defrag question

[asm481]

I have a concern with a fresh install here. After installing several programs I check fragmentation and of course windows says it isn't neccesary but shows many red stripes. (using w2k defrag). I defrag any how.

My question here is mostly why there are two seperate areas of system (green area) and file installs stay to the right of the center green stripe but relocate to the left tight on the other system area. I check my other 'puter here and i see no system area (green) center of the display (fairly fresh install) but this one is a 40 gig drive where the other is a 9 gig.

Have I totally confused all with this little question?

[dgiese01]

I have a concern with a fresh install here. After installing several programs I check fragmentation and of course windows says it isn't neccesary but shows many red stripes. (using w2k defrag). I defrag any how.

My question here is mostly why there are two seperate areas of system (green area) and file installs stay to the right of the center green stripe but relocate to the left tight on the other system area. I check my other 'puter here and i see no system area (green) center of the display (fairly fresh install) but this one is a 40 gig drive where the other is a 9 gig.

Have I totally confused all with this little question?

I am a newbie in the use of 2000. My "home" is 98,98SE,ME and sometimes XP. But to the question Are both machines running 2000? Are they both the same build number. The last build of 2000 was 2195 I believe. I know that some of the previous builds did treat the drive differently.
I am not intimating that I have an annswer but wish to clarify your setup.
On a side note, I use Diskeeper Ver.8.0 for all my defragmentation duties and Norton Systemworks 2003 for all other maintance duties. I rarely believe that Bill Gates has a better idea for anything. If there is an easy way and a hard way Bill will choose the hard way everytime.
L.

[confus-ed]

Ok ... yup I'm confus-ed ... what are you asking about ?

The placement of files on the disk in certain areas is by design with ntfs 5 to improve performance, different sized disks might result in differing 'patterns' dependant on what formatted it in the first place, whether its a system disk or just data

The usual 'strange' bit many folks notice is the mft (master file table - like the old master FAT) this generally occupies a whole 1/8th of your disk & is generally placed about 1/3 'in' by setup this is 'system' owned, & it is possible to vary its size & placement, though not through either w2k or xp setup ...

[asm481]

Ok ... yup I'm confus-ed ... what are you asking about ?

The placement of files on the disk in certain areas is by design with ntfs 5 to improve performance, different sized disks might result in differing 'patterns' dependant on what formatted it in the first place, whether its a system disk or just data

The usual 'strange' bit many folks notice is the mft (master file table - like the old master FAT) this generally occupies a whole 1/8th of your disk & is generally placed about 1/3 'in' by setup this is 'system' owned, & it is possible to vary its size & placement, though not through either w2k or xp setup ...

Both the drives I have compared are NTFS and both system drives. The 9 gig is all alone and the 40 has other drives in the system but not on same ide. I am used to the system files at the beggining of the drive it is the smal grouping of system files toward the center of the drive that has me curious. These systems both are working OK it is just my curiosity that is killing me.