FAT32 vs NTFS

I just bought an external hard drive and reading through the manual it says that the drive comes formatted with Windows FAT32 file system.

It recommends though that if it's going to be used on a Windows XP system that it be reformatted for NTFS file system.

I'd already started putting data out on it before I bothered to read the owner's manual ... so I'm wondering if there's any real benefit to reformatting the thing for NTFS.

~

 

NTFS is far more secure with all the security options that come with it. FAT32 has none.

Without going into great detail, on hard drives or partitions over 8GB, NTFS will save you disk space due to the difference in cluster sizes on the disk.

Then there's the issue of file sizes. With FAT32, file sizes are limited to 4GB, NTFS is limited only by the size of the disk. This may be important if you're going to be storing any video on the disk.

About the only reason I can see to use FAT32 instead of NTFS is the fact that Win9X can't use a disk that's NTFS. So, if you wanted to attach that drive to a Win9X system and access the files on it, you wouldn't be able to. It would have to be a FAT file system of some type.

That said, if you're comfortable with the way it is now, there's no reason you can't keep it that way. If you don't need the security, aren't concerned about the disk space efficiency issue or don't plan on having to save huge files, it'll work just fine the way it is now. I guess you have to be the judge.

 

Sire

Well it don't really matter as far as storing data untill you begin to get it full.

NTFS is more effecient with disk usage is more fault tolerent and somewhat faster .

Without NTFS XP security available on NTFS is not available. For example you could not restrict other user accounts.

One advantage of leaving it fat32 is that since it is an external you could hook it to say a Win98 system or even DOS if it had recognition of the drive and still have access to all your files.

If it was NTFS and you did this they would not show.

You can convert any time in XP or 2K with the following commands without removing the files you already have on.

Start-Run
cmd
type

convert x: /fs:ntfs

x: being the current drive letter of the removeable drive.

Mike

 

Hello my friend Zander we crossed in the ether!

Mike

 

thanks Zander ... Mike

I'm gonna go ahead and reformat it for NTFS.


~

 

Thats the spirit Gerald - when you get two pros that both post at the same time with basically the same recommendation - it sure takes the guesswork out of it. Smart Move - Good Luck.

 

Depends who you talk to and what other computers use the external hard drive.
Fat32 is an older system.
It fragments a lot.
It seems to have trouble over certain sizes ( 120 gig ??)
NTFS is a newer more secure file format system.
The default install setup for windows xp is ntsf although if you have the drive formatted or are upgrading you can keep fat32.
The key concern is if you will be using the external hard drive with computers that are running other operating systems.
Windows 98 and ME can not read ntsf.
It should be interesting to see what the thoughts are here as to what is the faster file system - ntsf or fat32

 

that's why i come here Rockster ... because this is where the pros are

~

 

Just to muddy the waters a bit - I use FAT32 on my USB drive to copy information from one Windows installation to another (usually backing up customer's data from their personal profiles) - and the FAT32 file system effectively "strips" the file permissions from the NTFS files which saves me from having to deal with Access Denied errors.

For all personal stuff tho' - I'll stick with NTFS.

 

Yeah, that was a key concern since I've got a Windows 98 system that had very little disk space on it and no working CD drive to backup onto.

But this new disk is replacing an old 20GB external disk on my XP ... so once I get that data transferred to the new disk I can reformat the 20GB and hook it to the Windows 98 system.

~

 

This is all personal stuff.
What's really nice is how quick the new drive is.

I don't know if that's because of NTFS or if the drive is just a faster drive.
I'd think that speed of data transfer would be defined more by the USB bus than the drive itself ... but regardless, this guy's about twice as fast as the older 20GB it's replacing.

Now if I can just get my $30 rebate from Maxtor ...

 

One Caveate to NTFS

As we all know, windows gets broke at the most worst time and files on the NTFS formated files will not be available at all in a lot of the recovery programs. The old DOS can't mount an NT partition

I had Windows Vista Beta installed and I ended up having to convert my NTFS (because Vista will not install in FAT32) back to FAT to get rid of the windows directory. In fact I reformated the partition in FAT and intend to leave it that way. Defragmentation on larger drives is in a lot of ways, a way to try and sell software and I use Diskeeper 2007 and it takes just as long to clean up the NTFS partitions as it does with the old Fat32

That at least is my two cents worth,