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Best Defrag for VMWare Server?

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by Member 30634329

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We are starting to run into issues with our Windows-based VMWare GSX (Server) hosts and guests.
Even with preallocated virtual drives, we find that our host server gets 30-40% fragmented every couple of months, which evententually causes severe slowness lockups of the guest OS and other issues.

We know now that we need to install an enterprise disk defragmenting solution on every guest VM and the host OS.

The two we are looking at are Diskeeper 2007 and PerfectDisk. Our goal is to do the majority of defragmenting in place while the guests and host are running. We would also like to be able to schedule more thorough defragmenting of each guest over the weekend. It should be able to run from a command line so that we can script the guests to shutdown, then defrag the host drive, then start up the guests.

Does anyone have any recommendations as to which one they like better?

9 replies

by jsnapper2

PerfectDisk from Raxco Software. It does a real thorough job of defragmenting the free space which is critical in a virtual environment. Also gives you control over when to defrag and uses few resources.

by shraven

I generally don't worry about defragging the free space on my disk. It's usually the part of the disk that is occupied by files, that I'm concerned with keeping defragmented and operating efficiently.

by raymond danner

PerfectDisk does both. You can indeed set PD to not bother with free-space optimization.

In addition, I've run both PerfectDisk and DiskKeeper in real-world tests, and (in my experience) PerfectDisk does a better job.

by masterhandyman

I have tried both Perfect Disk and DisKeeper and like the smart defrage option in Perfect Disk. I think it will solve a lot of your frag issues before they become a problem

by denchan

I'm retired ... however, have been using PerfectDisk for 3 years or more and found it to be excellent...and the support is also. I hear Diskeeper is also very good.

Chan

by mvpatrick

I agree that Perfect Disk and Diskeeper are both excellent choices. I have recently began looking at Vopt (www.vopt.com) after reading about it in Windows IT Pro magazine. And, I must admit, I really like it.

by tonyaaa8

mvpatrick email sent me on a look at this Voipt. Have been using Diskeeper 8 for a year or two.I use Diskeeper every day before shutdown. Freespace was 44% before trying the Voipt, after it was 53% free and it handled a whole lot more. I am most impressed. (So far) Have not tried Perfect or the new Diskeeper but I do like the Diskeeper gizmo that runs when the machine is idle.

by mcutler88

Diskeeper is by far and away the best choice ever for disk defragmentation. The number of awards speak for themselves. I'm surprised that Perfect Disk still has a market. To me, there is no one else out there and no other choice possible except Diskeeper 2007. Test out the trial, look at the reviews, I don't even believe there's any negative comments out there on Diskeeper. Check it out, I think you'll agree.

Thank you,
Mitchell Cutler
Loyal fan of Diskeeper

by acropolister

Have been using Diskeeper for a long time now and as a system admintrator i'drecommend it as the best defragger in the market, i tried their latest one and it seems to have surpassed the older one which by itself was a very good utility. we have it running on our busy servers and have never had a maintenance problem as far as fragmentation is concerned.

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