Pokertracker load time

[null]

This thread looks like it got pretty sidetracked from the original subject, but I'll post something along those lines anyway. For those of you who use Auto Import when playing on Party/skins (nearly everyone I imagine), does pokertracker get bogged down when importing hands? What I mean is, when I click on Pokertracker or a gametime window, it doesn't instantly pop up, the program seizes up a bit as it imports hands. Anyone have any suggestions for fixing this?

My computer's fast enough to handle something like Pokertracker without delays, I'm wondering if there's something I'm missing. Maybe it's just time to defrag.

[astroglide]

- ntfs is vulnerable to fragmentation
- fragmentation reduces performance
- defragging will not destroy your hard drive

nobody claimed the mechanics were simple. the results are. if you'd like to discuss mechanics, you could talk to sysinternals or microsoft. both recommend defragging.

[theghost]

[ QUOTE ]
you know nothing about computers and nothing about poker.

[/ QUOTE ]

whoa. it appears that you know nothing about astroglide.

[Richard Berg]

Defragging every night will reduce the MTBF of a desktop machine's disk. It's obvious -- just look at the failure rates of server drives versus the same model in a single-user machine.

Nevertheless, the effect is probably not significant on recent drives...BUT that may not apply to everyone reading this thread, so I'm going to nitpick. For example, if you bought an IBM drive before 2003, read the manufacturer spec sheet and you'll see its quoted MTBF assumes no more than 8 hrs/day of usage. Maxtor didn't list this spec on their datasheets due to controversy, but they did give only 1-year warranties on consumer drives for awhile suggesting they were engineered for similar usage patterns.

This is an even more pointless discussion, though. Forgetting about disk stress, defragging every night is retarded. (do you see why?) If you want to be obsessive-compulsive you're probably not hurting anything, but I'm not going to let you get away with advising it to other people. Show me where Luis Felipe Cabrera or Mark Russinovich recommends daily defrags and I'll eat my hat.

[astroglide]

mtbf doesn't refer to a specific drive. just being a cock, i know what you mean. there have been a number of drives that had the same internals but offered both scsi and ata interfaces. serial-attached scsi is going to seriously blur some lines. while pricier/more reliable components are used in server-class drives, it's certainly worth observing that they don't push the envelope in areal densities, don't employ exotics like 5-platter designs (75gxp fiasco), etc. those things promote failure.

for most multitablers/pt users/somewhat savvy people in general i would recommend defragging once per week. i do it nightly because of the volume of large files i am constantly creating, deleting, and moving across disks. i've got a couple mirrored wd2000jbs that have been in operation 24/7 (and served as my only volume until the 36gb raptor came out), defragged nightly, no problems. had a maxtor d740x at work which i did nightly as well for about 3 years, no problems. i said it should be done nightly if one wants the best performance. i haven't seen any evidence presented that nightly defrags will damage a drive, and the dvr argument presents compelling evidence that 24/7 use (not just spinning) isn't a death knell for desktop-class drives. defragging is much less intense than that.

[AncientPC]

I agree with Richard. Defragging is something done a few times a year at best, daily defragging is just overkill.

You have defragging as a common placebo right up there with rebooting, the only difference is that the latter actually helps sometimes.

[Richard Berg]

Fair enough.

I don't have a huge PT database. If you really are finding frequent slowdowns that defrag cures, look back to the suggestions in my NTFS post. Giving PT its own partition might slow things down if you're constantly importing Party's on-disk HHs (seeking back & forth to your app partition), but it's worth a try. If you have a spare physical disk, that's definitely the way to go.

[Richard Berg]

Forgot to mention, you can still choose to defrag individual files. If you read sysinternals you already know where to look [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

[LinusKS]

Ok, I've read this entire thread, and I'm even less smart than when I started - but I DO have the problem the OP stated - PT runs agonizingly slow.

I have a Compaq Presario notebook, with a 2.6GHz chip (whatever that means) and 192 MB of RAM. So according to some of the folks in this thread, I'm in desperate need of more RAM.

I'm game. But what I want to know is, should I pay $50 for 256MB, or $100 for 512?

Nothing else is wrong with this computer, just PT.

[edrugtrader]

[ QUOTE ]
Ok, I've read this entire thread, and I'm even less smart than when I started - but I DO have the problem the OP stated - PT runs agonizingly slow.

I have a Compaq Presario notebook, with a 2.6GHz chip (whatever that means) and 192 MB of RAM. So according to some of the folks in this thread, I'm in desperate need of more RAM.

I'm game. But what I want to know is, should I pay $50 for 256MB, or $100 for 512?

Nothing else is wrong with this computer, just PT.

[/ QUOTE ]
if you can afford $100, there is never a problem with too much ram