Actually, "Smart Placement" is what PerfectDisk 2000 does (Smart Placement is a registered mark of Raxco Software) and is based on file modification date. The Win9x defragger places files based on access dates - putting the most frequently accessed files at the top of the LOGICAL partition - which may or may not be the fastest part of the PHYSICAL drive. SpeedDisk 5.x tries to get close to what PerfectDisk does with placement of files - however it also does the "most frequently accessed" at the top of the LOGICAL partition - which may or may not be the fastest part of the PHYSICAL hard drive (yes, there is a difference between Logical Cluster Numbers - which is all defraggers know about and Physical Cluster Numbers - which is what the hard drive actually knows about).
 
- Greg/Raxco Software
 
Disclaimer: I work for Raxco Software, the maker of PerfectDisk 2000, as a systems engineer in the support department.

I wouldnt touch anything you value very much, ie. data, with a Symantec/Norton product unless its AntiVirus.
Norton System Works (Especially Crash Guard) cause more problems than they are worth.

Crash Guard--no, Crash Causer--yes.
 
Back to the topic at hand: I remember seeing an earlier post about this. 98 doesn't acknowledge the sovrenity of XP on its own partition, so what's best for 98 isn't necessarily so great for XP. Try a few rounds of defragging XP in XP. Do 98 in 98, and don't cross over. It's not optimal.

Alright...just a couple of quick questions:
 
XP's defragger (Diskeeper version whatever) should do the job, even if it also buggers me up?
 
And I know somebody who can lend me his Nortan Systemworks 2002. That says every MS OS out there with the exception of Dos 6 and Win 3.1. Somebody mentioned to stick with the NT/2k defraggers so is this new one ok when used with XP?

"Alright...just a couple of quick questions:
 
XP's defragger (Diskeeper version whatever) should do the job, even if it also buggers me up?
 
And I know somebody who can lend me his Nortan Systemworks 2002. That says every MS OS out there with the exception of Dos 6 and Win 3.1. Somebody mentioned to stick with the NT/2k defraggers so is this new one ok when used with XP?"
 
The WinXP built-in one is rather limited. It requires at least 15% free space and may take a while and may require multiple passes. It also can't defragment directories on FATx partitions and isn't easily scheduled (you can schedule via it's command line interface). With that being said, it the built-in defragger will probably work "okay enough" for most WinXP home users, however, you as the end user are the ultimate decision maker on whether it will work "okay enough" for you.
 
SpeedDisk (part of SystemWorks) is the only commercial defragger that does NOT use the defrag APIs provided by Microsoft as part of the NT4/Win2k/WinXP operating systems. These APIs are tightly integrated with the Windows Memory Manager, File System and Caching System and take care of all of the low level I/O synchronization that needs to occur to allow files that are open and in use to safely be moved online. This means that SpeedDisk may be service pack dependent under WinXP as they are under NT4 and Win2k. Anything changes that Microsoft makes in the file system, memory manager, etc... via hotfix or service pack may render SpeedDisk so that it will not run until Symantec releases an update to the product. With that being said, if you are comfortable with using SpeedDisk, then use it (hopefully, you'll get you own copy instead of "borrowing" somebody elses.
 
- Greg/Raxco Software
 
Disclaimer: I work for Raxco Software, the maker of PerfectDisk - a competitor to both SpeedDisk and the built-in defragmenter, as a system engineer in the support department.

Thanks for the reply. This is the sort of info that I'm not sure about and need to know This is also what probably buggered me up before too - the defragger basically ignoring/not paying enough attention to the main system files. It somewhat explains why Win98SE ran better and WinXP ran worse no matter what I did with it.
 
I'd rather not have to try out SpeedDisk because like I mentioned it's not in my possesion and it is a child of Norton. You mentioned that XP's included defragger can't do FATx at all or not that well? I'm running solely with Fat32 since NTFS5 didn't really run any faster for me and when something did go wrong with an earlier beta I couldn't get at the partition from WinMe (had that installed at the time.)
 
So, what's PerfectDisk like?

"You mentioned that XP's included defragger can't do FATx at all or not that well?"
 
The WinXP built-in defragger can't do DIRECTORIES on FATx partitions. It can do normal data files just fine.
 
"So, what's PerfectDisk like? "
 
Well, it's not like I'm biased or anything *grin* but I think that it is a pretty decent product...
 
- Greg/Raxco Software

What is the best defragger for winXP? I've got version 6.0.380.1t of Diskeeper. Should I install the win2k version - is that right?
 
Thanks!
 
Brad