formatting external HDD

  • Thread starter Thread starter ALEXIOS GOUTSOULAS
  • Start date Start date
A

ALEXIOS GOUTSOULAS

I just bought an external HDD and I want to know if I should format it to
NTFS or I should just leave it to FAT32.
what would be more compatible with windows vista?


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3645 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
NTFS allows files larger than 4GB. FAT32 does not. FAT32 may be better if
you are using the drive with many computers as no NTFS permissions issues
will arise. My recommendation would be NTFS because of the 4GB limitation
for FAT32. The permissions issues are easily dealt with by taking ownership
of files and folders if needed. NTFS is also a more robust file system, less
prone to corrupted files.
 
NTFS and the first thing that you should do is to disable your Nod32 from scanning
in and outgoing emails
 
how do you know that I'm using nod32? and why should I do that?





Peter Foldes said:
NTFS and the first thing that you should do is to disable your Nod32 from
scanning in and outgoing emails


--
Peter

Please Reply to Newsgroup for the benefit of others
Requests for assistance by email can not and will not be acknowledged.




__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3645 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3645 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
Personally, I wouldn't, but feel free.


ALEXIOS GOUTSOULAS said:
how do you know that I'm using nod32? and why should I do that?








__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3645 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...
 
I would recommend that you use NTFS file system.

--

--
John Barnett MVP
Windows XP Associate Expert
Windows Desktop Experience

Web: http://xphelpandsupport.mvps.org
Web: http://vistasupport.mvps.org
Web: http://www.silversurfer-guide.com

The information in this mail/post is supplied "as is". No warranty of any
kind, either expressed or implied, is made in relation to the accuracy,
reliability or content of this mail/post. The Author shall not be liable for
any direct, indirect, incidental or consequential damages arising out of the
use of, or inability to use, information or opinions expressed in this
mail/post..
 
John

If you go to all the newsgroups that are connected with email clients like
Outlook,Outlook Express, Windows Mail,Windows Live Mail, Thunderbird and you name it
then you will find that OP's that post that they get double emails,cannot
send,cannot receive etc, etc are caused by Anti Virus suites scanning in and
outgoing emails. Most also say that they have used their AV to scan emails for years
and have never had issues are finding that when they run into a problem with the
client then most of the time it is because of the scanning.
The fix for all these issues are to disable the scanning feature of the AV suite.

By disabling the email scanning you are still protected and no bad stuff will come
through because your resident AV will always catch it.
Even Symantec say so.

Turning off e-mail scanning is safe. See:

Viral Irony: The Most Common Cause of Corruption.
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/community/columns/filecorruption.mspx#EOAAC

And this is from Symantec, but applies to all anti-virus programs.

From:
http://snipurl.com/bmf6

Is my computer still protected against viruses if I disable Email Scanning?

Disabling Email Scanning does not leave you unprotected against viruses that
are distributed as email attachments. Norton AntiVirus Auto-Protect scans
incoming files as they are saved to your hard drive, including email and
email attachments. Email Scanning is just another layer on top of this. To
make sure that Auto-Protect is providing the maximum protection, keep
Auto-Protect enabled and run LiveUpdate regularly to ensure that you have
the most recent virus definitions.
 
I just bought an external HDD and I want to know if I should format it to
NTFS or I should just leave it to FAT32.
what would be more compatible with windows vista?
Click to expand...


Both are completely compatible, and compatibility is not an issue here
at all.

Considering the improvements of NTFS over FAT32, I recommend that
that's what you use.
 
also when I plug in my ex HDD, when I try to safely remove it from the
"safely remove hardware icon" it says that "windows cant stop your 'generic
volume' because a program is still using it. close any programs that might
be using the device, and then try again later".
what can i do?






Ken Blake said:
Both are completely compatible, and compatibility is not an issue here
at all.

Considering the improvements of NTFS over FAT32, I recommend that
that's what you use.

