Since 1995, Diskeeper has been the most popular and widely recognized third-party disk defragmenter on the market. Version 8, which has just recently been released, has added additional improvements, is faster and more efficient than previous versions, and has a whole new look. Executive Software has expanded the Diskeeper product line, creating versions that target specific markets from home use, to enterprise network environments. For this review, we will be looking at Diskeeper 8.0 Professional Edition for Windows-based desktop computers. To begin, let’s talk about disk defragmentation, and answer the question “Why purchase a disk defragmenting utility when one comes with Windows for free?”
Files on your hard drive become fragmented during normal usage, and your hard drive has to work harder to access them than they would if they were all contiguous. This degrades overall system performance over time, and severe disk fragmentation, if left unchecked can result in system instability, as well as shorten the life of the drive, as it has to work harder than necessary to locate and load files. Defragmenting the hard drive puts all of the files and folders that become scattered all over your hard drive back together, making them contiguous again. While Windows has a built-in defragmenter utility (Disk Defragmenter), like anything Microsoft bundles for free into its operating systems, it is limited in its functionality:
While the Windows XP version of Disk Defragmenter has improved somewhat in speed and efficiency over the version in Windows 9x/ME and Windows 2000, it is still slow.
You have to let the Windows Disk Defragmenter finish before resuming use of the computer, as it uses a lot of system resources during the process and will slow down any programs you are running.
Disk Defragmenter doesn’t always do a thorough job of defragmenting a hard drive or telling you when the drive should be defragmented.

As gamers, we invest as much money as our budgets will allow in hi-performance computer parts, spend hours benchmarking, tweaking and tuning BIOS and operating system settings to perfection. Elite gamers think nothing of dropping half a C-Note on a top-of-the-line video card, more than that on exotic case mods and elaborate water-cooling systems for overclocking to make their rigs look unique and push their performance into the stratosphere. Whether your system was built on a modest or “cost is no concern” budget, there’s one relatively inexpensive thing you can do to insure that you’re getting the most performance out of it: defragmenting your hard drive with Executive Software’s Diskeeper.
Installing Diskeeper 8.0 is pretty straight forward. Just load the CD and follow the on-screen prompts. The upgrade version requires that you own Diskeeper 6.0 or higher. If it isn’t already installed on your system, you will be asked to insert a Diskeeper 6.0 or higher CD during the installation process. Once Diskeeper 8.0 is installed, you can start using it immediately (rebooting your PC after installation is not required).

The first thing that you notice about Diskeeper 8.0 is the new interface. Although Diskeeper still uses the Microsoft Management Console (MMC) snap-in, you’d hardly recognize it as such. Sporting an attractive, Teal Green Outlook-style layout, it’s a major improvement over blander, previous versions (even the new Diskeeper 8.0 icon has been dressed-up). Everything is laid out more logically so the utility will be a snap to use for both novices and advanced users. The interface is divided into three windows. The left window has collapsible menus for all of Diskeeper’s functions. The upper window shows your hard drives and has a button bar with icons to analyze, pause, resume and stop defragmentation of your hard drives and access on-line help. Finally, the lower window consists of five information tabs that have summarized information on what they do, and how to use the features they represent. The first tab, labeled Performance, will display a set of bar charts on how long it will take your drive to read all of the fragmented files on your hard drive and all of the files on your hard drive. The second tab, labeled Reliability, will rate how healthy your hard drive is or isn’t based on its current level of fragmentation. The third tab, labeled Fragmentation, will give a detailed analysis of the level of fragmentation of your hard drive, where you can view a list of the most fragmented files, and print or save the information as a report. The fourth tab, labeled Drive Map shows a color-coded graphical representation of your hard drive and its level of fragmentation, which changes and updates when running a defragmentation job. The fifth and final tab, labeled Set It and Forget It, tells you how to create automatic schedules to defragment your hard drives. The new descriptive interface in Diskeeper 8.0 is an excellent feature, and everything is so intuitive, you probably won’t need the 26-page User Guide.