Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses

On Wed, 05 Dec 2007 20:46:54 GMT, "David J Taylor"
<david-taylor.RemoveThis@blueyonder.not-this-bit.nor-this-bit.co.uk> wrote in
<27E5j.58340$c_1.20151@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>:

>Douglas wrote:
>[]
>> Those programs you mentioned take up less than a gig of space and
>> have less than 80 registry entries (a few kilobytes at most) They are
>> not what's slowing your PC down.
>[]
>>
>> Douglas
>
>Having a continuously running defrag program can help a lot - I use and
>recommend:
>
> http://www.mstsoftware.com/en/Products/mst-Defrag
>
>Unlike other similar programs, it doesn't grind your PC to a halt. Works
>with Windows Vista as well. Oh, and try to keep your hard disks less than
>70% full.

As always, YMMV. I've carefully measured performance before and after
defragmentation, and the real difference is usually small enough that I
defragment infrequently (no more often than once a month). My own take
is that real-time defragmentation is a cool solution looking for a real
problem, reducing performance too much to make it actually worthwhile.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

John Navas wrote:
> On Wed, 05 Dec 2007 20:46:54 GMT, "David J Taylor"
[]
>> Having a continuously running defrag program can help a lot - I use
>> and recommend:
>>
>> http://www.mstsoftware.com/en/Products/mst-Defrag
>>
>> Unlike other similar programs, it doesn't grind your PC to a halt.
>> Works with Windows Vista as well. Oh, and try to keep your hard
>> disks less than 70% full.
>
> As always, YMMV. I've carefully measured performance before and after
> defragmentation, and the real difference is usually small enough that
> I defragment infrequently (no more often than once a month). My own
> take is that real-time defragmentation is a cool solution looking for
> a real problem, reducing performance too much to make it actually
> worthwhile.

John,

Some of my disks have a data turnover in excess of 40GB per day -
defragmentation makes a tremendous difference. You should try MST Defrag
and see if you can even notice that it's working (in terms of degrading
the performance of the PC in interactive use). The 40GB data throughput
is very sensitive to interference from programs like anti-virus and defrag
causing data loss, but with MST Defrag we notice no ill effects.
Real-time defrag for me is certainly not a gimmick.

Of course, if your data throughput doesn't demand it, and you can be sure
to run once a month, that's great, but for the small price of this
program, I normally recommend it as a "fit and forget" solution.

Cheers,
David
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Wed, 26 Dec 2007 17:29:51 GMT, "David J Taylor"
<david-taylor.TakeThisOut@blueyonder.not-this-bit.nor-this-bit.co.uk> wrote in
<jcwcj.68286$c_1.36685@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>:

>John Navas wrote:

>> As always, YMMV. I've carefully measured performance before and after
>> defragmentation, and the real difference is usually small enough that
>> I defragment infrequently (no more often than once a month). My own
>> take is that real-time defragmentation is a cool solution looking for
>> a real problem, reducing performance too much to make it actually
>> worthwhile.

>Some of my disks have a data turnover in excess of 40GB per day -
>defragmentation makes a tremendous difference. You should try MST Defrag
>and see if you can even notice that it's working (in terms of degrading
>the performance of the PC in interactive use). The 40GB data throughput
>is very sensitive to interference from programs like anti-virus and defrag
>causing data loss, but with MST Defrag we notice no ill effects.
>Real-time defrag for me is certainly not a gimmick.
>
>Of course, if your data throughput doesn't demand it, and you can be sure
>to run once a month, that's great, but for the small price of this
>program, I normally recommend it as a "fit and forget" solution.

I'll add it to my (rather long) list of things to try. What I have
tried is Diskeeper "InvisiTasking" and there are still definitely
performance hits from time to time, some of them severe. There are some
obvious technical reasons for this -- a background defragger can't
really predict when you're going to want disk access, does add overhead
(processor and system resources), and is inherently limited in the kind
of defragging it can do. Perhaps MST is magic. I'm skeptical, but will
reserve judgement until I actually try it. In the meantime I'll
continue to use PerfectDisk, which I highly recommend.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Wed, 26 Dec 2007 18:24:33 GMT, John Navas
<spamfilter1 DeleteThis @navasgroup.com> wrote in
<oa65n3lcai0lhtbe7s10e5cp820c6tkaqp DeleteThis @4ax.com>:

>On Wed, 26 Dec 2007 17:29:51 GMT, "David J Taylor"
><david-taylor DeleteThis @blueyonder.not-this-bit.nor-this-bit.co.uk> wrote in
><jcwcj.68286$c_1.36685@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>:

>>Some of my disks have a data turnover in excess of 40GB per day -
>>defragmentation makes a tremendous difference. You should try MST Defrag
>>and see if you can even notice that it's working (in terms of degrading
>>the performance of the PC in interactive use). The 40GB data throughput
>>is very sensitive to interference from programs like anti-virus and defrag
>>causing data loss, but with MST Defrag we notice no ill effects.
>>Real-time defrag for me is certainly not a gimmick.
>>
>>Of course, if your data throughput doesn't demand it, and you can be sure
>>to run once a month, that's great, but for the small price of this
>>program, I normally recommend it as a "fit and forget" solution.
>
>I'll add it to my (rather long) list of things to try. What I have
>tried is Diskeeper "InvisiTasking" and there are still definitely
>performance hits from time to time, some of them severe. There are some
>obvious technical reasons for this -- a background defragger can't
>really predict when you're going to want disk access, does add overhead
>(processor and system resources), and is inherently limited in the kind
>of defragging it can do. Perhaps MST is magic. I'm skeptical, but will
>reserve judgement until I actually try it. In the meantime I'll
>continue to use PerfectDisk, which I highly recommend.

The Great Defrag Shootout XIX: mst Defrag 2.0
<http://donnedwards.openaccess.co.za/2007/07/great-defrag-shootout-xix-mst-defrag-20.html>

Not only did the program not reduce the number of fragments, but it
increased the number of fragments from 7 to 1800 during a manual
defrag. This is the only program I have tested that actually
increased the number of fragments on my drive! Not good.

I should point out that it managed to defragment my other drive
without too much difficulty, but the processing overhead is high, and
the machine felt sluggish while defragmentation was being done. This
is undesirable, since a defrag program is supposed to improve
performance, not hinder it. I also got the impression that it wasn't
keeping up with the number of files being fragmented during normal
work, and it doesn't manage the free space very well either.

For home users mst Defrag will probably work OK, and it's a lot
cheaper than O&O Defrag, but I still don't think it's worth the
money. There is a lot more engineering work that needs to be done to
make it work properly and without interfering with the user.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

John Navas wrote:
[]
> The Great Defrag Shootout XIX: mst Defrag 2.0
> <http://donnedwards.openaccess.co.za/2007/07/great-defrag-shootout-xix-mst-defrag-20.html>
>
> Not only did the program not reduce the number of fragments, but it
> increased the number of fragments from 7 to 1800 during a manual
> defrag. This is the only program I have tested that actually
> increased the number of fragments on my drive! Not good.

... but the whole point of the program is that you /don't/ need to do
manual defrags, just put MST Defrag into "Monitor" mode, and it all
happens without intervention, and without a performance hit.

It seems the reviewer completely missed the point of the program. Try it
for yourself and make your own judgement.

(Please note that as I recommended before, disks should not be overful.
70% maximum occupancy is a good figure to aim at.)

Cheers,
David
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Wed, 26 Dec 2007 21:38:47 GMT, "David J Taylor"
<david-taylor DeleteThis @blueyonder.not-this-bit.nor-this-bit.co.uk> wrote in
<HRzcj.68371$c_1.66580@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>:

>John Navas wrote:
>[]
>> The Great Defrag Shootout XIX: mst Defrag 2.0
>> <http://donnedwards.openaccess.co.za/2007/07/great-defrag-shootout-xix-mst-defrag-20.html>
>>
>> Not only did the program not reduce the number of fragments, but it
>> increased the number of fragments from 7 to 1800 during a manual
>> defrag. This is the only program I have tested that actually
>> increased the number of fragments on my drive! Not good.
>
>.. but the whole point of the program is that you /don't/ need to do
>manual defrags, just put MST Defrag into "Monitor" mode, and it all
>happens without intervention, and without a performance hit.
>
>It seems the reviewer completely missed the point of the program.

The part you snipped explicitly talks about (and pans) monitor mode.
The part you left is a clear bug.

>Try it
>for yourself and make your own judgement.

I said I would.

>(Please note that as I recommended before, disks should not be overful.
>70% maximum occupancy is a good figure to aim at.)

