Defrag/optimize

If you are referring to a built in defrag tool from Microsoft, not really.

Diskeeper from Executive software, or Norton Speed Disk do a much better job of "optimization".

I don't know if Norton is W2K compatible prior to version 2002.

Chas

I've used Norton's & ended up going back to Windows defrag. If you download lots of files & such, Norton takes forever & I never really found that it helped speed anything up.

I defrag everyday now & it takes less than 10 minutes. You also need to get rid of temp files & cookies regularly.

Unless you use the exact same programs everyday, no defrager will ever optimize your system anyway.

Microsoft's built in tool pretty much does just a simple defrag.
It does little if any file location optimization.

Norton's tool is reported to do a decent job at Optimization.

Disk-keeper is also reported to do a decent job of optimization, and may be better suited to a W2K system than Norton.

The important consideration for overall system performance in my mind is to reduce / prevent fragmentation of the swap / page file.
Windows tool does NOT do this, unless you move / disable theswap file on the drive being defragmented.

Norton's tool can be configured to place a fixed size swap file on the fastest section of the hard drive. (at least for W9X)

I believe that Disk-keeper can also be configured to "optimize" the swap file.

Check out this link for a comparison of Diskeeper to the W2K defrag utility,
http://www.execsoft.com/diskeeper/dk-comparison.asp

Of course, they are trying to sell the product. They also have a white paper and trial version that you can download.

Hope this makes things clearer.

Chas