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Resolved Can't copy large file to USB drive

Discussion in 'Windows 7' started by Greg Golden, 2013/03/10.

  1. 2013/03/10
    Greg Golden

    Greg Golden Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    My OUTLOOK.PST file has grown to over 7 GB. I did some maintenance through Outlook 2010 and got it down to about 4 GB. In order to make a backup, I bought a 16GB USB thumb drive. But when I try to copy the file to the thumb drive, Windows tells me there's inadequate space. What gives?
     
    Greg Golden,
    #1
  2. 2013/03/10
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    Is the drive formatted NTFS ? - 4 GB is the max file size for FAT 32
     
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  4. 2013/03/10
    Greg Golden

    Greg Golden Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    Pete: Good question, and it didn't say anything about formatting or formatting limits on the package. I suppose I should just reformat it and try again?
     
    Greg Golden,
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  5. 2013/03/10
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    Generally speaking USB pen drives are formatted FAT 32 or FAT as delivered - I would check the format and if not NTFS format it as such.
     
    PeteC,
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  6. 2013/03/10
    Greg Golden

    Greg Golden Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    Pete, you are correct, it appeared to be FAT32 right out of the box. I did reformat as NTFS and that solved the problem.

    Seems odd that Sandisk would sell the drives as "16GB capacity" while formatting them for 4GB capacity!

    thanks-
    Greg
     
    Greg Golden,
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  7. 2013/03/10
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    You're welcome :)
    That's not strictly true - the drive formatted FAT32 will take ~16 GB, but only if the files are less than 4 GB each - > 4GB breaches the 4GB max file size of FAT32.
     
    PeteC,
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  8. 2013/03/10
    Greg Golden

    Greg Golden Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    OK, now that makes sense. Thanks again for the answer earlier today.
    GG
     
    Greg Golden,
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