How come you can't defrag some programs

I just got back from a visit at my dads. He has a new Laptop with Windows XP. I was checking out some of it's new things, and when I used Defrag, it told me which programs would Defrag and witch ones wouldn't. I was wondering why it won't let you Defrag some programs in XP? Thank you, Chris.

 

Chris - I think maybe you meant files rather than programs.

Some files are in use when your system is running and won't/can't allow defragger any access to them. Usual is for your pagefile and eventlog files to refuse as well as the hibernation files if you have them.

With NT/2K I have used a free utility (from www.sysinternals.com in the utilities seciton) which can be set to defrag these files at reboot time. Not sure if it works with XP. The site still only mentions NT/2K. I think when I get home tonight I will find out though - unless someone else already knows.

 

speaking of defrag,

how come XP won't do a defrag at a boot up? They do this with the error checking, and it works great! the defrag is a major plus with XP, but like he said, some stuff can't be defraged while in use..............hmmmm

 

How come in win 98 it doesn't say it can't defrag certain files? If I want to watch the disc defrag in 98 it will let me see details. It looks like it's defraging the whole drive. In my dads XP, you can see that some are not getting defraged.