Diskeeper 10 User's Manual

16 Overview of Diskeeper
• When you first install Diskeeper, analyze all the disk volumes on your computer. This gives you good
information about the extent of fragmentation on your computer.
• After you have analyzed your volumes, establish defragmentation schedules for each of your volumes and
enable automatic defragmentation. You can even allow Diskeeper to determine the best schedule for each
of your volumes, based on the fragmentation level and file activity on each individual volume. For more
information on how to establish a Set It and Forget It schedule, see page30.
• If the analysis shows fragmentation of the Master File Tables (MFTs) or paging files of your volumes, and
you are running Diskeeper on Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP, or Windows Server 2003, you
should next prepare for Boot-Time defragmentation to defragment MFTs and paging files. Since these
critical system files cannot be moved while your operating system is up and running, the Boot-Time
defragmentation operation defragments the paging file and/or MFT on your volumes while your computer
is booting. After running the Boot-Time operation once, regular online defragmentation by Diskeeper can
help prevent the MFT and paging file from becoming fragmented again.
It is recommended you run the Boot-Time defragmentation operation on one disk volume at a time,
because it can be time consuming and the computer cannot be used for any other purpose while the boottime
program is running.
Also, it is important to defragment your volumes before running the Boot-Time defragmentation in order to
create a contiguous free space for your directories and/or paging files to be moved into. For more
information about Boot-Time defragmentation, see page 38.