Let your PC start the new year right!

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ISSUE 21.01 • 2024-01-01 BEN’S WORKSHOP By Ben Myers Taking the time now to service your Windows PC thoroughly can pay off big time in the coming year
[See the full post at: Let your PC start the new year right!]

10 users thanked author for this post.

WSGeo, lmacri, ibe98765, GaryW, SueW, Norio, Alex5723, fisher75, DLivesInTexas, jrp2706

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Hi Ben,

Happy New Year to you and all the AskWoody Team.

Just a quick feedback about your article.

KC Softwares, the french company behind SUMo and other software ceased trading at the end of October 2023.

This didn’t please to say the least, as I had used SUMo for years and it was fantastic compared to the other applications that I had tried.

http://kcsoftwares.com

So, I am not sure what the best solution is moving forward, as I have been trying to find a good replacement that doesn’t cost a fortune, overly interfere, has full support and is kept up to date promptly.

Cheers,

John

 

2 users thanked author for this post.

Will Fastie, ibe98765

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Previusly discussed here: KC Softwares – Shutting Down

Try UpdateHub and/or WinGetUI.

(Both require WinGet, which you may already have.)

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UpdateHub leaves out a lot of software:

Kindle

Belarc Advisor

Jarte plus

Node JS

Western Digital dashboard

Ucheck will find these but cannot update or provide the location on your computer.

What else have we got??

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hhhenry1 wrote:

What else have we got?

WinGetUI

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As the software word turns, Another episode. I am not sure I can recommend an alternative to smooth out the non-Windows software update process. Thank you.

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In recovery from New Year’s Eve, I downloaded, installed and tested UpdateHub with mixed results. It updated a lot of software, was unable to do so for others. But it is handy, at least, to deal with those products that do not tell you when an update is available. It was pretty tedious to go through updates for all the software on this system.

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The link under Happy New Year! goes to Fred’s column from two years ago:

Read the bonus Plus Newsletter (21.01.0, 2024-01-01).

https://www.askwoody.com/2024/happy-new-year-2024/

1 user thanked author for this post.

Will Fastie

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Unfortunately * Macrium Reflect (https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree) is no longer free although there is a 30 day trial. I’ve been using it for many years and it’s a very good product and support has been excellent.

There is a 1 or 4 copy purchase options for the Home Edition. The 4 copy is a bit pricey if you only have 2 PCs, so I grumbled and they gave me a a discount for my second copy but I recall discount codes can be found on the web.

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Thank you for the update, as the software world turns.

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b wrote:

The link under Happy New Year! goes to Fred’s column from two years ago

We had a little linkage glitch with this issue and I forgot to change that link. It’s fixed now. Thanks.

2 users thanked author for this post.

b, satrow

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While you are doing the New Year cleanup/fix-up, don’t forget to vacuum the crumbs out of the keyboard!

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Aha! Better to be proactive and prevent. No cookies to be eaten while pounding on the keyboard. :>)

1 user thanked author for this post.

WSGeo

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Thanks for this.

I thought I would ‘checkdisk’ my main system drive (C:\  – a 1tb M.2 drive) – just for the fun of it as I’ve had no issues.

I’ve never seen the error message before:

“C:\WINDOWS\system32>chkdsk c: /f
The type of the file system is NTFS.
Cannot lock current drive.

Chkdsk cannot run because the volume is in use by another
process. Would you like to schedule this volume to be
checked the next time the system restarts? (Y/N)”

And I’ve run checkdisk many times in the past…    Why this issue?

 

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Chkdsk cannot check in-use system files. It has always required a reboot unless it is run from another/different boot drive.

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Exactly. You beat me to it with your response.

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Only chkdsk /f.

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b wrote:

Only chkdsk /f.

Not only; chkdsk /r gives the same warning.  Of course, /r implies /f.  I never use /f.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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chkdsk /f followed by the reboot needed to free up from usage the drive being checked. After the reboot, chkdsk runs in what looks like a command window, after which the system reboots at one’s request.

