Defragment NTFS volume?

[efrijters]

Hi guys,

Recently I asked a network administrator about the level of fragmentation on the NTFS-volumes that hold the Oracle datafiles.

His reply was: there is much fragmentation on that volume. He showed me a picture of "Disk Defragmenter" of MS Windows 2000 Advanced Server. That picture showed fragmented areas in red, but the whole picture was red!

Must I be worried about this? Can NTFS-level fragmentation influence the performance of Oracle? (I'm afraid so) Must I defragment regularly?

Hope you guys can shed some light on this issue...

Erik

[stancho]

Defrag on all windows systems definitly helps (I use Raxco Speed Disk, it has server and workstation version), but remember taht it is good to have at least 20% free space to have fast and quality defragmentation.

[efrijters]

The only place where I expect to see a difference in performance is at low-level I/O. And the CBO doesn't take that into consideration...

Should I use the "Disk defragmenter" by MS Windows? Or use a specific tool, like Raxco Speed Disk or Norton Speed Disk? What is better?

Are there any DBA's that don't agree on this?