What is Reddit's opinion of iDefrag?

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OS X does a pretty good job of keeping used files defragmented, on the boot disk anyway. There still are reasons to want to optimize a hard drive, or to reclaim contiguous free space on a data only drive. Or fix a Parallels/Windows XP partition ...now that's fragmentation!

For those jobs, check out iDfrag - it respects OS X hotfiles etc, and has some useful modes for other drives.

http://www.coriolis-systems.com/iDefrag.php

Otherwise, the free method would be to clean up your HD and make a couple of backups using something like SuperDuper. Then wipe your HD and restore from the backup. Instant defragmentation of files.

A filesystem repair in Disk Utility (as well as fsck) fixes some types of disrepair, but not the sort involving IO latency. Some people suggest solutions such as iDefrag, but from what I've seen it's not nearly as effective as a reformat.

Have you tried quitting Finder and letting it reboot? What about restarting? If neither of those work, perhaps you've got some serious file fragmentation going on. If that's the case, try iDefrag and see if file fragmentation is the issue.

As for deleting stuff, are you securely deleting things from the Trash? That could help. If not, there's always using something like Permanent Eraser to empty the Trash so that you get the space right back instantly. Works like a charm for me. Your Mileage May Vary.

You split your Mac's hard drive into 2 partitions. To the user, it'll look like 2 different hard drives (even though they're on the same physical disk). To switch what OS you boot into, you hold the option-key while booting the machine up and you'll get an option of what disk to boot from (this works with bootable CD's too).

But partitioning a disk without destroying what's on it is ... tricky. If you have a backup of your Mac stuff, the following instructions aren't needed (as you can simply wipe your disk, partition it, then reload your data from a backup disk), but if you must non-destructively partition your disk, read on:

The Bootcamp setup assistant asks you how many gigs you want your Bootcamp partition to be, and if it can find X-gigs of contiguous disk space (meaning, space that's all lined up next to each other on the disk) it will work fine. But if you don't have X-gigs of free space all in one physical part of the disk, you'll have to run a defragmentation utility to cram all the disk's data into one area, THEN partition it.

The defragmentation utility will have to be run from either a bootable CD/DVD, or another mac plugged into your Mac via “firewire target disk mode”. Why must the defragmentation utility be run from a bootable disk? Simply put, you can't defrag the operating system's files (The /System folder) while the OS is running off those files.

I personally do this using iDefrag. It's not terribly expensive, and it includes a bundled app called “Coriolis CDMaker” that burns bootable disks with iDefrag on it for you. Really easy.

Then of course you have to install Windows on Bootcamp. And if you have VMWare Fusion or Parallels you can run Mac OS & Windows simultaneously without rebooting the machine.

I've also used iDefrag to fix this issue. It doesn't look like it's been updated in a while, but if it works (I think it still should), it will allow you to partition the drive without having to wipe it.

You can use iDefrag to see how fragmented your drive is. There is a free demo that only shows the fragmentation, so you can see if that's the problem. OSX also defragments by itself, but only files smaller than 20MB and only if there is enough unfragmented free space. I bought iDefrag a few years ago and I'm pretty happy with it.

Most if not all of my partiton errors are directly related to needing a defrag. I would suggest iDefrag. I know it's not freeware, but it's an investment for any experienced user. ;)

Screen going blue, then nothing, sounds like LoginWindow crashing. But since it returns you to where you were, I don't know what's up. (That would only happen with Lion)

Mac users used to be as compulsive about maintenance as Windows users or maybe more. But we've gotten slow and complacent lately since Journaling HFS+ appeared in Panther.

Anything worth doing you have to do while booted from a different disc.

If you can boot from a different disk, use Disk Utility to "Repair Disk" on your boot drive.

If things have really gone haywire DiskWarrior is still the gold standard.

You shouldn't have to do anything to maintain a disk, but DiskWarrior does rebuild the drive directory and if you have a degfragmenting itch to scratch, iDefrag is the way to go. However OS X automatically defragments frequently used files so iDefrag is only if you're constantly writing to a nearly-full disk.