CIS preventing a successful defrag...?

[Guest]

[Vader]

Hi all,

After installation of CIS (which I had been waiting for like a kid waiting for his decoder ring in the mail ), I find I am unable to defragment the drive it's on (c:), because "some files could not be compacted" (or something like that).  When I click on the "Show Report" button to display the problem file(s), it displays the file "sfi.dat" in the Windows\System32\Drivers directory.  I am unable to even copy the file (it complains that the file may be already in use...?!?), and I have reproduced this error on two separate clean installs of the OS (and, by default, CIS) on two different machines.  Is this file dynamically created?  If so, how do I delete it and allow CIS to create a new, clean one?  Thanks!

[Dch48]

I got the message in the XP defragger that sfi.dat could not be defragmented but the defrag did complete. I really don't care if only one file doesn't get defragged. I ran Auslogics before that and it defragged everything.

[OmeletGuy]

well window defrager with 3.9 AV set to startful on my PC made a huge slow down and some hang like pausing for all applcaitons. I wonder if adding Defrager program to excultion list will help.

[Dch48]

well window defrager with 3.9 AV set to startful on my PC made a huge slow down and some hang like pausing for all applcaitons. I wonder if adding Defrager program to excultion list will help.

I had the slowdown problem with 3.8, but It's not happening now in 3.9 for me

[EricJH]

At Vader. What defragmenter are you using? Try switching to the freeware Smart Defrag from IObit.

[Vettetech]

I use Smart Defrag and have been for awhile now. Its faster and better then any paid defragger.

http://www.iobit.com/iobitsmartdefrag.html?Str=download

[neried]

don't sfi.dat belong to cis and is locked by cis

[Dch48]

I prefer the Auslogics defragger. It's also free and just received a major update. I had problems with SmartDefrag scattering files across my disk when it was supposed to be optimizing it.

[languy99]

I'm a defraggler fan. Why you ask, well because after using it and using other paid software they declare that the hard drive is perfectly defragged, who can argue with that. 

[Vettetech]

I prefer the Auslogics defragger. It's also free and just received a major update. I had problems with SmartDefrag scattering files across my disk when it was supposed to be optimizing it.

You cannot do more then one drive at the same time with Auslogics.

[Vader]

Thanks for the replys!

I use the Windows XP defrag utility (I know, I know...), which has always works fine.  CIS caused several additional problems, which required me to uninstall it (the defrag worked fine after that).  I guess it's back to the ol' drawing board for me...

[HeffeD]

I prefer the Auslogics defragger. It's also free and just received a major update. I had problems with SmartDefrag scattering files across my disk when it was supposed to be optimizing it.

I've been using DiskKeeper Lite (the older free version) for a couple of years. I had downloaded SmartDefrag several months ago but never used it. I finally decided to give SmartDefrag a chance and downloaded the latest version. I fired it up and had it do a deep optimize, then I've been having it use its auto defrag for about two weeks.

After reading your post, I decided to download Auslogics Defrag and see what it thought about SmartDefrag's abilities. Auslogics defragged in seconds. The only files it found that were fragmented were in my browsers cache from this session. So it seems that SmartDefrag is doing a good job as far as Auslogics is concerned.

[Dch48]

You cannot do more then one drive at the same time with Auslogics.

You can now with the new 2.0 version that just came out.

 I never said that SmartDefrag didn't do a good job of defragmenting. What I said was that the optimization routines did anything but optimize on my system. It scattered my files all over the drive with huge gaps in between them. The XP defragger did a better job of keeping the files compacted.

I find Auslogics to be faster and I have no use for scheduled or auto defrags. That puts too much wear and tear on the drive.  The only thing Auslogics doesn't have is an optimizer, but I  run the xp defrag periodically to compact things. Not having an optimizer is better than having one that doesn't work.

[JoWa]

Start Windows in safe mode, and you can defragment sfi.dat.

[Jahn]

I'm having the same problem. Windows and Auslogics defrag will only get the OS drive down to 4/8% fragmented in normal or safe mode. This concerns me, as no software should be able to prevent the OS from functioning normally.

I'll give Smart Defrag and Defraggler a try.

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