The most common application I recommend to my customers is JkDefrag created by Jeroen Kessels.

It is by far the best disk defragmenter and optimizer I have ever come across!

Best of all IT’S FREE!

Click here to Download

I recommend this disk defragmenter because it is so simple to use, you do not need to be very technical minded at all.  You just run JkDefrag.exe and then it starts.  You can stop it at any time just by closing the program.  When it has finished it will display “Finished” in the top left corner of the application. I would recommend doing a disk defrag at least once a month to keep your hard drive at optimal performance.

Here is what Jeroen Kessels (Creator) says about JkDefrag.

What is “disk fragmentation”?
Imagine a book split into several parts, some pages are over here, other pages in another room on another floor altogether. You will have to walk a lot when you need to read the book. It may sound silly, but this is exactly what happens to files on your harddisk. Defragmentation will put all the parts (fragments) back together, making your computer a lot faster.

What is “disk optimization”?
Imagine a big library with lot’s of books, spread out all over the building and not sorted whatsoever. There is an index telling you exactly where every book is, but you will have to walk a lot when you need several books. This is exactly what happens on your harddisk, the files that belong to an application can be all over the place, anywhere on the harddisk. Optimization will bring all the files together in one place, leaving the rest of the harddisk empty, and will sort the files, for example alphabetically.
JkDefrag is based on the standard defragmentation API by Microsoft, a system library that is included in Windows 2000, 2003, XP, Vista, and 2008. Most defragmenters are based on this API, including the free defragmenter that comes with Windows and many commercial defragmenters. Basically all JkDefrag does is send “move this file to that location” commands to the API. JkDefrag does not modify the disk by itself, and is therefore extremely solid.

Defragmentation and optimizing will not only make a harddisk faster, but also lengthen it’s life span. The disk will have less work to do and therefore have less wear and tear. Secondly, the sorting optimization strategies (see the “-a” option) will refresh all the magnetic data on your harddisk. However, defragmenting and optimizing is work, so excessive defragmenting and optimizing can actually cause more wear and tear than it prevents. JkDefrag is therefore set for “fast” optimization by default, intended to be used on a daily basis. The other optimizations should only be used occasionally.

Click here for a direct download to JkDefrag or Click here to view the creator’s website