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My system is so clean it doesn’t have a system!

I read this and thinking of olden days when I would use a Fred Langa inspired .bat file to clean things up, I right clicked on C:, clicked on properties, and clicked on Details (lower right box). Normally I get something that at least makes some sense. but alas, today I have asolutely nothing! – 41GB of nothing, but, nothing!

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Relative to previous Windows versions, Windows 11 does provide better management of the cleanup and removal of useless data. It has taken at least a decade for me to say that.

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Uh, yes it does, but it has always had the good grace to at least report the system and app sizes. Now it is nothing. It is simply wrong.

windows/temp is 4MB and user/aps/local/temp is 8MB.

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WinDirStat does a nice graphic job of reporting about files and folders.

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WinDirStat took 30 seconds to show my C partition. TreeSize Free is virtually instantaneous.

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Directory Report can do so much more than WinDirStat.  Find duplicate files and save reports to more formats

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I didn’t get the Plus Newsletter by mail.

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I see in the mailchimp logs it was sent to you.  You might want to see if it’s in a spam folder?

Susan Bradley Patch Lady/Prudent patcher

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jrp2706 wrote:

as I have been trying to find a good replacement that doesn’t cost a fortune, overly interfere, has full support and is kept up to date promptly.

There are none so far.

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Alan_uk wrote:

Unfortunately * Macrium Reflect (https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree) is no longer free

There is still a fully free version

https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/macrium-free-being-discontinued/

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For backup, I think it was about a year ago, I switched to terabyte and haven’t looked back. Much faster and saved me many times. EDIT: It works perfectly with a mixed (windows/linux) system.

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a wrote:

Much faster and saved me many times.

Indeed.  Also, one personal license is good for installation on up to 5 PC’s in the household.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

2 users thanked author for this post.

jrp2706, a

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Yes indeed – And YOU @bbearren were the one that influenced me to check it out, and after doing so I was easily convinced! THANKS!!!!!!!

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My PCs all run Windows 10 Pro.  The machines are all on the Web, but I’ve not used OneDrive or other cloud services, preferring to keep Microsoft (and others) out of my knickers.

I’ve been using “Backup and Restore (Windows 7),” the legacy feature on the Control Panel, to make periodic full system images.  I noticed Ben did not mention this tool in the article — which implies that this is not a ‘preferred option.’  Is there a risk or limitation (other than the obvious ones: (1) I should have off-site storage and (2) I’m not getting incremental backups between full images) that I should be aware of?

Thanks in advance.

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A preferred option without Microsoft knickers would be the incremental File History backup, not so mysteriously omitted from any Microsoft web pages, because they want us all to use OneDrive.

The Backup and Restore carried forward from Windows 7 is fine for what it does, but I think would supplement it with incremental backups between full system backups. If, for some reason, system storage fails and there are no incremental backups, some potentially valuable files are lost. How often to do incremental backup? How frequently are important files created and changed?

Note also the commentary from Greg Carmark on a Microsoft web page. I wish he had explained more. https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/all/windows-7-backup-will-not-work-on-windows-11/e131c18c-f385-452c-94ec-d36eda3af541

“Windows 7 Backup is only included in Windows 10 and 11 to transfer files over from Windows 7. It is way too old to work reliably for regular backup.

The built-in Backup for Windows 10 and 11 is File History.”

Expect that it won’t work with Windows 11 when you get there.

1 user thanked author for this post.

AlexEiffel

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Ben Myers wrote:

A preferred option without Microsoft knickers would be the incremental File History backup, not so mysteriously omitted from any Microsoft web pages, because they want us all to use OneDrive.
…
The built-in Backup for Windows 10 and 11 is File History.”

Expect that it won’t work with Windows 11 when you get there.

Why do you say that File History won’t work with Windows 11?

I’ve been using File History on Windows 11 for at least two years.

How to Perform a Backup Using File History in Windows 11 or Windows 10

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My error. “It” referred to Backup and Restore (Windows 7).

