Optimizing/defragging sample drives

[jzuker]

Stupid question alert, but I am a Mac guy who is forever paranoid when it comes to my Giga PC.

Because of all the updating (and adding of files to) the sample drives (D:, E:), isn\'t a good idea to optimize/defragment those drives just as Tascam (Dave Casey) recommends in the PC optimization guide? I routinely scan and defrag the C: (system) drive, but the sample drives are actually doing more of the work-streaming etc., right?
I\'m nervous about moving around those big sample files.

Thanks in advance.

[Alexcremers]

In my experience you better have some backups of the more important edits. I, indeed, ran into some troubles with a few files after defragmenting the gig drive in Windows 98. So I\'m not willing to say that it\'s a 100% safe.


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Alex Cremers

[jzuker]

That\'s what I was afraid of. Thanks.

[Nick Batzdorf]

I would have thought the drive would stay defragmented if you\'re not writing to it all the time and don\'t have it overly full.

[jzuker]

Hey Nick,

I\'m not writing to it all the time, but with version updates (.art files. etc.)and adding sound libs periodically, I\'m writing to it maybe once a month.
Enough to cause fragmenting that would affect performance? I am not sure.

Best,

John Z.

[Haydn]

I\'ve never had a problem defragging drives in 15 years on hundreds of computers. I always check the drives for errors before defragging them. My Giga machine is defragged once a month. My computer with Sonar and Kontakt is defragged every week.

[csduke]

I have also never introduced an error from defragmenting and I have interrupted them in the middle.

Also, a drive doesn\'t become fragmented if it has not been written to since its last defrag. Fragmentation is a result of writing files. A fragmented disk is one where the data associated with a file is non-contiguous on the disk. This, of course, slows the read since the drive has to do more multiple seeks per file (sample) instead of one. Seeking is very very slow relative to the streaming of data off a disk. GigaSampler is all about reading data from disk.

I have sample only disks which means no applications and now writing of audio data, GS .wav rendering etc. on to those disks. It take a long time to defrag 120 GB.

Is mac defragmenting automatic?

[jzuker]

Hi Craig,

Yes, indeed I do defrag my system drive on the Mac where my apps/MIDI files/non-music files reside. After backing up the audio drive, I would generally reformat and repartition it after a particular project.

I considered defragging the .gig drives on my PC because I have been writing to them a fair amount lately, what with all the updated .art files from Sonic Implants, Garritan, SAM hns and Bones et. al.,not to mention the recent addition of new libraries. I realize that the .gig drives are doing alot and need to be able to perform at their optimum level. Reformatting, and then reloading all those samples onto my .gig drives is not a good alternative.

Best,

John