortune 500 companies world-wide than any other defrag program around. Professional IT Managers who oversee and maintain large sites with thousands of computers will only use Diskeeper as they know it helps their disks last a lot longer.
Sorry for the long comment — I hope this is useful info for you and your readers. 🙂
thanks Bill – thats really useful additional information.
FYI TYPO
http://usingwindowshomeserver.com/2011/04/05/review-of-diskeeper-2011-professional-with-hyperfast/
Efficient Mode is available in all Diskeeper 2011 editions expect for Home edition.
s/b except
thanks Dan – I have updated it. It was taken directly from their documentation 🙂