Disk defrag restarts

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 1:45 am

Can somebody tell me why, when I defrag my hard drive, the blasted thing keeps restarting with the message "drive contents changed"? It does this even when booted in safe mode, with nothing but Explorer in the task list. When it does restart, it picks up where it left off, more or less, and will eventually finish. Takes forever though. The box is a Compaq DeskPro EN Series, Pentium II 333, running Win95 (didn't have this problem with DOS)

Thanks for your help. I've learned a lot from this forum.

Lou[This message was edited by Lou[NE] on 22 February 2001 at 02:47 AM.]

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 22 Feb 2001 4:02 am

Win95 is more disk I/O dependent than the later 98 or ME. I seem to remember that my old WIN95 machine did the same thing.

Booting up in the safe mode pretty much eliminates as much as you can and that's the way I still run defrag on my PC, which has WIN ME installed.

The old DOS Norton Speed Disk, which is a defrag program, took a while too. Just the nature of what the program is doing and the size of the drive and the amount of defragmentation that is there.

Ole Dantoft · Post by **Ole Dantoft** » 22 Feb 2001 4:42 am

This is normal behaviour on a large disk. I assume that, like most of us, you have a disk that's considerably bigger than when you ran DOS ?

I run Win98 on a 10Gb drive, and if I neglect to defrag it often enough it does exactly this, so the solution is probably just to defrag more often !

Ole

Dave Van Allen · Post by **Dave Van Allen** » 22 Feb 2001 8:31 am

I have the same issue with my compaq laptop with a 4 gb drive... I've found that booting win98 in "safe mode" then running defrag minimizes this issue...

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 22 Feb 2001 11:20 am

Lou (and others) -- Windows DEFRAG will start over each time it becomes aware the drive contents have changed.

This could be caused by ANY application (running at the same time as Defrag) that writes to the disk. Screen savers are notorious culprits -- as are many other 'automatic' things like schedulers, email, auto-update's, etc.

One that many Windows systems install by default (and most of us don't use/need) is FindFast, or in some cases, FastFind.

This is a utility used by MS-Office and other app's. Look in the Windows START MENU/PROGRAMS/STARTUP folder for something like that. If you find it, MOVE it to another folder, restart the machine and see if the problem is gone. Also removing the MS-Office shortcut from your startup may be a good idea.

Hope this is usefull. -- Everett

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 11:32 am

Ole, you're quite right - my 3.3Gb hard drive is not large by today's standards, but is considerably larger than the drive that was in my old DOS box.

I had not been able to find any information on this behaviour elsewhere, and was beginning to think it was just me. Thanks and best wishes to all.

Lou

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 22 Feb 2001 11:32 am

Another thing --- As mentioned in my previous reply, DEFRAG will restart whenever it is aware the drive contents have changed.

Sometimes, Degrag 'shoots itself in the foot'!!! If you allow it to 'automatically' fix errors, it will make itself restart.

Same thing can be true for SCANDISK.

Whenever I can remain at the machine, I turn OFF these 'auto' features. I want to KNOW what files, if any, had problems -- often the 'fixes' are incorrect.

BTW - I try to do a FULL Scandisk prior to Defragging so that Defrag shouldn't encounter any REAL errors. -- Everett

Henning Kock · Post by **Henning Kock** » 22 Feb 2001 11:36 am

22.feb.2001
Hi,
Try put your virus detections program on standby, while you do the harddisk defragmenting program.
All the best
Henning
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
Henning Kock
(pedal steel guitar, piano, keyboards)
Henning K. Music
111 Aarhusvej
DK-8300 Odder
Denmark,
Europe
phone 8654 2959
---------------------------------------------
e-mail address: henningkmusic@hotmail.com
webpages:
merchandise trade: www.henningkmusic.subnet.dk
pedal steel guitar: www.geocities.com/Nashville/1520
piano & keyyboard: www.danskmusik.com/dmfbook/selskab/html/henning_kock.html www.festmusik.dk/henning_kock.html

------------------
[This message was edited by Henning Kock on 22 February 2001 at 11:38 AM.]

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 11:52 am

Hi Everett,

Thanks for your reply. I thought that booting in safe mode would ignore the stuff in the Start Menu/Programs/Startup folder. The only thing in this folder on my box is RealDownload. I don't have MS-Office. I do disable my screen saver when running defrag (when I remember

)

I do have a FastFind icon in the Control Panel - does this mean it's there and running all the time? FastFind doesn't show up in the Add/Remove Programs dialogue box.

I should have mentioned in my original post that I get the same restart behaviour when running Scandisk, probably for the same reasons.

Thanks again to all.

Lou

John Paul Jones · Post by **John Paul Jones** » 22 Feb 2001 12:09 pm

Lou,

The problem is that even when you have no programs open your computer is
constantly exchanging information with the programs that are in your 'start' menu.
These are the programs that have icons on the bar at the bottom of your screen.
Each time the defrag program starts to defrag the hard drive and is interrupted by
one of these information exchanges it starts over. The maintenance programs
you have scheduled in your ‘task scheduler’ react the same way.What you have
to do is to remove these progarms from your ‘start’ menu, then run your
maintenance programs. Afterwards you can re-add the programs to your ‘start’
menu.

At your Windows screen place your cursor on any part of your background screen
an right click. A menu will appear. Click on ‘new’, then ‘folder’. Name the folder
‘Computer Maintainance’.

