FAT32 / NTFS
- Started
- Last post
- 14 Responses
- autonoma
I just installed an external hard drive on my computer. The installation manual suggests that, since I'm running Windows XP, I reformat the drive for NTFS instead of the original FAT32 format.
Is this a good idea? What's the difference? I know nothing about this.
I did notice that my main hard drive uses the FAT32 file system.
I'd appreciate any suggestions I could get.
- protoculture0
http://www.devhood.com/messages/…
Basically FAT32 is dead, NTFS is good.
reliability -this is done through it being a jornalling file system so that if there is a problem it can roll back the changes to the last comit. It also supports hot fixing so if a bad cluster is found during operation it can take care of it without the app noticing. And it doesn't have any special locations on the HDD like FAT32.
security - this is done with ACLs, owner of files
hard Links - two different filenames, which can be located in different directories, point to the same data.
reparse points - directory junctions and volume mount points
disk quotas
encryption- by way of EFS
streams-While I havn't seen this used it means multiple data globs can be under one filename. For example:
echo text>program:source_file
moresmaller clusters - less wasted disk space
compression at the cluster level
sparse files - programs can create very large files, but consume disk space only as needed
scales larger - can go up to 2^64 bytes (16 exabytes or 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 bytes)
unicode file names
distributed link-tracking
- JazX0
yeah protoculture is right on. Just follow what XP is telling you, it's dummy proof and knows what you need anyway.
- autonoma0
Thanks a million, guys.
- pr20
whait, wiat, wait, not so quick!
Although i have to admit that NTFS is better if you are running older operating system such as win98 (i think NT and 2000 too?) you should stick with FAT32 as they won't recognize your NTFS hard drives.
- autonoma0
pr2 - I've already formatted the drive and added a bunch of data. Seems to be working nicely.
I actually started to add some data when the file system was FAT32 and it took longer than it does now that it's NTFS.
- sparker0
And, older 9x versions don't use NTFS, they use FAT...it is only NT Kernel based systems that use NTFS.
Under XP, both work fine together...as long as you keep your systems healthy.
- JazX0
trust me your ok
- unknown0
Pr2 what in the world did you say?
you need to upgrade to NTFS to be compatible and to use all the features here at Newstoday.
News Today File System
Have a good day!
- pr20
Make me Pro Tools Free working on WinXP and i'll convert... no, really, i keep buck up with win98 (which i already had to use twice) so i have to stick to fat32
- corin0
This might not be of any consequence, but I remember having all sorts of problems with ZIP disks (formatted for PC and MaC at the same time) unless they were formatted with FAT32
- pr20
Well only if you try to connect exteranl hd to OS 9 -- it will work only with FAT32.
- unknown0
must... not... upgrade... no... pretty... aqua... interface... must remain...greyy...y....y...
:)
- hulja0
hey look.. it's derek. the king ripper. holy shit, i thought you'd changed your identity and gotten a sex change after last week's bash on your ass.
- unknown0
nope