Defrag/Trim

@Dch48
Yes I spotted that too in the Scott Hanselman blog mentioned above. Like you I always disable System Restore as I create my own regular drive backups. Regarding hibernation & fast boot, I haven't read up on that subject or the impact it might have on an SSD but what I can say is that my Samsung 850 EVO SSD will be 7 years old this coming October and to date it has only written 9.8 TBW. I checked the manufacturing specs and it claims the following TBW...so a good few years to go yet, all being well :)

• Model: MZ-75E120 (120 GB) Samsung 850 EVO​

  5 Years or 75 TBW

Slinky,

Here's the Custom view definition I referred to in a Conversation.

It will list all defrag operations and, in the General tab, tell which which type it was [re-trim, defrag]

Unzip it then run Event viewer, click on the Import Custom view control near its upper-right corner, ...

Denis

Further to the comments left by the original OP I've filtered my own Windows 11 Event Logs and I'm shocked by the result! Defragmentation is running on my SSD every day currently. As you can see from the screenshots below on the 27/12/2021 it actually ran twice performing both a defragmentation and a retrim at precisely the same time. Unfortunately my logs only date back to 12/12/2021 when I upgraded to Windows 11. To begin with after I upgrade to W11 this process was only occurring every 3 days but now that behaviour has changed to daily!!!






I wonder if perhaps retrim is happening as expected however the mention of defrag is just windows way of saying that it called upon that tool to perform the retrim? It seems strange that a retrim & defrag could complete at precisely the same time. Just guessing here...

@KevTech

Somebody else has finally found the same symptom as you.

Denis

Slinky said:

if perhaps retrim is happening as expected however the mention of defrag is just windows way of saying that it called upon that tool to perform the retrim?

Click to expand...

If that was the case then mine would be reporting the same. But it's not. Mine just reports re-trim [apart from after the manual defrag experiment I did that we discussed in the Conversation].

Denis

@Try3

Thanks Dennis, I don't think I need to view your logs now, I can see it for myself in the above screenshots I've just posted. I wonder if I've hit on something in my comment about Windows calling upon the defrag tool to perform the Trim ? Although another member pointed out that it's no longer called 'Disk Defragmenter' but instead 'Optimize Drives' the actual *.exe file is still called 'Defrag.exe' Just a thought anyway.

EDIT:

Ah ok, you posted your response before I finished typing mine! This is strange!!

By any chance did you do a fresh install of Windows 11 or Upgrade? I wonder if there's a link somewhere? I upgraded myself (not literally), I wonder if @KevTech did the same?

I just rechecked my event logs for event ID: 258 and the last time my SSD (C: Drive) was defragged & Trimmed was on the 31/12/2021 so the daily behaviour I reported above now seems to have changed again. Sorry I didn't spot that in my post above.

No, there are two exe files involved.

Please confirm that you are using the UI to optimise. It knows which switches to apply to defrag.exe for SSDs. Without those switches you would get the same results as I did in my experiment.

In all cases, defrag.exe does the work. C:\Windows\System32\dfrgui.exe is the UI that triggers it.

I assume C:\Windows\System32\dfrgui.exe does show your disk as an SSD.

Denis

I upgraded from Windows 10 Home to Windows 11 Home.

You do not need to see my "logs". The attachment was merely to set up a Custom view as a convenience. No additional logs are created.

I did use the wrong name for the UI. That's because my shortcut to the UI was written ages ago so I use the words that I keep seeing when I run it.

The MS article linked to in post #28 explains that if the Optimize tool [see, I am trying] is set for weekly defrag then it will do that for HDDs but will only defrag SSDs monthly [by changing the switches it uses to run defrag.exe].

Denis

Ah yes you're right.., I didn't spot the second one. Regardless I don't run either tool from that location. If I want to view it I open the properties of the drive and then go to the 'Tools' tab.

Yes Dfrgui.exe does show my disk as an SSD.

I haven't attempted a manual defrag myself, my comments above relate to the Windows schedule which I haven't changed.

Slinky said:

Regardless I don't run either tool from that location

Click to expand...

Slinky said:

open the properties of the drive and then go to the 'Tools' tab

Click to expand...

That runs C:\Windows\System32\dfrgui.exe just as my direct shortcut does.
C:\Windows\System32\dfrgui.exe triggers & sets switches for defrag.exe and both of them can also start the defragsvc service [the precise function of which has never been clear].
The actual defragging or trimming is done by defrag.exe.

Denis

@Slinky
@KevTech

I've just had a thought.

Letting C:\Windows\System32\dfrgui.exe handle defragging-trimming means that the operations are performed when the system is idle.
What if you started using the computer again before it had finished?
It would want to continue the next time it was idle.
What if the Event viewer records are badly worded? What if completing defrag and having to stop defrag because the system was no longer idle are both reported using the same wording?

Testing this idea would be awkward.

Just a thought,
Denis

along those lines, I installed the Samsung Magician, their management tool for SSD drives, which offers options for managing your drive beyond what Windows does. Worth installing and checking it out.

@maarkr

Samsung Magician is quite handy, I've been using it myself since I bought my SSD in 2015 but the tools are quite limited. Some features are also not available on some SSD's. For instance on my 850 EVO I can't run the 'Diagnostic Scan' feature.

In the Performance Optimisation tab I can only adjust the following:-

• Turn ON/OFF RAPID Mode
• Turn ON/OFF TRIM
• Turn ON/OFF Over Provisioning

The Performance Benchmark is useful I suppose if you understand it but it's not something I've really looked into aside a quick test now and then.

