Disk space management

[momboso]

I want to run some disk management tools to see if my hard drive will work better, and also to see if some periodic crashing, freezing, and slowness will improve for the better. The drive is 70.5 GB with 17 GB free (53.5 used). The OS is win XP. Is this sequence good?

Spin Rite (grc.com) Conditions the drive surface, moving data and covering bad sectors if necessary (don't think it found bad spots in 5 years)

C-Cleaner

Defrag

Then, "Disk Cleanup" function and Compress option are available in the Disk Properties report. Should I run these too?

 

[momboso]

I don't have the XP disks and do not want to reload the OS.

 

[fzabkar]

SpinRite is at best useless, and at worst a drive killer. Data recovery professionals will tell you that it potentially accelerates the failure of weak heads.

If you examine the screenshots at grc.com, you will find that the most recent example is for a 200MB model (MEGAbytes, not GIGAbytes).

Try a comprehensive SMART diagnostic. Look for reallocated, pending, or uncorrectable sectors.

HD Sentinel (DOS / Windows / Linux):
http://www.hdsentinel.com/

HDDScan for Windows:
http://hddscan.com/

See this article for SMART info:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M.A.R.T.

 

[momboso]

Thank you. I looked at the links. hddscan is best for now (no cost). Learning how to use and interpreting results seems daunting! Steep learning curve? Still might try it?

How about C-Cleaner, defrag, and the others? Is the sequence ok, will they work, and will they help the situation?

 

[fzabkar]

Post the SMART data if you like. Someone will be able to interpret them for you.

AIUI, NTFS doesn't suffer from defragmentation like FAT32, so the benefit of defragging may be questionable.

Others will be able to advise you about C-Cleaner.