The size of the compressed filesystems

It seems like I'm having trouble getting the size of the compressed filesystem down to what it should be. For instance, when I try to compress the files from Damn Small Linux, they turn out to be almost a megabyte larger than the original compressed filesystem was. That is without adding, subtracting, or modifying any of them.

I used the instructions from the KNOPPIX Remastering Howto as posted on this forum awhile back.

What am I doing wrong?

I am not an expert on this and would also like to know the answer. But I remember reading somewhere that the experts use some sort of system that orders the files on the disk in the most efficient way.

I have read that, but from what I understand that deals with the access time of the disc, not the size of the filesystem itself.