In the latest build of the Magician software 7.0.1, there also appears to be a bug which incorrectly reports the Over Provisioning as being OFF, see below. As you can see in the first image it is turned ON and is using 10% drive capacity however in the second image it shows it as being turned OFF. It is ON definitely, I can see the 'Unallocated' space in disk manager. If I then turn Over Provisioning back ON it creates a second 'Unallocated' space which is not right.

Try3 said:

@Slinky
@KevTech

What if the Event viewer records are badly worded? What if completing defrag and having to stop defrag because the system was no longer idle are both reported using the same wording?

Testing this idea would be awkward.

Just a thought,
Denis

Click to expand...

This has been precisely my thoughts since entering these discussions. Not specifically relating to the Event Logs but moreover Windows 11 in general. A lot of what we see has been carried over from previous versions of the OS and as we all know Microsoft has a habit of repurposing old tools, look at Bill Gates for example, just kidding! Take the disk defragmenter/optimisation tool as an example, it's existed in it's present form since Windows 7 so has it been updated for Windows 11, or just carried forward as is? My point is like @Try3 mentions above, what if the logs we're seeing are badly worded? What if the wording hasn't been updated to include Windows 11 yet? It wouldn't be the first time the Windows Event Logs have given redundant/outdated information, I recall it happened quite a while back for something on my system but I can't recall what the log said now.

Maybe you're on to something Dennis?

Windows Feedback Hub is seeing similar reports, thankfully! Hopefully someone at MS will find a solution soon.

Slinky said:

Windows Feedback Hub is seeing similar reports, thankfully! Hopefully someone at MS will find a solution soon.

View attachment 17814

View attachment 17815

Click to expand...

Don't understand their issue. Windows 11 is doing what they asked it to- if you tell it to defrag the SSD daily it does the defrag daily. It was not behaving properly in 10. If they want to do it monthly, don't schedule defrag for the SSD drives. Then it will run monthly as part of the monthly maintenance task. It is now behaving properly.

Running RETRIM frequently is not going to wear your SSD out any. Your SSD gets sent TRIM commands every time a file is deleted to inform the SSD of the deletion so it can mark the associated blocks as unused. RETRIM sends command(s) for all blocks that are not in use by the file system to the SSD. In principle RETRIM is not necessary because of the TRIM on file deletion. It only makes a difference if something went wrong and the a delete TRIM got lost or couldn't be processed timely by the SSD or who knows what reasons, which shouldn't really happen. If anything, RETRIM is only cleaning up any mishaps that may have happened with TRIM and frequent RETRIM will likely improve the life of the SSD by providing the garbage collection with more information unused blocks. If al TRIM were processed without issue, the SSD will process the RETRIM and find that all unused blocks are already accounted for and will do nothing more.

Slinky,

Those feedback items ignore the fact that the MS article [and the Scott Handelsmann investigation] relate only to the defragmenter UI being set to weekly. No information has been published about its behaviour under other conditions.

In addition, since you asked in a Conversation, my hardware is not supported and I do not get your symptoms.
Upgrading with the Windows 11 RTM ISO on a well-below spec computer [my post #266] - ElevenForum

Denis

This was already explained in detail. You could send a retrim to an SSD every 2 seconds and it would make NO difference to the lifespan of an SSD. The assertion that it would shorten the lifespan indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of what TRIM and RETRIM is.

Example: I have an SSD on which no data has ever been deleted. As a result, no blocks need to be trimmed. Now, I delete a chunk of data. Let's assume that this data occupied 100 blocks of data. TRIM operations will occur to erase those 100 blocks. Note that under normal conditions this would happen almost immediately (WAY MORE than once a day), as soon as some slack time exists after data occupying those blocks was deleted.

Now, assume the same scenario. However, the system loses power before the trim operations can be performed. This is where retrim comes into play. On occasion (for example, once a week) Windows informs the drive of all the blocks that should be blank. The drive can then understand that there are 100 blocks out there that should have previously been trimmed, but were not. It can now go about trimming those blocks.

Now suppose we send another retrim. The drive will look at that information and determine that all blocks that should be unoccupied are already trimmed and so it simply does nothing. You could send a retrim 1,000 more times and the result will be the same - no action will be taken.

The retrim operation simply serves as a reminder from the OS to the physical hardware. Since Windows is intimately familiar with the filesystem and how the partitions, metadata, etc. should be laid out and the drive has zero clue about this, it is the OS that has to tell the drive what blocks are considered unused. All the drive does is to check that nothing has been missed, trimming any blocks that may have been missed.

So long as no trim operations were missed, a retrim will result in zero writes to the SSD. In fact, the only time it will result in writes is if a trim that should have already been performed was missed.

So, explain to me how no activity is going to wear out the SSD. I dare you :).

@geneo @Try3 @hsehestedt

Guys.., either I'm missing something here or you're all ignoring that fact that Windows is also defragmenting my SSD. I'm not talking about 'Trimming', I have no problem with it 'Trimming' my SSD, I think we've all established long ago that this is normal behaviour but 'Defragging' as well?

@Try3 said in post #65 in reference to the Windows Event Log

If that was the case then mine would be reporting the same. But it's not. Mine just reports re-trim [apart from after the manual defrag experiment I did that we discussed in the Conversation].

Click to expand...

For what it's worth here's my event logs again, as you can see Defragging is happening alongside Trimming, if this is normal fine. I'll go my merry way.