TITLE:              Optimizing a PNW Server's Hard Drive
DOCUMENT ID:        TID1200861
DOCUMENT REVISION:  0
DATE:               16JUN95
ALERT STATUS:       Yellow
README FOR:         NA

NOVELL PRODUCT and VERSION:
PERSONAL NETWARE V1.0

ABSTRACT:
NA

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ISSUE:

Optimizing a PNW Server's Hard Drive

During the day to day work on your computer, files are deleted,
rewritten, or replaced on the hard disk.  This will eventually cause
your files to be "fragmented."  Fragmented refers to a file being
divided into pieces and those pieces being located throughout your
hard disk instead of in one contiguous block of disk space.  Thus, if
you try to access one of these files, the hard disk has to look for a
single file in several places.  This in turn causes your hard disk to
respond slowly.  The more fragmented your disk is; the slower it will
respond.  If the hard disk is in a Personal NetWare server, the
entire network can be affected.  To eliminate this effect, consider
"optimizing" you hard disk.  A disk is optimized by rearranging the
data so that files are not spread out over the disk.  Many different
utilities are available for optimizing hard disks; a disk optimizer
utility is NOT provided with Personal NetWare.

Please consider the following before optimizing your hard disk: 

*  It is vital that no other stations access your hard disk while the
utility is running.  Because of this, it is strongly suggested that
you optimize the disk without the network loaded.

*  Disk Optimizers can take a considerable amount of time to complete
data arrangement (20 minutes or more).

*  It is recommended that you have a backup of your vital information
before optimizing.

*  If your hard disk is in a Personal NetWare server, the optimizing
utility must be executed from the server itself and not from a
client.

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