300Gb FAT32 drive. Will performance increase if I convert to NTFS?

[wrreisen]

Hi,

I have XP installed on a 300Gb FAT32 partition on a RAID 1/0 4 disk
array. Would its performance increase if I convert it to NTFS or to get
a better performance increase do I have to reformat this array as NTFS
and reinstall everything? I am using it for storing video files and
image sequences?

 

[Yves Leclerc]

One thing: This was sure set up before you had XP! XP can only do 32GB
FAT32 partitions.

You need to know that XP can only handle files that are less than 4GB on
FAT32. Since you are using this 300GB hard drive for video files, you may
encounter a file larger 4GB someday.

 

[Justin]

I can't imagine that you would perceive any increase in performance.
Changing the file system does nothing that would make the hardware run any
faster.

Hi,

I have XP installed on a 300Gb FAT32 partition on a RAID 1/0 4 disk
array. Would its performance increase if I convert it to NTFS or to get
a better performance increase do I have to reformat this array as NTFS
and reinstall everything? I am using it for storing video files and
image sequences?

 

[Ken Blake]

In

I have XP installed on a 300Gb FAT32 partition on a RAID 1/0 4
disk
array. Would its performance increase if I convert it to NTFS
or to
get a better performance increase do I have to reformat this
array as
NTFS and reinstall everything? I am using it for storing video
files
and image sequences?

I wouldn't expect a performance increase, but you need to be
aware that with FAT32 you have a maximum file size of 4GB. Since
that may be significant with video files, you might want to go to
NTFS.

You don't need to reformat to go to NTFS. To convert to NTFS, you
use the CONVERT command. But first read
http://www.aumha.org/a/ntfscvt.htm because there's an issue
regarding cluster size that isn't obvious.
Also note that conversion is a big step, affecting everything on
your drive. When you take such a big step, no matter how
unlikely, it is always possible that something could go wrong.
For that reason, it's prudent to make sure you have a backup of
anything you can't afford to lose before beginning.

 

[Alan Smith]

Hi,

I have XP installed on a 300Gb FAT32 partition on a RAID 1/0 4 disk
array. Would its performance increase if I convert it to NTFS or to get
a better performance increase do I have to reformat this array as NTFS
and reinstall everything? I am using it for storing video files and
image sequences?

It's doubtful. But ntfs is generally considered more robust than FAT so it's
probably the thing to do.