also files of that size don't even count for the problem.

Way back "in the day" when file fragmentation was an issue, there were two important factors at work:

1) users were running well near the limit of their HD's capacity all the time. it was considered very unusual for you to have less than 50% of your disk space used, so free space was distributed throughout the drive in small pieces, space almost immediately getting reused when a file was deleted.

2) the files being deleted were of a similar size. Since this was creating small "holes" of free space, the OS was often forced to break up files into several smaller pieces that would fit into the holes.

Since you are dealing with files over a gig in size, the hole you create when you delete it is massive, and likely anything you need to save will fit in it in a single piece, creating absolutely no fragmentation.


I work for the Department of Redundancy Department