I'm running Windows XP Pro on my PC. The internal HD is formatted NTFS.
Just bought an external HD (Wiebetech 800 firewire 250 GB HD that comes
formtted FAT32.
I'm using this HD to back up and clone and image each of my three
computers in my home, all of which are formatted NTFS and reside on a
hardwired/wireless home network (D Link DI-614+).
Should I reformat the new external HD to match the others or doesn't it
make a difference?
I'd go for NTFS, mainly on reliability and partition size issues.
A quick google search found the following:
NTFS is much more reliable - most necessary in a backup system.
FAT32 drives are much more susceptible to disk errors.
NTFS volumes have the ability to recover from errors more readily than
similar FAT32 volumes.
Log files are created under NTFS which can be used for automatic file
system repairs.
NTFS supports dynamic cluster remapping for bad sectors and prevent
them from being used in the future.
NTFS is a 64-bit file system, so it can support many more clusters
than FAT32. This means each cluster can be smaller, making more
efficient use of the partition.
NTFS is a true database, not a cluster map, so for small partitions it
takes up more room on disk and in memory than FAT32, but for realistic
partition sizes of 2G bytes or more, NTFS will consume less disk space
and memory than FAT32.
Once you pass the 8GB partition size, NTFS handles space management
much more efficiently than FAT32. Cluster sizes play an important part
in how much disk space is wasted storing files. NTFS provides smaller
cluster sizes and less disk space waste than FAT32.
In Windows XP, the maximum partition size that can be created using
FAT32 is 32GB. This increases to 16TB using NTFS. There is a
workaround for the FAT32 32GB limit, but, hey, why bother?
For small partitions and light file loads you might get marginally
better performance out of FAT32, but the performance improvement is
far outweighed by the stability of NTFS. Anyway, you don't really want
small partitions in your application, do you, so NTFS will be faster
anyway.
NTFS supports disk quotas, allowing you to control the amount of disk
usage on a per user basis: each of your 3 users could use or manage
their own backup space without fear of stuffing up other users.
NTFS supports file compression. FAT32 does not.
Perhaps the only possible downer for NTFS is that NTFS cannot be read
directly by W9X systems while FAT32 can - but does that matter if all
your working systems are NTFS?
So I say there is no contest - NTFS wins hands down.
Also, any comments on which cloning, imaging, back up program is
easiest to use? I have been narrowed it down to either Acronis True
Image 8 or Norton Ghost 9. Any comments would be most appreciated.
Ghost9 is just a hacked and rebadged Drive Image plagiarised by
Symantec. I never liked Drive Image much and always preferred Ghost,
at least up to Version 2003. I have used and do like Acronis True
Image 8 and think it is better than Ghost 2003 or 9 - it is certainly
easy to use. I still have my doubts about the total accuracy of
imaging from within windows, but Acronis users don't seem to report
any problems. I still use Ghost 2003 because it's bought and paid for
and does the job OK, but when I update it will be to Acronis, not
Ghost 9.
