There is nothing wrong with the standard Windows defrag utility.  It’s far faster than it used to be, it’s free (kinda), and it does a reasonable job defragmenting a hard drive.  But it just seemed like there had to be something better out there. So, I've been searching websites on the 'Net, looking for a free defrag utility that’s easy to use, faster than the included utility in Windows, and still does an excellent job. Well, I think I found it.   Actually, it’s two programs that work as one.  Contig from SysInternals, which is the engine, and Power Defragmenter GUI (Graphical User Interface), which is a GUI interface for Contig from eXcessive software.

Did I mention the following programs are free?

How do they work?

First off, make a new folder on your Desktop called Defrag. By using a new folder, you can keep things organized. Then, download Contig and unzip it into the new folder on your Desktop. Next, download the Power Defragmenter GUI and unzip it to the Defrag folder on your Desktop. When both files are in your new folder, it will look like this:


You will want to double click on the Power Defragmenter icon. When the GUI fires up, you'll be presented with this view:


Just click the "Next" button. You will then be presented with:


Now if you've never used this app before, you'll want to click on the radio button for "Power Mode Disk Defragmentation." Regardless of whether you choose Power Mode or Defragment Disk, you'll come to the next screen, which allows you to choose the drive you want to defrag:


Once you've selected the drive you wish to defragment, simply click on the Defragment button on the bottom of that window. When the app starts the chore, you'll get a DOS box that will display the innards of the program's job:


When the defrag is complete, you'll see this in the DOS box:

You'll have to wait a little bit, from 15-45 seconds, and the DOS box will automatically close, taking you to this next window:

Just click on the OK button and you will be returned to this screen:


You can now click "Next" to select another drive or exit the program.

Power Mode does a more in-depth defragmentation and should be used if this is the first time you've used the program. After you've done a Power Mode Defrag, which takes a while as you've probably already surmised, you can do a "Defragment Disk" routine which is much faster than Power Mode.

OK, easy to use, but is it better?

I allowed my C: and E: drives to become heavily fragmented by installing and removing games and other programs. Also, by copying large files, like entire game directories, to and from the two drives and then deleting them, I was able to reach a 20% fragmentation on both drives.

Windows Defrag took over 50 minutes to tidy up both drives. "Power Mode" in this app took just 20 minutes for both drives, less than half the time! Start-up times for my C: drive being so fragmented were 1m48s. After the Windows defrag, it was 1m26s. After doing the Power mode, it was a scant 55 seconds from the time I pushed the Power On button on my case to being on the Windows Desktop. So, I'd say it's better than the standard Windows offering.

The only negative part to this free utility(s) is that you can't schedule defrags with it. It's a totally manual program, however, for what it does and how good it is, I can live with doing it manually.

We hope you enjoy this app. This little program has done an excellent job of keeping my files and drives healthy and organized, offsetting the inability to schedule defrags. If you would like to discuss this program in our forums, just click here.

These two programs were developed and published by Mark Russinovich and Bryce Cogswell. You can read more about this program, and others from Sysinternal, here. Sysinternal was acquired by Microsoft in July 2006. In light of this information, we wonder why Microsoft hasn't incorporated it into a Service Pack or Vista.