The Windows Vista Disk Defragmenter has been improved over the Windows XP version, but you can’t see or use all the best features unless you run it from the command line. By default the defrag tool only defragments files smaller than 64 MB, because according to Microsoft’s benchmarks, fragments of this size, which already consist of at least 16000 contiguous clusters, have a negligible impact on performance. If you still want to defrag files larger than 64 MB too.

To run you will need to run the command line prompt as the Administrator.Then type defrag c: -w to defragment files of all size.

Disk Defragmenter does not defragment files in the Recycle Bin, or files which are in use. Disk Defragmenter will not degragment Bootsect dos, Safeboot fs, Safeboot csv, Safeboot rsv, Hiberfil sys, Memory dmp, or the Windows page file. Type defrag c: -b parameter to optimize these boot files.

The only indication you will get is a blinking cursor. This means that the process is going. To interrupt the defragmentation process, press Ctrl + C in the command window.

Alternatively instead of using the standard Windows Vista Defrag Tool, use the combination of Contig and PowerDefragmenter to make the process ten times faster.

In PowerDefragmenter choose options appropriate for you:

Defragment File(s) : Defrags up to 4 files
Defragment Folder(s): Defrags up to 4 folders
Defragment Disk : Defrag disk
PowerMode(TM) : Defrags two consecutive defragmentations