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When I think “backup” I think not just the files and folders “that I wouldn’t want to lose” but also all of the partitions and the partition structure (MBR/GPT) that makes your SSD or NVMe viable. This includes the 9 plus partitions that are on this particular NVMe. (5 if you only have 1 bootable windows partition) With a simple 5 min backup, or 5 min restore, I’m done – back to where I was. COMPLETELY. If my NVMe has a heart attack, I just bop down to Microcenter and get another and restore to that. Done. If it’s an emergency I could grab one of my spares and use that. Again. Done. So easy. back to fully operational in minutes, NOT days.

If I just back up the few files and folders, then I will have to waste a lot of time re-creating the partitions so I have some place to put that stuff. Think of the hours I would have to waste re-creating win 11 and a couple linux partitions, let alone setting them up as they were before disaster struck.

I recommend not using windows 7 backup, or any microsoft backup app from any release of windows. Unless of course you like to make work for yourself. If a backup image can not be restored to a different physical storage device, it is, to me, worthless. Any backup worth it’s salt comes with an iso that you burn onto a USB stick to boot to when your system is dead, and use it to restore your last image. So easy!.

(I hate Samsung phones. I love and use only Samsung SSDs and NVMe’s. )

3 users thanked author for this post.

ibe98765, bbearren, RetiredGeek

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a wrote:

If a backup image can not be restored to a different physical storage device, it is, to me, worthless.

I concur.  In my daily driver (dual boot) are twenty one partitions on six drives; three NVMe and three SATA SSD’s.  I create weekly images of six partitions (OS, Programs, Users for each installation), and periodically make full drive images of each separate SSD.  If an SSD goes belly up, I can replace it, restore its image, and it’s as if nothing happened.

The only work involved is opening the case and swapping out the drives.  The rest is just a few mouse clicks.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

1 user thanked author for this post.

a

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I’ve edited my post #2616851 for the sake of clarity.  The full drive images I create from time to time serve as the backbone for replacing a failed drive.  The partition structure and sizes are preserved in those images which, as @krism illustrates, makes replacing a failed drive simple work.

A number of my partitions serve basically as archival storage of data duplicates, downloaded programs/apps/utilities as well as file groups that seldom change, such as pictures, music, my web site, etc.  I don’t need a weekly image of a partition’s contents that haven’t changed in a couple of months.  I create a new image when the contents actually have changed.  That’s the “periodically” of some of those images.  Partitioning Options explains it a bit better.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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Exactly! I have a MUCH smaller setup than @bbearren – I have (not counting my spare laptop) 1 volatile NVMe with 9 or so partitions that I back up frequently and a much more slothful NVMe with 2 partitions that I periodically image to offsite. I have perhaps 5 usable “offsite drives” that are in various physical geographic locations and other spares here that I can swap in if needed. I use NVMes because they are cheap and fast, like I used to use SSDs before them. Never had one go bad. (but then I always get Samsung) They get replaced because there is cheaper faster stuff out there. I did, once, long ago, have a physical spindle start to go bad – it just made a few nasty noises and so gave me plenty of time to image it and take it out of service.  I learned many years ago the value of a good backup, and paid when I did not have one. Easeus is serviceable but not for mixed windows/linux systems. I used Macrium until it became not free. Realizing I would have to pay ~$50 to get the dependability/reliability that I required, I benched I believe 4 different ones. Because of speed and ease of use (and mixed-system-capable) I chose terabyte. It has bailed me many times. I value the capability to restore the entire partition table and partition set simply because I have no idea if windows changed something in the boot or recovery partitions in the last set of updates. I simply restore it to what I had at the time, and therefore the correct setup. I of course can and have many times just restored the 5 pertinent windows partitions if I know nothing has changed in my linux stuff. It does it, and correctly. Saves me tons of time.

I back up to what I have here on my shelf. I do not back up to the cloud where I feel anyone could look at it – I don’t care what encryption or security it supposedly has. I am always forgetting what OneDrive is, even though MS wants to put an icon on the taskbar. I don’t use it. My android phone backs up its contacts msgs and apps to google. I do not do banking or other security needful stuff on my phone. Too easy to get hacked.

