Windows 7 / Getting Started

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Optimizing the Location of the Boot Files

The speed at which your files are read depends on your physical hard drive access speed and where the files are located in your hard drive. To increase the speed of your boot, you want to have the files used to boot your computer in a location that will allow the fastest read speed possible.

Windows 7 does a good job of this from a fresh install, but over time as your hard drive fills up and you make changes to the configuration of Windows, some of your boot files can become scattered inside the hard drive, resulting in a slower possible read speed. In addition, adding new applications and new hardware can contribute to this even further. Over time, your original boot optimization fades away as your internal hard drive data makeup changes.

Using Windows 7 Disk Defragmenter

Starting with Windows XP and continuing in Windows 7, the Prefetcher service will automatically optimize the location of the boot files in your hard drive using Windows Disk Defragmenter. However, this occurs only after a certain number of boots and when it gets around to it (because it runs only when your computer is idle).

Microsoft has a talented team working on the Prefetcher service that even took into consideration your system boot changes. For example, you might install an updated device driver or add new hardware. To solve this problem, the systems will re-defragment the boot files every three days.

Tip Windows keeps track of the last time that it optimized the boot file so that it can calculate how often it should run the boot defrag. If you are interesting in finding when the boot defrag was last run, open regedit, navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\ Prefetcher, and then look for the key named LastDiskLayoutTimeString. The value is formatted as year/month/day - hour/minute/seconds.

An operating system that takes care of itself? Yes, Windows is getting smarter and smarter. However, there is still one problem: there is no possible way to initiate a boot defrag directly. The only way is to leave your computer on for a little while without using it at all. If you are impatient and do not want to wait, a solution for you.

The system will initiate the boot defrag only when the system is idle. Typing in a command that will start the boot is not possible.

However, you can tell your computer, even when it is not idle, to process the idle tasks. This will indirectly start the boot defrag. Because the boot defrag is most likely not the only idle task waiting to be run, other processes will be run, too, which can cause your computer to appear to be doing a lot of hard work - from a few minutes up to half an hour - as it completes all tasks. During this time, your computer should not be used for any intensive activities such as playing games. If you try to use your computer while the idle tasks are being processed, you will notice slow performance until the tasks are completed.

Perform the following steps to process all idle tasks:

1. Click the Start button, type cmd in the Search box, and press Enter.
2. When the command prompt opens, type Rundll32.exe advapi32. dll,ProcessIdleTasks and press Enter. Your computer will now work on the tasks.

Performing these steps will allow your system to defrag the boot files sooner; however, the boot defrag is done every three days. Processing the idle tasks more frequently will do nothing to help you boot because the boot defrag will not be on your idle tasks lists all the time.