Why does defrag fail to defragment all files and leave some fragmentmented files behind?

Answer 1

some of the files which are in use by the Operating System can't be moved so they are left.
Best is to scehdule for defrag at startup.

Start Regedit.
Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Dfrg\BootOptimizeFunction
Select Enable from the list on the right.
Right on it and select Modify.
Change the value to Y to enable and N to disable.
Reboot your computer.

Answer 2

Like Devil said, the main reason for this is that they're in use or locked by the operating system.

However, it's not that important to be 100% defragmented. Speed isn't usually an issue until you're well below 90% defragmented. That's the "neat freak" part of yourself wanting to be at the perfect 100 mark...

Answer 3

all great answers, but there is a betterway to keep your disk as fresh as the day it was made, simply go to www.grc.com and download spinrite ok it's not freeware but it sounds like an excellent piece of software, i'd buy a copy myself as i have several drives that need to be recovered if possible. but i just dont have the cash right now.
as for defrag itself well the other answers are correct defrag idealy should be run several times in a row to get the job done as this can involve defragmenting the system pagefile which it can not do while the system is using that section of the drive.

Answer 4

Defrag again. That happened to me and when i did it a second time it got all of the fragmented files.

Answer 5

there might not be enough free space to do a complete defrag or it might be the boot file get a program called disksweeper download their free trial version and use that to defrag itll let u just defrag ur boot sector

Answer 6

some files don't have to be defraged. go to diskeeper.com. they are the Co. that make the defrag program for microsoft.

Answer 7

Run "Ewido" across your hard drive first too. There's no point rearranging all the rubbish in order too. Ccleaner's also a good program they're both free and neither appear to have any malware in them.

They both get rid of a lot of rubbish on your hard drive, Ccleaner needs to be set so that you choose what is removed; most of it is pre-set, but you can choose whether, or not, to remove cookies or temp internet files etc.

Make sure there is nothing running in the background either - anti-virus programs etc.

Good luck.

Answer 8

There are some files in your computer that are set to work in a certain way. They stay in place no matter what you do. If they are moved your computer will not work properly.