$50 or so every 2-3 years for terabyte will do me for something I use and rely on several times a week, or daily. (interim updates are free).

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I agree with your reasoning about backing up the entire drive, not just one’s own data.

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Ben Myers wrote:

I agree with your reasoning about backing up the entire drive, not just one’s own data.

As part of starting the new year off right, I’ve completed a full set of complete drive images for all six drives in my daily driver and copied them to external offline HDD’s for safekeeping.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

1 user thanked author for this post.

a

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Excellent idea! This weekend!

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Hi Ben and Happy New Year.

I have never used OneDrive because have a basic trust issue with them.  I do have ShadowProtect SPX and run weekly full images and incrementals three times a week.

So from where you sit, should I change my thinking on this and go ahead and start using OneDrive?

Thanks,

John

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Nope. Continue doing what you are doing. I am not bullish on OneDrive for several reasons including cost for the amount of storage truly needed, trust in Microsoft, and overall trust in the cloud. Better to have the backup right here on a shelf or may in an off-site vault.

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John18

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I have a bit of a unique structure for software installs so automatic update processes don’t work for me.

But it is kind of fun to update on your own anyway.  You get to go to each website and find out if it is still live and/or if the product is being updated.  And sometimes you stumble on other products that the website/author is offering that might tickle your fancy.

Then their are the horror stories when updating.  A few weeks ago, I was checking if Revo Uninstaller had an update.  I’ve used the free product for years.  They had a special offer for their Pro version that I didn’t really need but decided to take the offer and give them some $$.  I made the purchase with my PayPal account.  It was something like $15 for 2 years.

I then received an email from their payment processor company

You have placed an order on https://www.revouninstaller.com/ on
2023-12-01 (order reference number: xxxxxxx), order processed by 2Checkout as the reseller of VS Revo Group, the software / service provider which operates
https://www.revouninstaller.com/, order paid with PayPal.

Your order is currently under evaluation by 2Checkout’s risk prevention
specialists. We perform this verification to prevent unauthorized use of
your PayPal account and personal details.

In order to validate your payment and complete your order, please
provide us with the following documents during the next two business
days:

– a copy of a photo ID (identification card, driver`s license or
passport) of the PayPal account holder.
– Proof of Valid billing address: Utility Bill.

All items must be legible and uploaded to our secure interface at:

You cannot be serious, I thought!  There is no way I would send that info to anyone and especially not to a payment processor in Europe an double especially for a small $15 purchase.

I declined and told them they could accept my PayPal payment or cancel the order.  They cancelled the order.  Tough on the software company, which lost the sale because of this crazy requirement.

I wonder how many people actually send such documentation to companies on request?  Those documents would certainly help make ID theft easier.

The software company must have heard about this as they send me a subsequent email with a link to another payment processor but the price was not at the discount I was originally buying at, so I stuck with the free version.

4 users thanked author for this post.

SueW, windbg, Matador, WSbobby-p

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jrp2706 wrote:

KC Softwares, the French company behind SUMo and other software, ceased trading at the end of October 2023.

After consultation with Ben, I modified his article to reflect KC Softwares cessation of operations. His recommendation has been removed.

Also see his column today about software updating.

1 user thanked author for this post.

SueW

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From the newsletter:

However, defragging is neither needed nor wanted on solid-state drives (SSDs)

This isn’t quite true, the file allocation tables still need defragmenting. Fortunately, MS added this to Windows regular disk maintenance.
https://www.hanselman.com/blog/the-real-and-complete-story-does-windows-defragment-your-ssd

cheers, Paul

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Alex5723

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Paul T wrote:

This isn’t quite true, the file allocation tables still need defragmenting.

From your link: “However, this stuff is handled by Windows today in 2014, and you can trust that it’s “doing the right thing.” Windows 7, along with 8 and 8.1 come with appropriate and intelligent defaults and you don’t need to change them for optimal disk performance. This is also true with Server SKUs like Windows Server 2008R2 and later.”

