PerfectDisk Blog from Raxco.com| Defrag Software

Virtualization -- the ever-growing wave

When The Wall Street Journal starts writing about virtualization, you know it's here in a big way, no matter where Microsoft stacks up from a readiness standpoint. Journal reporter Robert Guth summarized in yesterday's edition about how far Microsoft is behind with the technology. Clearly, it will be at least second choice behind VMware for the enterprise for a long time, if Microsoft can ever catch up. Of course, when Microsoft sets its sights on something, anybody or anything in the way better buckle up, but this will be one of their toughest fights ever, as VMware has a huge leg up. And as Guth points out, the stakes for Microsoft are high, as there are many ramifications to Microsoft's business models and competititve landscape.

One example the article points to is the U.S. Marine Corps, which uses VMware on servers in 14 data centers, with plans to increase. Microsoft's virtualization technology, even as it evolves, does not fit into the Marine Corps' plans, according to Major Carl P. Brodhun. As Guth points out, the field is wide open, even for new players. The Wall Street Journal printed the graph below from Merrill Lynch showing CIO purchase plans for virtualization.

                                             

From our standpoint, we have also seen a great deal of interest and activity with virtualization. Probably the biggest benefit of PerfectDisk in this environment is the total free space consolidation that is provided with PerfectDisk's Space Restoration Technology, as this is critical on a virtual platform.

The wave is becoming a tidal wave.

Announcing Optimize Now -- a new newsletter for enterprise IT professionals

Around mid-July, Raxco Software will launch a new newsletter for enterprise users -- Optimize Now. This newsletter will focus on performance, productivity and storage management issues for those of you in an enterprise environment.

The goal is to bring you informative and topical information to help you in your jobs - by either providing specific how-to information or a perspective on a particular topic or issue. Information will be provided in a variety of media, including articles, podcasts and more.

So if this sounds like it's for you, I encourage you to sign up below. If not, you can continue to look here for PerfectDisk, Raxco Software and industry news and opinions. 

  Click here to sign up.

Find a better fate for your Doom 3 game

Kevin Read, of the metropolitan Chicago area, is a big Doom 3 player. He's always on the lookout for things that will help give him the fastest PC possible and the best playing experience. He's had problems with motherboards, network cards, keyboards, heat problems, spyware - you name it. But he realizes that these are just "normal problems that just come up from time to time." So he addresses them, finds a cure, and moves on with better results.

One thing he hadn't tried, until recently, was defragmenting his system. He had made some system tweaks, cleaned up spyware, but still found his system running sluggishly. After doing a little research, he came across the issue of fragmentation, tried a few programs, and said he "quickly came to the conclusion that PerfectDisk's Space Restoration Technology helped my system the most." After defragmenting, his system ran a lot faster, and his Doom 3 game was running faster than ever. But he really loves the total free space consolidation PerfectDisk provides, that he didn't find in any other tool.

There are thousands of gamers using PerfectDisk to help them with their games. We hear from lots of them, including many Doom 3 players. They've found an inexpensive way to improve their systems.

They've helped their fate with PerfectDisk.

             

Save your job, be a hero -- defrag now!

Partners in IT, a United-Kingdom-based service management company, recently reported, after a study, that business managers in the UK lose 31 working days - more than 10 percent of the year - putting out fires that result from bad management of IT systems. I learned of this from an article in eWeek Careers.

Almost 75 percent of non-IT business managers surveyed said they spent, on average, 12 percent of their time each week dealing with problems caused by their IT systems. Eighty percent said that IT system downtime was a productivity issue, and 90 percent of survey respondents in large companies said downtime was a big issue.

Paul Cash, managing director of Partners in IT, said "globalization of successful businesses coupled with more flexible and mobile work forces have driven innovation within even the largest of companies. Technology has played its part in helping to drive this innovation but, just as any other resource in an organization, technology needs to be maintained and managed - it needs time devoted to it to ensure that the most benefit is gained."

Do fragmentation problems cause all the 31 lost working days? Surely not. But I would bet that a great deal of down time, help desk calls, general frustration and more is the result of fragmentation problems. That's why, despite its lack of visibility in the press, many forward-thinking companies and companies that pay great attention to optimal performance and user productivity, deploy enterprise defragmentation software. They know that without it, there can be decreased end-user productivity, wasted system admin and help desk resources, increased backup times, hanging applications, and in extreme cases, even worse.

I agree with most of what Cash says, although I would say that with a product like PerfectDisk, you can gain a lot with very minimal time devoted.

If you're an IT professional drowning in fire-fighting, free up some of your time with enterprise deframentation. Or be the forward-thinking person and help reduce fire-fighting with defragmentation so you and your organization can spend more time on strategic initiatives.

It's a good move for your company -- and for you.

                                          

Yes, Virginia -- there will be a Vista SP1

Despite some people wondering if there really would be a Service Pack 1 for Vista, it's finaly official. SP1 is planned for release later this year, coinciding with the release of Windows Server 2008. Microsoft really needed to get on with this announcement, as many people, and especially businesses, won't even consider a new OS from Redmond until an SP1 is released. You can read more from Mary Jo Foley, Microsoft watcher, on her blog.

