Defragging a laptop

[Rockfossil]

Goodmorning Members, I have an 8 year old laptop which I recently defragged about two weeks ago. Since then I have joined Inetflix to watch movies. Last night, during a movie, a notice came on screen advising me that "C" drive was full and needed defragging. I then commenced the defragging processs, but after nearly 8 hours nothing has virtually changed. The system is still saying it is full, therefore, am I doing something wrong with Inetlflix ?

[BobHelm]

You probably had no need to defrag in the first place.
In the old days of Windows ME then it was a useful tool. If you are using Windows 7 then it will not buy you much..
The problem would seem to be that your disk is full.
Do you use anything like Ccleaner to get rid of the 'junk' in your computer?
If not then download from here & run it.. the free version..
https://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download

If that does not not clear enough space (right mouse click on the drive in windows explorer & select 'properties' to see a visualisation of how much space is available) then you need to delete some files from your hard drive to free up some space..

Which ones???
Well I would suggest downloading another free program, TreeSize, from here..
https://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/

That will list all your directories by size. You then 'drill down' through the largest directories to find files that you no longer need - old movies for example - & then delete them to free up space...

[Liam Dale]

Spot on Bob. Defrag just puts socks in socks drawer.. shirts in shirts drawer. delete old junk to clear for space taking movies. Especially if older smaller drive.

[Udon Map]

I always consider temp files as the most likely suspect.

Continuing the metaphor, it's true that defragging just folds your shirts neatly and puts them in a drawer; but it's also true that shirts folded and stacked neatly take up less space than shirt thrown in a pile on the floor.

[glalt]

The first step is to run the Windows built in disk cleaner. After that you need to uninstall programs that you don't need. Defrag cannot help a full hard drive.

[karonsteve]

Glalt...I agree that deleting old files, running a disk cleaner etc. is the best way to free up space but defragging will also free up space.
I defrag my 1Tb hard drive monthly and regularly get 6+Gb freed up.

[Nigglyb]

My laptop running Win7 was getting painfully slow & I was ignoring the idea of defragging because I though it was set up to run automatically each month. I then looked in the task manager & saw it had failed to run since March so performed a manual drefrag. Its so much faster now.
I then ran free versions of CCLEANER & ADWCLEANER & its like having a new laptop back

[hairyharry]

On the BBC website today:

http://www.studylifestyle.com/2016/xtra ... estyle.com

This looks too good to be true.

If anyone has knowledge or experience of this device then feedback would be much appreciated.

[BobHelm]

Yes Harry, it is $25 for something that you could make yourself for less than a $2..

It is a bootable USB thumb drive loaded with a very light distribution of Linux.

It 'speeds up' your computer because the Linux operating system is designed to take up very little memory & so more of the memory is left available for the programs that you are running.
As it is Linux don't expect it to run Microsoft Office as it probably uses Libre Office instead - something else that would be more efficient on the computer's limited resources & so also 'speed it up'.

In most cases (unless you had multiple old low specification computers) it would be just as easy to download a 'small' Linux distribution (something like Puppy Linux or Tiny Core - there are others as well) & just install it on the PC directly.. That would just cost you a DVD, or CD..

http://puppylinux.org/main/Overview%20a ... tarted.htm
http://tinycorelinux.net/downloads.html

[Charlieb]

A dual boot version of CENTOS 7, which is basically Redhat, is free and easy to install. As Linux goes, fairly easy to use but you would need more expertise than with Windows.

[redwolf]

A dual boot version of CENTOS 7, which is basically Redhat, is free and easy to install. As Linux goes, fairly easy to use but you would need more expertise than with Windows.

True regarding CentOS. For beginners I have found Ubuntu to be preferable. https://www.ubuntu.com/download

I wish Manrake Linux (Redhat variant) and Xandros Linux (descended from Corel Linux) were still around. They were both paid versions but well worth it in their time.

[glalt]

I do have ubuntu on my laptop. I am on my Windows desktop right now. I just booted up the laptop and it asked me if I wanted upgrade to 14.04. It is downloading now. I'm satisfied with Linux as far as using the Internet and writing documents but I use a lot of programs that simply will not work on Linux. It's likely that if I had started with Linux, I'd be happy. That is not the case.

[glalt]

I just went through a huge download to 14.04. Now it just asked me if I wanted to upgrade to 16.04. What kind of crap is this?

[redwolf]

I just went through a huge download to 14.04. Now it just asked me if I wanted to upgrade to 16.04. What kind of crap is this?

Hi Glait, it seems such at first but actually It's not crap. It's a good thing.

That version you were running before it upgraded to 14.04 was older than 2014. And they are now on version 16.04 LTS (Long Term Service).

The current year now is the current version in Ubuntu. 2016. Version 16.

The .04 part is the long term upgrade version. It means if you leave your laptop unbooted for 2 years or un-upgraded, it'll still be able to leap forward several versions via upgrade with no new install needed. But it can only leap about 2 versions at a time. That's why it asked you if you wanted 14.04. And then when it got to there, it realized there are 2 more versions it can leap safely, with relatively few if any bugs during the upgrade.

Linux machines are simply a collection of files, many of which are referred to as "libraries", and still others, "binary executables", which depend on libraries to run. These are what are being "updated".

So if you get upgrade warnings, just roll with it. 17.04 still down the road a few.

As to Windows or Mac apps I prefer to just run those on those OS's. I can dual boot but the systems always seem unstable. One can run Crossover but it's limited.

All 3 operating systems are easy enough to understand for just about any user born after 1970 LOL. To those born before, Ubuntu still a real value (FREE) for those wishing to just use their PC to surf the net.

That said, I have met people here in their 50's, 60's and 70's who are retired (or even currently still working!) software programmers & network engineers, etc. just say "I wrote the UNIX operating system!" at Villa Market and see who turns their head in critical dismay.

p.s. Anyone here an online gamer who wants to start a server here in Udon? If so what game?

RW

[BobHelm]

16.04 is the current Long Term Supported release of Ubuntu - supported until April 2021.
The 14.04 release was the previous LTS, supported until April 2019.
Whether you move from 14.04 to 16.04 is a matter of personal choice. There will be new LTS releases before April 2019 & so a user can 'miss' a complete LTS if they so wish.
Each new release brings changes (rather than just security updates, which will come automatically if you stay with the current release you have - well up to April 2019 )
Ubuntu will release 16.10 (not a LTS, so will stop being supported in 9 months' time) in a couple of days' time, for example.

Some people like to be at the 'cutting edge' of Ubuntu, some prefer to have a safe, stable version - their choice. What system changes are in any release can be read in the 'release' notes, along with any known bugs.

Personally I prefer Mint to Ubuntu. Mint releases are only based on the Ubuntu LTS releases so are a bit fewer & far between.

Unlike Windows (or Apple) Linux Distributions have a future planned series of releases planned into the future, but, as I said Users are free to pick & chose as they wish..

[glalt]

The 16.04 is right now in the process installing the upgrades. Cleaning up is next then restarting. It certainly is taking a long time even with my SSD.

[glalt]

OK, back up and running. Changed the default browser to Chromium. No drama there.