This Kingston article from July 2022 gives a good explanation: “The Garbage Collection process occurs automatically, usually during a system idle, and as it is a vital part of the functioning of the drive. SSDs incorporate advanced controllers that manage the NAND Flash storage. When files are deleted in an operating system such as Windows, the OS just marks its internal file table indicating that the file is deleted. On hard disk drives (HDDs), the now-invalid data remains there and can be directly overwritten by the system to store new data. Newer operating systems also support the TRIM command, whereby the OS notifies the SSD that it has deleted specific files so that the SSD can better manage the GC process to recover that space earlier and prevent saving and moving all that invalid data.”  (emphasis mine)

Windows’ file allocation table isn’t so much defragmented as it is simply re-written with up-to-date data after Garbage Collection and TRIM are finished.  Fragmentation is not a bug with SSD’s, it’s a feature, handled by the SSD controller, not necessarily by Windows.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

1 user thanked author for this post.

satrow

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bbearren wrote:

Fragmentation is … handled by the SSD controller, not necessarily by Windows

That fragmentation is for internal data fragments, not FAT – the controller knows the write request is for a contiguous block, but its wear levelling algorithm breaks that contiguous segment into fragments.
FAT fragmentation cannot be handled by the SSD because the SSD has no knowledge of the logical disk format / file structure. Windows knows the logical structure and manages FAT fragmentation for you.

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

FAT fragmentation cannot be handled by the SSD because the SSD has no knowledge of the logical disk format / file structure. Windows knows the logical structure and manages FAT fragmentation for you.

All due respect, Windows 10/11 do not use FAT, they use NTFS, and the SSD just writes files (wherever the SSD Controller sees fit) that are passed to it by the OS (which has absolutely no idea where the file is actually written).

“NTFS overview

From a user’s point of view, NTFS continues to organize files into directories, which, like HPFS, are sorted. However, unlike FAT or HPFS, there are no “special” objects on the disk and there is no dependence on the underlying hardware, such as 512-byte sectors. In addition, there are no special locations on the disk, such as FAT tables or HPFS Super Blocks.

The goals of NTFS are to provide:

Reliability, which is especially desirable for high end systems and file servers

A platform for added functionality

Support POSIX requirements

Removal of the limitations of the FAT and HPFS file systems

Reliability

To ensure reliability of NTFS, three major areas were addressed: recoverability, removal of fatal single sector failures, and hot fixing.

NTFS is a recoverable file system because it keeps track of transactions against the file system. When a CHKDSK is performed on FAT or HPFS, the consistency of pointers within the directory, allocation, and file tables are being checked. Under NTFS, a log of transactions against these components is maintained so that CHKDSK need only roll back transactions to the last commit point in order to recover consistency within the file system.

Under FAT or HPFS, if a sector that is the location of one of the file system’s special objects fails, then a single sector failure will occur. NTFS avoids this in two ways: first, by not using special objects on the disk and tracking and protecting all objects that are on the disk. Secondly, under NTFS, multiple copies (the number depends on the volume size) of the Master File Table are kept.

Similar to OS/2 versions of HPFS, NTFS supports hot fixing.”

“One of the functional limitations of SSDs is while they can read and write data very quickly to an empty drive, overwriting data is much slower. This is because while SSDs read data at the page level (meaning from individual rows within the NAND memory grid) and can write at the page level, assuming surrounding cells are empty, they can only erase data at the block level. This is because the act of erasing NAND flash requires a high amount of voltage. While you can theoretically erase NAND at the page level, the amount of voltage required stresses the individual cells around the cells that are being rewritten. Erasing data at the block level helps mitigate this problem.

The only way for an SSD to update an existing page is to copy the contents of the entire block into memory, erase the block, and then write the contents of the old block + the updated page. If the drive is full and there are no empty pages available, the SSD must first scan for blocks that are marked for deletion but that haven’t been deleted yet, erase them, and then write the data to the now-erased page. This is why SSDs can become slower as they age—a mostly-empty drive is full of blocks that can be written immediately, a mostly-full drive is more likely to be forced through the entire program/erase sequence.