Click on ‘Start’ / Programs / Windows Explorer / Windows / System. Right click
on ‘msconfig.exe’. (If you see no files, only folders, then right click on
backfground. Select ‘View’. Then ‘Large Icons”. Now you can see the files).
Right click on ‘msconfig.exe’. From menu select ‘Create Shortcut’. Make your
window smaller by clicking on the top-right-center button. Scroll to the bottom of
the ‘system’ files’. Click and drag the shortcut you created to a visible portion of
the Windows screen. Close Windows Explorer.

Click on ‘Start’ / Programs / Accessories / System Tools. Right click on
‘Maintainance Wizard’. Select ‘Create Shortcut’. Make your window smaller by
clicking on the top-right-center button. Scroll to the bottom of the ‘System Tools’
menu. Click and drag the shortcut you created to a visible portion of the Windows
screen. Close Windows Explorer.

You should be back at your Windows screen. Click and drag each icon, one at a
time, to the ‘Computer Maintainance’ folder.

To run general maintainance to your computer:
1)Double click on ‘Computer Maintainance’.
2)Double click on ‘msconfig.exe”
3)Click on ‘Startup’ You will see a list of programs. Those with the check-marks
startup when you turn your computer.on. Un-check all except the monitor and the
keyboard programs. Click ‘OK’. Your computer will prompt you to re-start your
computer. Tell it re-start.

After computer has restarted:
4)Double click on ‘Computer Maintainance’.
5)Double click on ‘Maintainance Wizard’.
6)Instruct it to perform maintainance now.

After maintainance is performed:
7)Double click on ‘Computer Maintainance’.
8)Double click on ‘msconfig.exe”
9)Click on ‘Startup’ Re-check all except the monitor and the keyboard programs.
Click ‘OK’. Your computer will prompt you to re-start your computer. Tell it
re-start.

Your are through.

Email me and let me know how it worked out.

John Paul Jones

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 22 Feb 2001 1:23 pm

Lou -- Since you're running Win95, I don't think you can do things quite the way JPJ suggested.

Yes, Scandisk has much the same problem as Defrag.

Yes, that 'Find' utility in ControlPanel is a likely suspect. It's been so long that I had to take care of it that memory fails. Try to disable it somehow (you may see a way to do that if you activate it or look at its properties. Email me if you wish.

Problem with just bypassing 'startup' is that some of these 'helper' utilities get integrated into the system so that Windows does not consider them optional not to load. For the same reason, they may not show up seperately in ADD/REMOVE.

Also, the 'startup' folder is not the ONLY way Windows keeps track of what to load. The Registry has 'RunOnce' and 'Run' sections that are more stealthy than StartUp.

Finally, the old WIN.INI and SYSTEM.INI files from Windows 3.x days are STILL around and STILL get used to some degree. They, too, can affect the system environment and startup options. Lots of fun!!! -- Everett

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 2:13 pm

John Paul, Everett seem to be right - I don't have a program called msconfig.exe, nor do I have a "Maintenance Wizard" in my System Tools. Are these things specific to Win98? I'm running Win95, but pondering an upgrade to Win98. I do have the View option set to "show all files" so I don't think msconfig is hiding from me.

Everett, when I open the FastFind icon in Control Panel, I have an Index drop-down menu. One of the options there is "Close and Stop". when I select that option, I get a warning about "indexing operations will not be complete if you do this." I'll try doing "close and stop" the next time I defrag and see if that helps.

I am able to complete the ScanDisk and Defrag operations, so this more an annoyance than a crippling problem.

Thanks once again to all who responded.

Lou

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 22 Feb 2001 3:07 pm

Lou -- Been tapping my head and seem to recall...

Look in the WINDOWS/SYSTEM folder for a file like 'FastFind.CPL'. The name may be a little different but the '.CPL' is a must.

If you've got it, MOVE it somewhere else for safe-keeping. Use the machine for a while including ScanDisk, Defrag and see how it goes. If/when you want it back, move the file from safe-keeping to the system folder.

It's used, primarily to index help files so you can search them by word.

BTW 'Scanner buttons' in your task bar or system tray are another common cause of Scandisk/Defrag restarts. -- Everett

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 3:34 pm

Everett,

Found it, moved it. We shall see. Double-clicked on it just for grins, and got the FastFind dialogue box with the Index menu that I mentioned in a previous reply.

When I run defrag, I try to have no icons in the systray. If I remember rightly, there remain three icons in the taskbar for IE, Outlook Express and WinAmp, but they appearer to be only shortcuts. I have a scanner attached, but there is no button for it.
Thanks again.

Lou[This message was edited by Lou[NE] on 22 February 2001 at 03:38 PM.]

Jack Stoner · Post by **Jack Stoner** » 22 Feb 2001 4:05 pm

If you go to the control panel and then the add/remove software you can uninstall the fast find (at least I could when it installed with Office 2000). That's the best way to get rid of it.

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 4:10 pm

Already tried that, Jack. Fastfind didn't show up in the Add/Remove dialogue box. I don't have MS Office.

Thanks.

Lou

Everett Cox · Post by **Everett Cox** » 22 Feb 2001 4:29 pm

Lou -- Methinks you'll be OK, now. Noticed you giving help/advice on another thread. Great!! We give, we receive, we enjoy - that's the way things SHOULD be. -- Everett

Lou[NE] · Post by **Lou[NE]** » 22 Feb 2001 7:31 pm

Thanks for your kind words, Everett. I'm glad to be able to contribute in some small way, especially given how much I've learned from this board, and the other boards on the PSG Forum. Thanks also to Jack, b0b, and all the others who make it all work. It's how life SHOULD be.

Lou