Defrag - Page file - NTFS questions

I was wondering about defrag and the page files.

Defrag

Does anyone have any statistics on the performance gains? Personally, I
think that today's hard disk drives are so fast, that a difference between a
moderately fragmented drive and a defragmented one will be negligible. Has
anybody found reliable information on the net concerning this matter?

When I say moderately, I am refering to fragmentation being the result of an
average usage, ratehr than artificially fragmenting the drive just to prove
that it does have an effect on performance. Now that most systems use (or
ought to be using) NTFS, fragmentation is even less, so the performance
difference should be less too.

Page file

I have read countless articles about the page file, but I still haven't
figured a couple of things. I believe that a page file is needed even when
you have a huge amount of RAM installed, but i am looking for more
information regarding this matter. For instance, would it be advisable to
just turn it off and see if your system behaves better without it? Or is it
100% certain that it is better to have a page file regardless of the amount
of RAM installed.

NTFS

Can anybody reply the following? When you move, delete, create, rename files
etc, the changes must be written to the MFT (assuming NTFS). Does Windows XP
cache any part of the MFT, does it group maybe such activities to accelerate
them, or does it have to access the MFT every single time? Again, a reliable
resource will be appreciated.

Thank you in advance.

Fleur de Coin
- http://www.fleur-de-coin.com/
Ελληνικός στρατός
- http://skopia.digitalrice.com/

Defrag is still recommended. I have seen system that were "crawling" along
speed up after a defrag.

Please note: Windows XP built-in defrag utility does not seem to be able to
defrag the XP pgae file.


Page File has been part of every Windows (since 3.11.) Some people say you
do not need if if you have huge amounts of RAM but MS states that you need
it. I still am not sure which is right!.


"yandr" <vikhr DeleteThis @hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:cpk8vd$3j9$1@newsmaster.public.dc.hol.net...
 >I was wondering about defrag and the page files.
 >
 > Defrag
 >
 > Does anyone have any statistics on the performance gains? Personally, I
 > think that today's hard disk drives are so fast, that a difference between
 > a moderately fragmented drive and a defragmented one will be negligible.
 > Has anybody found reliable information on the net concerning this matter?
 >
 > When I say moderately, I am refering to fragmentation being the result of
 > an average usage, ratehr than artificially fragmenting the drive just to
 > prove that it does have an effect on performance. Now that most systems
 > use (or ought to be using) NTFS, fragmentation is even less, so the
 > performance difference should be less too.
 >
 > Page file
 >
 > I have read countless articles about the page file, but I still haven't
 > figured a couple of things. I believe that a page file is needed even when
 > you have a huge amount of RAM installed, but i am looking for more
 > information regarding this matter. For instance, would it be advisable to
 > just turn it off and see if your system behaves better without it? Or is
 > it 100% certain that it is better to have a page file regardless of the
 > amount of RAM installed.
 >
 > NTFS
 >
 > Can anybody reply the following? When you move, delete, create, rename
 > files etc, the changes must be written to the MFT (assuming NTFS). Does
 > Windows XP cache any part of the MFT, does it group maybe such activities
 > to accelerate them, or does it have to access the MFT every single time?
 > Again, a reliable resource will be appreciated.
 >
 > Thank you in advance.
 >
 > Fleur de Coin
<font color=purple> > - <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://www.fleur-de-coin.com/</font" target="_blank">http://www.fleur-de-coin.com/</font</a>>
 > Ελληνικός στρατός
<font color=purple> > - <a style='text-decoration: underline;' href="http://skopia.digitalrice.com/</font" target="_blank">http://skopia.digitalrice.com/</font</a>>
 ><!-- ~MESSAGE_AFTER~ -->