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Sysinternals PageDefrag: Good, Bad?

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f0dder:
12GB ha!  XP (32bit) can only use 3GB of Ram and most of the laptops I have seen with Vista pre-loaded only come with 3GB as well.-SchoolDaGeek (April 22, 2009, 01:31 PM)
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32bit client Windows OSes can use 4GB physical addresses - because of memory mapped devices, this usually ends up at max ~3.5GB, though, depending on BIOS, chipset and the cards you've installed in your computer. Prior to SP1, XP supported 4GB of physical RAM, regardless of whether regions were above the 4GB physical mark - this has been possible ever since the Pentium Pro. The change was because of "driver incompatibilities" (sloppy driver coders using LowPart instead of QuadPart of the PHYSICALADDRESS datatype, I bet).

32bit server editions have no trouble accessing up to 64GB of physical ram through PAE, but even though XP uses PAE for per-page no-execute bit, client versions are artificially capped to the low 4GB physical addresses... partially for marketing reasons, partially because of those "buggy drivers".

CompactFlash->IDE is a bad idea for anything performance-sensitive, most of the adapters only support PIO (S-L-O-W, überhigh CPU usage), and unless you shell out for the high-end CF cards you're going to get miserable performance.

Carol Haynes:
Two corrections:

32 bit windows is not limited to 3Gb but rather to 4Gb - you lose some of that because it has to include memory mapped devices such as a graphics card so if you have a 1Gb graphics card it is reduced to 3Gb for Windows. If you only have a 128Gb card (enough for Vista Aero interface) you can potentially have 3.875Gb of usable RAM for Windows - it doesn't make any difference if you have XP or Vista.

Re. using a flash card for you page file - bad idea. It will be slower than a fast SATA drive (by a large margin) because it effectively uses a USB bus and you will wear out your flash card rapidly.

Edit: Oops sorry fOdder I didn't see your post - but at least we agree ;)

siouxdax:
I use JKDefrag in this manner: 

1.  I first delete all the temp files I can by using the last page of the GUI and optimize the registry as well.  CCleaner style. 
2.  I also turn on "show hidden folders/system folders" in Tools/Folder Options and delete all the folders that are in BLUE and start with $NT (Service pack uninstall), as well as empty the recycle bin again.  I've never had to uninstall an sp or hotfix.
3.  I then set XP for "No page file" and reboot. 
4.  Then I run JKDefrag GUI and move everything to the END of the disk. 
5.  I then reset the Page file to whatever I feel is optimal based on the computer, typically the standard 1.5x Ram, accounting for any shared video cards, and reboot again.  This places the page file as close to the outside edge of the disk it is able to find in a contiguous space.  I have used 2x Ram sometimes when the computer has more HDD space than ram.
6.  I then re-run JKDefrag GUI in "last access" mode making sure I specify any additional space hogs such as the c:\windows\installer\* directory. 
7.  From that point forward you can leave JKDefrag Screen Saver in whatever mode you like best and set it to wait an Hour before it kicks in, and then only defrag if the last defrag was more than 24hours ago.
-SchoolDaGeek (April 22, 2009, 01:31 PM)
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Wow. That's quite a protocol you've whipped up!

mahesh2k:
How's Defraggler?

Carol Haynes:
How's Defraggler?
-mahesh2k (April 22, 2009, 07:47 PM)
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Very simple - give it a go. It is a tiny download and you don't have to install it (there is a portable version under Alternative downloads).

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