While PerfectDisk is still the only defagmenter certified for Vista, we know others are working to catch up, so at some point another may join us. But since Microsoft came to Raxco to assist them on the Vista certification, it's taking them awhile.

Hey, we have to make them work to try reach the bar we've set....again.

                                  

PC sales are smoking

Research firm Isuppli reported today that PC sales in 2007 are very brisk, with notebook sales leading the charge. Isuppli has upgraded its sales estimates for PCs in 2007 because notebooks are selling much better than previously forecast.

Principal analyst Matthew Wilkins stated "notebook PC shipments rose to 21.8 million units in the first quarter of 2007, up 23 percent from 17.7 million in the first quarter of 2006." He said that notebooks are expected to account for 40 percent of PC shipments this year, with desktops showing virtually no growth.

Desktop or notebook, remember to defrag.

               

Summer's here -- must be time for George Foreman and a cold one

Couldn't resist passing on Information Week's Gadgets of Summer article in its June18th edition. How can those of you in the Northern Hemisphere get through this summer without the $170 George Foreman grill with a dock, 10-watt amplifier and speaker all in one!

                                                          

Or Brando's $33 USB Mini Fridge that plugs into USB popwer to cool a single can of your favorite drink...

                                                

Check 'em all out here.

We are shocked - shocked! - that PerfectDisk wasn't on this list. Ah, PerfectDisk's defragmentation - it just works.

CAD is not bad, as long as you defrag

We have many CAD (Computer-Aided Design) users that find PerfectDisk an important part of their computing environment.  Because of many large, fragmented files in their CAD environment, PerfectDisk is an easy way to clean up and optimize the drive. CAD applications also typically create a lot of temp files, so when they get deleted, your drive is in a fragmented state. Since PerfectDisk is designed to address the fragmented free space issue, it's a natural for tidying up the drives of CAD users.

An interesting post in a CAD Google group points out another problem - difficulty in placing dimensions between simple edges and the ensuing extra clicks and wasted time. Again, defragmentation is a large part of the answer.

If you're doing CAD, PerfectDisk will help.

Virtualization - look before you leap

This week's Information Week cover story is entitled "9 Hot Technologies That Can Blow Up In Your Face." The introduction points out that there are emerging technologies that are definitely worthy of enterprise consideration, but caution is also a must.

       

Charles Babcock writes about the "virtualization threat ahead" and astutely addresses the security threats in this new virtual world.  A big problem, according to Babcock, is that this area is just so infant that there are bound to be problems. At least Windows, even with its security issues, has had many years and millions of user experiences and environments to address issues. So security holes are out there - implementor and deployer beware.

Given the propensity of people and organizations to neglect defragmentation in the "physical" world, it's likely to also be an issue with virtualization. Gartner Research estimates that 60% of virtual nmachines will be less secure than their physical counterparts through 2009. It doesn't provide a similar estimate for fragmentation, but I'd bet the chances are good that many will go undefragged. That's too bad, because some of the benefits of virtualization will be lost, and if completely neglected for a long time, even more severe problems can occur.

Virtualization - it's a good move, just do it wisely.

      

Slippery slopes, smoke and mirrors - which iPod do you use?

One of the world's largest financial firms does business in wealth management, investment banking, and asset management. It is present in over 50 countries and employs about 90,000 people. When it looked to address its defragmentation needs, it chose PerfectDisk, primarily because of its superiority in free space consolidation, its flexible scheduling capabilities, and its ability to use fewer resources. As the IT director told us, "it just works efficiently, it doesn't spin its wheels." But my point here is that this company, with one of the world's best-known brands, purchased 90,000 copies of PerfectDisk for its enterprise after extensive testing and research - but that sale never showed up on anyone's market research or market share report.

If you want market share numbers on PCs, iPods and MP3s, and operating systems, give IDC or Gartner Research a call and they will be happy to tell you (well, you might need to pay them, depending on how much detail you want). They'll spew out as many numbers as you can handle. But they don't have numbers on the defrag market - it's not tracked. We can handle it - we know defragmentation is not in the list of Top 10 Sexiest Utilities. But that won't stop people from trying to use data any way they want.

Check out this interesting article on Market Share Myth 2007: iPod vs Zune and Mac vs PC. As the article points out, "...clearly, market share isn't a subject where numbers "speak for themselves." Just as market researcher NPD's market share numbers can be "grossly misleading" when referring to iPod and Zune, the same can be said for most markets. In the case of defragmentation, it's looking at the paltry retail market for defraggers, (now there's a place where shoppers are going for defraggers - Costco!), selected reseller sales, and a few other distributors. We are not going after the retail, boxed product defrag market in the US (we do have boxed products outside the US, where it is more relevant).

PerfectDisk is a defragmentation and optimization tool for sophisticated users. Capabilities like Space Restoration Technology mean organizations are getting a high-end solution for the boring, recurring problem of fragmentation in the world's largest enterprises, as well as small businesses, power users, videographers, and gamers. Not every Global 2000 company runs PerfectDisk, but many do, and the list keeps growing.

Don't be fooled - whether it's product capability or other numbers. Test and verify.