If you’ve used SSDs, you’ve likely heard of something called “garbage collection.” Garbage collection is a background process that allows a drive to mitigate the performance impact of the program/erase cycle by performing certain tasks in the background.

When you delete a file from Windows 11 on a typical hard drive, the file isn’t deleted immediately. Instead, the operating system tells the hard drive it can overwrite the physical area of the disk where that data was stored the next time it needs to perform a write. This is why it’s possible to undelete files (and why deleting files in Windows doesn’t typically clear much physical disk space until you empty the recycling bin). With a traditional HDD, the OS doesn’t need to pay attention to where data is being written or what the relative state of the blocks or pages is. With an SSD, this matters.

The TRIM command allows the operating system to tell the SSD it can skip rewriting certain data the next time it performs a block erase. This lowers the total amount of data the drive writes and increases SSD longevity. Both reads and writes damage NAND flash, but writes do far more damage than reads. Fortunately, block-level longevity has not proven to be an issue in modern NAND flash.

The last two concepts we want to talk about are wear leveling and write amplification. Because SSDs write data to pages but erase data in blocks, the amount of data being written to the drive is always larger than the actual update. If you make a change to a 4KB file, for example, the entire block that 4K file sits within must be updated and rewritten. Depending on the number of pages per block and the size of the pages, you might end up writing 4MB worth of data to update a 4KB file. Garbage collection reduces the impact of write amplification, as does the TRIM command. Keeping a significant chunk of the drive free and/or manufacturer over-provisioning can also reduce the impact of write amplification.

Wear leveling refers to the practice of ensuring certain NAND blocks aren’t written and erased more often than others. While wear leveling increases a drive’s life expectancy and endurance by writing to the NAND equally, it can actually increase write amplification. In order to distribute writes evenly across the disk, it’s sometimes necessary to program and erase blocks even though their contents haven’t actually changed. A good wear-leveling algorithm seeks to balance these impacts.”

Bottom line, Windows has no idea where a file is written on an SSD.  The OS simply tells the SSD Controller, “Write thisfile.txt” and the Controller decides where to write it.  At some point in the future the OS tells the SSD Controller, “Read thisfile.txt” and the Controller fetches the file and passes it off to the OS.  The TRIM command is the OS telling the SSD Controller “I don’t need this list of files anymore” and the SSD Controller will not write that list of files the next time it does Garbage Collection/Wear Leveling.  There is no fragmentation on the OS side of things.  There is plenty of fragmentation of the SSD side of things, and that is by design; Pages/Blocks.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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FAT is File Allocation Table, not a file system. NTFS has a File Allocation Table, although it’s called the Master File Table. (Sorry for the confusion.)

cheers, Paul

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Paul T wrote:

FAT is File Allocation Table, not a file system. NTFS has a File Allocation Table, although it’s called the Master File Table.

Obviously you did not read the information from the links.  NTFS has multiple copies of its MFT.  “… under NTFS, multiple copies (the number depends on the volume size) of the Master File Table are kept.”

And there is no fragmentation other than the intended fragmentation by the SSD controller at the Page/Block/Wear Leveling operational level.  “NTFS is a recoverable file system because it keeps track of transactions against the file system. When a CHKDSK is performed on FAT or HPFS, the consistency of pointers within the directory, allocation, and file tables are being checked. Under NTFS, a log of transactions against these components is maintained so that CHKDSK need only roll back transactions to the last commit point in order to recover consistency within the file system.”  That is part of the “file system overhead” of NTFS.  The MFT is not stored in the OS; it’s on the HDD/SSD.

Paul T wrote:

(Sorry for the confusion.)

I’m not confused.

Always create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates; you may need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do with our systems; we don't need anyone's approval, and we don't all have to do the same things.

We were all once "Average Users".

Computer Specs

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