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Is it fine for an SMR drive to be at 100% fragmentation?

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Here is a screenshot of the "Optimise Drives" app from windows. It seems confusing to me as I was told that SMR drives don't need to be defragmented, because of their shingled layer storage? Is there anything that I should do to remove the fragmentation?

image.png.5ce2622555d6d89287de62009ce6f475.png

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Defrag is needed on mechanical drives including SMR if you want to keep performance up. All SMR does is make it generally slower for writes for the benefit of an improvement to capacity/cost. 100% fragmentation is impressive unless it is some calculation error. Is it full? That wont help. If it is quite full, temporarily moving some files off it, defrag it, then move those files back might help.

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It's not a matter if it's fine or not, a hard drive can be 100% fragmented, the hard drive doesn't care. YOU care because you'll get lower performance, as the drive's read/write heads have to constantly move around to the next fragment of a file and then wait until the disc spins at least a rotation so that data is under the read/write head and then read a bunch of tracks in the drive cache.

 

The 100% number is probably wrong, as there should be at least a small file that's continuous, not in fragments. It may be rounded up ... as in 99.1% -> 100%

We also have no idea how much data you have on the D: partition, could be just a couple of files, both fragmented.

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2 hours ago, porina said:

Defrag is needed on mechanical drives including SMR if you want to keep performance up. All SMR does is make it generally slower for writes for the benefit of an improvement to capacity/cost. 100% fragmentation is impressive unless it is some calculation error. Is it full? That wont help. If it is quite full, temporarily moving some files off it, defrag it, then move those files back might help.

2 hours ago, mariushm said:

It's not a matter if it's fine or not, a hard drive can be 100% fragmented, the hard drive doesn't care. YOU care because you'll get lower performance, as the drive's read/write heads have to constantly move around to the next fragment of a file and then wait until the disc spins at least a rotation so that data is under the read/write head and then read a bunch of tracks in the drive cache.

 

The 100% number is probably wrong, as there should be at least a small file that's continuous, not in fragments. It may be rounded up ... as in 99.1% -> 100%

We also have no idea how much data you have on the D: partition, could be just a couple of files, both fragmented.

I doesn't have a lot of data on it currently, since I recently decided to fully format the drive.

 

image.png.a010dcec5d9ada7fd6e0557c6773ca50.png

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Actually, you can't physically defrag the SMR drives, at least not the current generation that have FTL equivalent on them. And because of it, the fragmentation is 100% and will be. You just don't have access to the sector level, you can think you have, but you don’t. And that is why it says it needs optimization, not defragmentation ( so just TRIM ).  
Current generation SMR HDD have TRIM support, just like SSD, you just run TRIM command and they will take care of themselves, just like SSDs. 

How to know if it like that? Just run hd tune benchmark, you will see the flat line.
And you can open CDI and see if it has TRIM support. 

   
 
 
 
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6 hours ago, kokosnh said:

Actually, you can't physically defrag the SMR drives, at least not the current generation that have FTL equivalent on them. And because of it, the fragmentation is 100% and will be. You just don't have access to the sector level, you can think you have, but you don’t. And that is why it says it needs optimization, not defragmentation ( so just TRIM ).  
Current generation SMR HDD have TRIM support, just like SSD, you just run TRIM command and they will take care of themselves, just like SSDs. 

How to know if it like that? Just run hd tune benchmark, you will see the flat line.
And you can open CDI and see if it has TRIM support. 

image.png.dfad1ed8d75ce24435522a5391402dc1.png

I didn't touch it and now it's back down to 56% fragmentation. Now i'm more confused, haha. Thanks for your explanation on SMR hdd's now! I'll remember that next time I get hard drives.

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Hmm, Well I guess even I don't know what’s it’s doing now, or how it’s doing it.

