hard drive technical question

[Guest perky]

hi

I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question that someone

maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it is never more than

half full. I would like to know if I am using the same portion of the drive

all the time or are all the items on the drive covering the whole drive.

Basically, I would like to know if the unused section of the drive never

get's used,is this unwise and should I fill the drive occasionally to use

all the drive. Sorry to be a bit long-winded but I am trying to explain as

best I can

thank you

[Guest Shenan Stanley]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

perky wrote:

> I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question

> that someone maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it

> is never more than half full. I would like to know if I am using

> the same portion of the drive all the time or are all the items on

> the drive covering the whole drive. Basically, I would like to know

> if the unused section of the drive never get's used,is this unwise

> and should I fill the drive occasionally to use all the drive.

> Sorry to be a bit long-winded but I am trying to explain as best I

> can

 

It is not unwise. In fact - the drive does not care and it is not harming

it in any way.

 

When you write data to a hard disk drive - it is not necessarily writing it

in order from the inside of the platter (think of a record/LP) to the

outside... It jumps around - writing pretty well randomly.

 

Suggested reading:

http://computer.howstuffworks.com/hard-disk.htm

 

For your computers performance - you may wish to CHKDSK and DEFRAG the drive

on occassion.

 

How to use Disk Cleanup

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310312

 

How to scan your disks for errors

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315265

 

How to Defragment your hard drives

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314848

 

Also - don't *depend* on your hard disk drive alone. If that is the only

copy you have of all your stuff -that *is* unwise. Archive/backup to

external media (USB hard disk drive, CD or DVD, etc.)

 

--

Shenan Stanley

MS-MVP

--

How To Ask Questions The Smart Way

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

[Guest R. McCarty]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

There is no technical reason to fill a drive or force use of a particular

area

of sectors. If you visualize the drive as circle, the outermost area is the

fastest. The heads move less writing/reading to the outside area. Using

the inner area requires more head movement. ( longer access times ). A

NTFS volume has it's MFT offset by a certain percent from the start of

the volume (~15%). Where the data is written depends on the availability

of free space. A heavily fragmented volume will have data spread across

a larger percentage of the drive and perform less than optimally.

 

"perky" <alperk47asif@hotmail.com> wrote in message

news:%236vlk0UeIHA.4196@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...

> hi

> I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question that

> someone maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it is never

> more than half full. I would like to know if I am using the same portion

> of the drive all the time or are all the items on the drive covering the

> whole drive. Basically, I would like to know if the unused section of the

> drive never get's used,is this unwise and should I fill the drive

> occasionally to use all the drive. Sorry to be a bit long-winded but I am

> trying to explain as best I can

> thank you

>

[Guest throwitout]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

On Feb 27, 10:29 am, "perky" <alperk47a...@hotmail.com> wrote:

> hi

> I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question that someone

> maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it is never more than

> half full. I would like to know if I am using the same portion of the drive

> all the time or are all the items on the drive covering the whole drive.

> Basically, I would like to know if the unused section of the drive never

> get's used,is this unwise and should I fill the drive occasionally to use

> all the drive. Sorry to be a bit long-winded but I am trying to explain as

> best I can

> thank you

 

Generally as you add and delete files things will start to get spaced

around the hard drive. As a rough approximation of how things are

spaced, look at the analyze screen in defrag:

My Computer->Right click C:-> properties->tools->Defragment now.

 

Click analyze and it will show (roughly) how the data is spaced across

the drive. Usually it won't always be all compactly in the far left

side (start of disk), but kind of spread out. If there's a lot of red

you probably should defragment your drive ;)

 

It really isn't something worth worrying about, you aren't in anyway

harming your drive the way you're using it now.

[Guest VanguardLH]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

"perky" wrote in message

news:%236vlk0UeIHA.4196@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...

> I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question that

> someone maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it is

> never more than half full. I would like to know if I am using the

> same portion of the drive all the time or are all the items on the

> drive covering the whole drive. Basically, I would like to know if

> the unused section of the drive never get's used,is this unwise and

> should I fill the drive occasionally to use all the drive. Sorry to

> be a bit long-winded but I am trying to explain as best I can

 

 

Do you also feel the need to occasionally fill your glass to the brim

because you think that not doing so would somehow diminish its

capacity?

[Guest Colin Barnhorst]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

The others have pretty well answered your question so I will simply supply

some often forgotten advice. If you want to reduce fragmentation on the

drive, increase performance, and utilize new areas of the drive stop using

the Save command wherever you can. Save only writes the changes to a file

and the file manager only looks for the next convenient place on the hard

drive that will store the fragment. Over time a file can be in a hundred

pieces and the disk head has to move all over the place to read file

sequentially into memory.

 

Use the Save As command instead and use the same filename you have been

using. The Save As command causes the file manager to save the entire

contents of the file in a contiguous new filespace somewhere else on the

hard drive. This makes it very easy on the hard drive to read the file into

memory the next time because the heads only have to move to the starting

point and just read. Not only that but it requires much less drive activity

to defrag (there still is a lot of save activity from system processes too)

and defrag is easier on the drive mechanism and quicker to perform.

 

"perky" <alperk47asif@hotmail.com> wrote in message

news:%236vlk0UeIHA.4196@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...

> hi

> I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question that

> someone maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it is never

> more than half full. I would like to know if I am using the same portion

> of the drive all the time or are all the items on the drive covering the

> whole drive. Basically, I would like to know if the unused section of the

> drive never get's used,is this unwise and should I fill the drive

> occasionally to use all the drive. Sorry to be a bit long-winded but I am

> trying to explain as best I can

> thank you

>

[Guest perky]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

thank you all for taking the trouble to clarify my question. it really is

appreciated

keep up the good work

[Guest Lil' Dave]

Re: hard drive technical question

 

On my PC, system files seems to reside all over the windows partition. The

swapfile stays pretty much at the end of the windows partition after

educating it by removal at the proper time and reinstating it. Rest stays

up towards the beginning of the partition including the MFT table which

can't be moved. Using an older version of diskeeper for defragmentation.

 

--

Dave

"perky" <alperk47asif@hotmail.com> wrote in message

news:%236vlk0UeIHA.4196@TK2MSFTNGP04.phx.gbl...

> hi

> I am using xp pro fully updated and I have a technical question that

> someone maybe able to answer. I have a 60gig hard drive and it is never

> more than half full. I would like to know if I am using the same portion

> of the drive all the time or are all the items on the drive covering the

> whole drive. Basically, I would like to know if the unused section of the

> drive never get's used,is this unwise and should I fill the drive

> occasionally to use all the drive. Sorry to be a bit long-winded but I am

> trying to explain as best I can

> thank you

>