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP - Windows Desktop Experience
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3646 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3646 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
Have you tried rebooting as so anything connected with the USB HD is not running and
then try to dismount the drive
 
the problem is that only with a reboot I can remove the HDD, but sometimes
I'm in a hurry and I cant wait for the pc to restart. any suggestion to
that?







Peter Foldes said:
Have you tried rebooting as so anything connected with the USB HD is not
running and then try to dismount the drive

--
Peter

Please Reply to Newsgroup for the benefit of others
Requests for assistance by email can not and will not be acknowledged.




__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3646 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3646 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
Then you need to find out what is running and disable it. Since it is your computer
only you can see and tell
 
I tried searching everywhere but I cant fid it what it could be using it.





Peter Foldes said:
Then you need to find out what is running and disable it. Since it is your
computer only you can see and tell

--
Peter

Please Reply to Newsgroup for the benefit of others
Requests for assistance by email can not and will not be acknowledged.




__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3647 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3647 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
I also inserted the HDD to another pc and it did the same problem





ALEXIOS GOUTSOULAS said:
I tried searching everywhere but I cant fid it what it could be using it.








__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3647 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3647 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
if you mean the dialog that says that the hdd is used by something else or a
general description of open programs that might use it, it doesn't say
anything.
also I forgot to mention something, when I plug in the hdd I get the
following problem: upon inserting the hdd, the moment I go to open the
windows explorer window to view the contents of the disk, the explorer.exe
crashes and stops working and the only thing to do is to reset my pc to make
it work again.





Peter Foldes said:
What does Task Manager say

--
Peter

Please Reply to Newsgroup for the benefit of others
Requests for assistance by email can not and will not be acknowledged.




__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3647 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3647 (20081127) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
ALEXIOS GOUTSOULAS said:
I also inserted the HDD to another pc and it did the same problem
Click to expand...


Did it crash the second pc as well? It sounds like you may have a corrupted
partition table. If that's the case you should use the manufacturer's
diagnostic utility to initialize the disk (overwrite track 0) to return it
to the shipped from factory state. This will erase everything on the disk.
If there is data on it you need make sure it's backed up. Once the disk is
erased you will have to create a partition and format it.

It sounds like this is a recent purchase. Have you contacted the
manufacturer for help?
 
my pc is using windows vista ultimate sp1, and the second pc was windows xp
sp3. the second pc didn't crash but it wouldn't let me safely remove the
hdd.
I recently purchased vista ultimate which I reformatted the disk from the
installation dvd during the installation proccess. what do you mean to
initialize the disk?





Kerry Brown said:
Did it crash the second pc as well? It sounds like you may have a
corrupted partition table. If that's the case you should use the
manufacturer's diagnostic utility to initialize the disk (overwrite track
0) to return it to the shipped from factory state. This will erase
everything on the disk. If there is data on it you need make sure it's
backed up. Once the disk is erased you will have to create a partition and
format it.

It sounds like this is a recent purchase. Have you contacted the
manufacturer for help?

--
Kerry Brown
MS-MVP - Windows Desktop Experience: Systems Administration
http://www.vistahelp.ca/phpBB2/
http://vistahelpca.blogspot.com/




__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus
signature database 3649 (20081128) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
Click to expand...


__________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3649 (20081128) __________

The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus.

part000.txt - is OK

http://www.eset.com
 
This often happens with V*sta.

If you don't have some specific problem (see other replies), and assuming
some application isn't really using the disk, open W*nd*ws Explorer, access
the disk, then access some other disk (c: for example). Then, V*sta will
kindly give you permission to dismount your USB disk.

Concerning the file format: I thought V*sta only allowes you to format NTFS.
Operating systems should be designed to be file-compatible with other OS. In
other words, any worthwhile OS should allow you to format to any current or
legacy file format. This point is very important, because the only way a non
professional can ensure long term storage of large amounts of important data
such as photos & videos is to periodically copy files to hard disks that can
be read by different kinds of computer/OS.

Regards

Regards
 
Back
Top