Fat 32 formatting a portable HDD with XP

Hello everybody,

I have a Pentium 4 PC with XP (with both service packs and up to date) and am having trouble formatting my portable drive. I want to use the portable drive with my car stereo since the headunit has a USB port on the back.

The headunit I have is a Pioneer DEH-P6900UB and the portable drive I have is a Western Digital WD1200XMS-00 120GB USB powered portable. I have read on one of the car audio forums that some have had success using a portable. One member has the same head unit and drive that I have and was able to access his MP3s from it.

The Pioneer's manual does not mention anything about whether or not it supports NTFS, just Fat 8, 16, or 32. Unfortunately, I'm limited to 32GB if I format to Fat32 which the Pioneer still will not recognize. What's funny the Pioneer's manual states it will work with memory as large as 250GB.

Is there a way to convert this drive to Fat32? I tried a way where I could have all 120GB and still be formatted in Fat32, but it didn't work.

If there is no way, what large capacity drive would you recommend? I don't mind going to a 4-8GB thumb drive, but would prefer a much bigger (within price) alternative.

Thanks everyone for your help.

 

Read the information in the following post.

http://www.windowsbbs.com/showthread.php?t=69897

 

It is "self" powered, through the USB jack. Since this is in a car application, I'm guessing it is through the Pioneer's USB port.

I looked over that thread and now I'm beginning to think it's just based to look for a FAT based drive rather than trying to reformat it