A good defragger should be able to handle a disk much more full than
that.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Wed, 5 Dec 2007 04:31:44 -0800 (PST), Annika1980 <annika1980.RemoveThis@aol.com>
wrote in
<401903be-7e09-4f51-945a-f31e632c00b5.RemoveThis@w34g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>:

>On Dec 4, 10:26 pm, "Douglas" <j....RemoveThis@the.group> wrote:
>>
>> If you actually had a clue you'd clean it out... More rocket science over
>> your intellegence level. I'm surprise you figured out how to access custome
>> functions on that sieve you call a camera.
>
>Ever done any digging into a computer registry?
>Sure if I was locked in a basement and had hours and hours to kill
>(like yourself) I could go through there and clean it out. But I would
>probably end up deleting something important. The better way is to do
>a fresh install. ...

A *much* simpler solution is to use Windows Live OneCare Safety Scanner
<http://onecare.live.com/site/en-us/default.htm>.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:52:27 GMT, John Navas
<spamfilter1 RemoveThis @navasgroup.com> wrote in
<4kf5n316qic6d06h77d0laftibaaei7r59 RemoveThis @4ax.com>:

>>I'll add it to my (rather long) list of things to try. What I have
>>tried is Diskeeper "InvisiTasking" and there are still definitely
>>performance hits from time to time, some of them severe. There are some
>>obvious technical reasons for this -- a background defragger can't
>>really predict when you're going to want disk access, does add overhead
>>(processor and system resources), and is inherently limited in the kind
>>of defragging it can do. Perhaps MST is magic. I'm skeptical, but will
>>reserve judgement until I actually try it. In the meantime I'll
>>continue to use PerfectDisk, which I highly recommend.

Why background defragging doesn't live up to the hype:

Any good Windows defragger uses the Windows Defrag API to move files.
The problem with this is that prior to Vista, Windows didn't have the
concept of I/O priority. Thus if a background defragger tells Windows
XP to move a 4 GB file, which requires well over 100,000 reads and
writes, the disk is going to be very busy for a long period of time no
matter what the CPU priority of the background defragger task, severely
impacting any foreground task that needs the same disk.

This is part of why I personally prefer to run defrag as a scheduled
task or screen saver utility. You can still be locked out of the disk
for an extended period of time whenever a huge file is being moved, but
the problem is much easier to avoid.

A very good and totally free alternative to PerfectDisk is JkDefrag
<http://www.kessels.com/JkDefrag/> -- highly recommended.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

John Navas wrote:
[]
> The part you snipped explicitly talks about (and pans) monitor mode.

Do you mean that MST Defrag monitor mode is good or bad?

>> (Please note that as I recommended before, disks should not be
>> overful. 70% maximum occupancy is a good figure to aim at.)
>
> A good defragger should be able to handle a disk much more full than
> that.

It's nothing to do with defrag as such, simply a recommendation for best
system performance.

Cheers,
David
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

John Navas wrote:
[]
> Any good Windows defragger uses the Windows Defrag API to move files.
> The problem with this is that prior to Vista, Windows didn't have the
> concept of I/O priority.

Eh? Have you looked at task scheduling and scheduler states in Windows?

> Thus if a background defragger tells Windows
> XP to move a 4 GB file, which requires well over 100,000 reads and
> writes,

so only 40KB per I/O operation? Wring!

> the disk is going to be very busy for a long period of time no
> matter what the CPU priority of the background defragger task,
> severely impacting any foreground task that needs the same disk.

Who says the defragger would want to move such a file in one continuous
operation. Maybe on such a large file it moves it in chunks?

> This is part of why I personally prefer to run defrag as a scheduled
> task or screen saver utility. You can still be locked out of the disk
> for an extended period of time whenever a huge file is being moved,
> but the problem is much easier to avoid.

This is highly system dependant. In my systems, even when the
screen-saver is running the background processing of the 40GB/day
throughput continues, so "defrag only during screen save" would be a poor
choice. A number of us have tested MST Defrag under these high throughput
conditions, and found that there is no perceptible degradation during
interactive operation, nor is there any interference with the highly time
sensitive continuous throughput.

Cheers,
David
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Thu, 27 Dec 2007 09:09:33 GMT, "David J Taylor"
<david-taylor.DeleteThis@blueyonder.not-this-bit.nor-this-bit.co.uk> wrote in
<hZJcj.68521$c_1.9790@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>:

>John Navas wrote:
>[]
>> The part you snipped explicitly talks about (and pans) monitor mode.
>
>Do you mean that MST Defrag monitor mode is good or bad?

I mean that background defragging is problematic,
as the reviewer noted, and as I explain in another post:
<news:dsn5n3pvllmo0arc0hjodjq594f3oiu3dd@4ax.com>

>>> (Please note that as I recommended before, disks should not be
>>> overful. 70% maximum occupancy is a good figure to aim at.)
>>
>> A good defragger should be able to handle a disk much more full than
>> that.
>
>It's nothing to do with defrag as such, simply a recommendation for best
>system performance.

