adamwillson001
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Can i defragment mp3 players with a hard-drive. Im not sure if there are only certain types you can do so with. Does anyone have any ideas please?
Defragmenting
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wolfen68
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Yes.
With my Archos, to save a little wear and tear (defragging is a lot of work for a harddrive), I just re-format and reload my music every 4-6 months. This achieves the same effect in the same (or less) time frame.
I've heard ihp-120/140 owners talk about defragging only and to avoid reformatting, but I've never had any troubles with my unit.
With my Archos, to save a little wear and tear (defragging is a lot of work for a harddrive), I just re-format and reload my music every 4-6 months. This achieves the same effect in the same (or less) time frame.
I've heard ihp-120/140 owners talk about defragging only and to avoid reformatting, but I've never had any troubles with my unit.
IpaqMan
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Since the IHP-1XXs read in the filenames during startup from power-on, it is very helpful to defrag and group the directories at the beginning of the drive. Norton Speed Disk can do this on Win9x/WinMe but not on WinNT/XP/2K. When I chose move folders to the front and alphabetize, my startup time improved from over 26 seconds to 11 seconds.
Quote:
you mean defragmenting will harm/lower the life of your harddrive player?
| Originally Posted by wolfen68 Yes. With my Archos, to save a little wear and tear (defragging is a lot of work for a harddrive), I just re-format and reload my music every 4-6 months. This achieves the same effect in the same (or less) time frame. |
you mean defragmenting will harm/lower the life of your harddrive player?
skitlets
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it relly shuldnt. hard drives are made 2 stand up 2 lots of stress, and defragging puts less stress than simply transferring files.
wolfen68
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Quote:
No, not really. Hard drives are made for a certain service life...and periodic defragging is part of that.
However, (please correct me someone if I'm wrong), defragging IS a transfer of files. Files are copied to free sectors, and then copied again to their final resting place to put them in a less "shuffled order"
On an archos forum that I frequent, a lot of discussion occurred regarding this....and the "group collective" decided that a reformat and a reload is less work to the hard drive than a defrag. Reformatting is not much work and occurs rapidly. The harddrive is informed to disregard the old information (though it's still there). Then a fresh data load can be written sequentially with minimal jockeying position by the writing head. It just spans across the sectors and overwrites with a single sweep. I think it matters how defragmented your drive actually is whether it would be more or less work than a reformat/reload.
If you wanted, you could also delete all your files in windows explorer, and just reload everything on top again. This would achieve a similar effect without the reformat step.
In practice with my Archos 20 gig (working through USB 2.0), a defragment takes about 60-80 minutes...and the drive is chugging all the while. Using the alternative method, a reformat takes about 5 minutes, and the reload of 14 gigs of songs (data) takes 20-25 minutes. Seems like less work to me.
Archos people always cared about this because the Archos HD goes through a full spinup whenever you're connected to USB, draining power quickly. The AC adapter provided actually feeds the batteries, which in turn feed the unit (not supplied directly to the unit).
Because of this goofy approach, even with AC connected on a older style archos recorder, the player will go dead from a full charge in about two hours of connected use. The quicker things can be done, the better.
| Originally Posted by terrymx you mean defragmenting will harm/lower the life of your harddrive player?
|
No, not really. Hard drives are made for a certain service life...and periodic defragging is part of that.
However, (please correct me someone if I'm wrong), defragging IS a transfer of files. Files are copied to free sectors, and then copied again to their final resting place to put them in a less "shuffled order"
On an archos forum that I frequent, a lot of discussion occurred regarding this....and the "group collective" decided that a reformat and a reload is less work to the hard drive than a defrag. Reformatting is not much work and occurs rapidly. The harddrive is informed to disregard the old information (though it's still there). Then a fresh data load can be written sequentially with minimal jockeying position by the writing head. It just spans across the sectors and overwrites with a single sweep. I think it matters how defragmented your drive actually is whether it would be more or less work than a reformat/reload.
If you wanted, you could also delete all your files in windows explorer, and just reload everything on top again. This would achieve a similar effect without the reformat step.
In practice with my Archos 20 gig (working through USB 2.0), a defragment takes about 60-80 minutes...and the drive is chugging all the while. Using the alternative method, a reformat takes about 5 minutes, and the reload of 14 gigs of songs (data) takes 20-25 minutes. Seems like less work to me.
Archos people always cared about this because the Archos HD goes through a full spinup whenever you're connected to USB, draining power quickly. The AC adapter provided actually feeds the batteries, which in turn feed the unit (not supplied directly to the unit).
Because of this goofy approach, even with AC connected on a older style archos recorder, the player will go dead from a full charge in about two hours of connected use. The quicker things can be done, the better.
adamwillson001
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cheers for all the information people,
IpaqMan
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I would agree that a backup, reformat, restore would be easier on the drive and possibly quicker.
The problem with IHP-1XXs is that the directories would tend to fragment when copying the files back to the IHP. Folders would be created on the fly and wherever the free space was available. For improved startup times, it is important that the folders be on as few tracks as possible. Jumping from track to track to find all of the filenames from the folders slows down the boot.
Edit: BTW, I tried out reformatting and restoring the files. Now my startup time was 15 seconds. After defragging with the move folders to the front option, the startup time decreased to 10.5 seconds.
The problem with IHP-1XXs is that the directories would tend to fragment when copying the files back to the IHP. Folders would be created on the fly and wherever the free space was available. For improved startup times, it is important that the folders be on as few tracks as possible. Jumping from track to track to find all of the filenames from the folders slows down the boot.
Edit: BTW, I tried out reformatting and restoring the files. Now my startup time was 15 seconds. After defragging with the move folders to the front option, the startup time decreased to 10.5 seconds.
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