DISKEEPER Version 8.0 Home Edition

by Arlene G. Kapner

Did you know that computers are very messy housekeepers. Whenever you type anything onto your hard drive, the computer tosses all those bits and pieces of information all over the place wherever it finds a space. When you want to use that file again, your computer retrieves all those bits and pieces (called fragments) and reassembles them into that nice file you see on your screen. However, all this fragment fetching slows down the computer, a problem which can be completely and painlessly resolved using Diskeeper. This is a program designed to automatically defragment computers and servers for companies large and small as well as for the home user. It works in the background, so you can continue to do whatever computer work you want to do.  

To get started, I just put the disk in and the initial screen came up automatically. This special reviewer’s edition of Diskeeper offers 5 different installations as follows:  

All of these are Version 8.0. I selected #5, Home Edition.

The Professional Edition and Home Edition are for individual users as opposed to the above network versions.The Professional Edition adds Boot-Time defragmentation which allows you to defragment critical system files which can not ordinarily be defragmented. Activating Boot-Time defragmentation for your system’s MFT (Master File Table) and Paging/Swap files can help resolve system freezes, lock-ups and hangs. Boot-Time mode is available in Diskeeper Professional Edition which you need for Windows XP Professional. The Home Edition will run on Windows XP Home, Win 95, 98 and most other versions of Windows. I decided to install the Home Edition.

After putting the disk in the drive, the Install Shield Wizard automatically appears on the screen and offers a succession of screens to walk even the least savvy computer user through the install process. The Welcome screen gives some tips for getting started as does the Getting Started section in the Help menu – all this help is divided between these two different sources. This program constantly assures optimum efficiency of your operating system by automatically defragmenting your hard drive according to whatever schedule you select -- or you may choose to use the defrag manually.

The Diskeeper screen offers a list of options on the left while the center of the screen describes what each option will do for you. These are clearly written and easy to follow.

The options you will see on the left are:  

The center screen describes the fragmentation that occurs on all computers as you work. Pieces of your file are scattered all over the disk wherever the computer happens to find a bit of space. The more your files are scattered in this manner, the slower the computer operates when a desired file is retrieved. For example, common tasks like opening e-mail or a picture take longer.  

With the Diskeeper  program you can see the details about the degree of fragmentation on your hard disk, or you can call up a graphic view that resembles books on shelves – a very interesting display. The Set It and Forget It button, if selected, will defrag the mess your computer leaves behind on a regular basis, as you choose. Then defragmenting “. . . becomes Diskeepers problem, not yours.” If, like me, you don’t have a particular time to sit at the computer, you can select Smart Schedule which will work every day, all day (whenever your computer is turned on) behind the scenes, so you can continue with whatever computer projects you are working on -- without interference.