I did say they should take care of themselves, but... 

is it the SMR drive with TRIM ? Open crystaldiskinfo and look. 
you can also run the optimise ( it should’t hurt )  

   
 
 
 
Spoiler
CPU : Intel 14gen i7-14700K
COOLER :  Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 White + thermaltake toughfan 12 white + Thermal Grizzly - CPU Contact Frame Intel 13./14. +  Coollaboratory Liquid Ultra
GPU : MSI RTX 2070 Armor @GPU 2050MHz Mem 8200MHz -> USB C 10Gb/s cable 2m -> Unitek 4x USB HUB 10 Gb/s (Y-HB08003)
MOBO : MSI MEG Z690 UNIFY
RAM :  Corsair VENGEANCE DDR5 RAM 64 GB (2 x 32 GB) 6400 MHz CL32 (CMK64GX5M2B6400C32)
SSD : Intel Optane 905P 960GB U.2 (OS) + 2 x WD SN850X 4TB + 2 x PNY CS3140 2TB + ASM2824 PCIe switch -> 4 x Plextor M8PeG 1TB + flexiDOCK MB014SP-B -> Crucial MX500 2TB + GoodRam Iridium PRO 960GB + Samsung 850 Pro 512GB
HDD : WD White 18TB WD180EDFZ + SATA port multiplier adp6st0-j05 (JMB575) ->  WD Gold 8TB WD8002FRYZ + WD Gold 4TB WD4002FYYZ + WD Red PRO 4TB WD4001FFSX + WD Green 2TB WD20EARS
EXTERNAL
HDD/SSD :  		XT-XINTE LM906 (JMS583) -> Plextor M8PeG 1TB + WD My Passport slim 1TB + LaCie Porsche Design Mobile Drive 1TB USB-C + Zalman ZM-VE350 -> Goodram IRDM PRO 240GB
PSU :  Super Flower leadex platinum 750 W biały -> Bitfenix alchemy extensions białe/białe + AsiaHorse 16AWG White 
UPS :  CyberPower CP1500EPFCLCD -> Brennenstuhl primera-line 8 -> Brennenstuhl primera-line 10
LCD :  LG 32UD59-B + LG flatron IPS236 -> Silverstone SST-ARM11BC
CASE :  Fractal R5 Biały + Lian Li BZ-H06A srebrny + 6 x Thermaltake toughfan 14 white + Thermalright TL-B8W
SPEAKERS :  Aune S6 Pro -> Topping PA3-B -> Polk S20e black -> Monoprice stand 16250
HEADPHONES :  TOSLINK 2m -> Aune S6 Pro -> 2 x Monoprice Premier 1.8m 16AWG 3-pin XLR -> Monoprice Monolith THX AAA 887 -> 4-pin XLR na 2 x 3.5mm 16 cores OCC 2m Cable -> HiFiMAN Edition XS -> sheepskin pads + 4-pin XLR na 2 x 2.5mm ABLET silver 2m  Cable -> Monoprice Monolith M1060 + Brainwavz HM100 -> Brainwavz sheepskin oval pads + Wooden double Ɪ Stand + Audio-Technica ATH-MSR7BK -> sheepskin pads + Multibrackets MB1893 + Sennheiser Momentum 3 +  Philips Fidelio X2HR/00 + JBL J88 White
MIC :  Tonor TC30 -> Mozos SB38
KEYBOARD : Corsair STRAFE RGB Cherry MX Silent (EU) + Glorious PC Gaming Race Stealth Slim - Full Size Black + PQI MyLockey
MOUSE :  Logitech MX ERGO + 2 x Logitech MX Performance + Logitech G Pro wireless + Logitech G Pro Gaming -> Hotline Games 2.0 Plus + Corsair MM500 3xl + Corsair MM300 Extended + Razer goliathus control
CONTROLLERS :  Microsoft xbox series x controller pc (1VA-00002) -> brainwavz audio Controller Holder UGC2 + Microsoft xbox 360 wireless black + Ravcore Javelin
NET :  Intel x520-DA2 -> 2 x FTLX8571D3BCV-IT + 2 x ASUS ZenWiFi Pro XT12
NAS :  Qnap TS-932X-2G -> Noctua NF-P14s redux 1200 PWM -> Kingston 16GB 2400Mhz CL14 (HX424S14IB/16) -> 9 x Crucial MX500 2TB ->  2 x FTLX8571D3BCV-IT -> 2 x Digitus (DK-HD2533-05/3)
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13 hours ago, kokosnh said:

Hmm, Well I guess even I don't know what’s it’s doing now, or how it’s doing it.

I did say they should take care of themselves, but... 

is it the SMR drive with TRIM ? Open crystaldiskinfo and look. 
you can also run the optimise ( it should’t hurt )  

Ah alright, thanks!

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