In fact it can be a big issue for defraggers, many of which perform
poorly (or not at all) with a low percentage of free space.

There should be no significant impact of system performance as long as
the system doesn't run out of free disk space, so perhaps I don't
understand what you're saying.

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

On Thu, 27 Dec 2007 09:19:27 GMT, "David J Taylor"
<david-taylor.DeleteThis@blueyonder.not-this-bit.nor-this-bit.co.uk> wrote in
<z6Kcj.68527$c_1.35012@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk>:

>John Navas wrote:
>[]
>> Any good Windows defragger uses the Windows Defrag API to move files.
>> The problem with this is that prior to Vista, Windows didn't have the
>> concept of I/O priority.
>
>Eh? Have you looked at task scheduling and scheduler states in Windows?

What I wrote is well-documented by Microsoft; e.g.,
<http://www.microsoft.com/technet/technetmag/issues/2007/02/VistaKernel/>

While Windows has always supported prioritization of CPU usage, it
hasn't included the concept of I/O priority. Without I/O priority,
background activities like search indexing, virus scanning, and disk
defragmenting can severely impact the responsiveness of foreground
operations. A user launching an app or opening a document while
another process is performing disk I/O, for example, experiences
delays as the foreground task waits for disk access. The same
interference also affects the streaming playback of multimedia
content like songs from a hard disk.

Windows Vista introduces two new types of I/O prioritization in order
to help make foreground I/O operations get preference: priority on
individual I/O operations and I/O bandwidth reservations. ...

>> Thus if a background defragger tells Windows
>> XP to move a 4 GB file, which requires well over 100,000 reads and
>> writes,
>
>so only 40KB per I/O operation? Wring!

64 KB. Ibid:

One final change in the I/O system worth mentioning relates to the
size of I/O operations. Since the first version of Windows NT, the
Memory Manager and the I/O system have limited the amount of data
processed by an individual storage I/O request to 64KB. Thus, even if
an application issues a much larger I/O request, it's broken into
individual requests having a maximum size of 64KB. Each I/O incurs an
overhead for transitions to kernel-mode and initiating an I/O
transfer on the storage device, so in Windows Vista storage I/O
request sizes are no longer capped. Several Windows Vista user-mode
components have been modified to take advantage of the support for
larger I/Os, including Explorer's copy functionality and the command
prompt's Copy command, which now issue 1MB I/Os.

>> the disk is going to be very busy for a long period of time no
>> matter what the CPU priority of the background defragger task,
>> severely impacting any foreground task that needs the same disk.
>
>Who says the defragger would want to move such a file in one continuous
>operation. Maybe on such a large file it moves it in chunks?

No -- it's a limitation of the Windows Defrag API. Haven't you noticed
how long it sometimes takes to pause or stop a defragger?

>> This is part of why I personally prefer to run defrag as a scheduled
>> task or screen saver utility. You can still be locked out of the disk
>> for an extended period of time whenever a huge file is being moved,
>> but the problem is much easier to avoid.
>
>This is highly system dependant. In my systems, even when the
>screen-saver is running the background processing of the 40GB/day
>throughput continues, so "defrag only during screen save" would be a poor
>choice. A number of us have tested MST Defrag under these high throughput
>conditions, and found that there is no perceptible degradation during
>interactive operation, nor is there any interference with the highly time
>sensitive continuous throughput.

That's at odds with the review I posted, and with how the technology
works. There is no magic.(c) Perhaps you're just not seeing the impact
of very large files, or your I/O is spread over multiple drives. The
impact is nonetheless real for any version of Windows prior to Vista
(and Vista has its own performance issues).

--
Best regards,
John Navas
Panasonic DMC-FZ8 (and several others)
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses 

John Navas wrote:
[]
> I mean that background defragging is problematic,
> as the reviewer noted, and as I explain in another post:

OK, but I haven't seen these issues.

> In fact it can be a big issue for defraggers, many of which perform
> poorly (or not at all) with a low percentage of free space.
>
> There should be no significant impact of system performance as long as
> the system doesn't run out of free disk space, so perhaps I don't
> understand what you're saying.

It's good practice - keeping the disk 70% full can reduce the likelihood
of fragmentation in the first place, although it's OS dependant.

Cheers,
David
 >> Stay informed about: Photoshop blur tool Vs expensive lenses