NTFS to Fat32

[Mint]

I am interested in seeing what's involved in converting a second drive
from NTFS back to Fat32.
Drive size is 120 Mb.

1. If I did so, could I still store my Disk Images(Macrium Reflect)
from my C: NTFS drive and use
to them to restore the drive?

If #1 is doable, how do I convert the drive?
Info is extremely slim on how to do it.

Thanks.

 

[LVTravel]

I am interested in seeing what's involved in converting a second drive
from NTFS back to Fat32.
Drive size is 120 Mb.

1. If I did so, could I still store my Disk Images(Macrium Reflect)
from my C: NTFS drive and use
to them to restore the drive?

If #1 is doable, how do I convert the drive?
Info is extremely slim on how to do it.

Thanks.

It would entail a reformat of the drive and all data currently on the drive
would be lost if not saved on some other drive first. Windows XP and later
also has a built in restriction on formatting drives as FAT 32 larger than
32 GB. If you use another program to format the drive then Win XP and later
can use the larger FAT 32 drive.

If any file is over 4 GB in size it would not be able to be stored on a FAT
32 drive but only on an NTFS drive as FAT 32 has a 4 GB file size limit. As
this would be a "disk image" it is probable that the ultimate image file
size will be over 4 GB if the imaged drive is of a larger size even with the
imaging program's compression.

I would recommend that you leave the drive as an NTFS drive for security,
error recovery and file size limits.

 

[Tester]

Are you sure it is only 120 Mb? It should be 120 GB.

Assuming it is 120 GB, you need to reformat the HD to convert it to
Fat32. Doing so, you are exposing yourself to risks associated with
fat32 file system i.e. there is no encryption and everybody can browse
the drive and do whatever they want to do with the files including
deleting them and corrupting them.

Also, FAT32 file system has limit of file size of 4GB. So if you are
backing up your system using acronis or Norton Ghost then you will have
many small files created as backup files and if one file is damaged or
corrupted then the entire backup is rendered worthless.

Hope you now know the risks associated with FAT32 file system.

1) I am nor aware of Macrium Reflect software so I am not in a position
to answer this. In Acronis and Norton, it is possible to save and
restore the system from FAT32 file system backup storage. I am sure
Your software should be the same in this respect.

2) To convert, Right click the on the drive from My Computer and then
select Format. Alternatively, you can use Disk Management to do it for
you. I suggest use this article as a reference point:

<http://support.microsoft.com/kb/309000>

Good luck.

 

[mm]

I am interested in seeing what's involved in converting a second drive
from NTFS back to Fat32.
Drive size is 120 Mb.

Mb, not Gb? At any rate, Partition Magic 8 and maybe earlier handles
partitions up to 160 Gb.

It will convert in both directions, even when there is data on the
disk. Although I would back up first anyhow. It also might require
some empty space on one or the other drive, but I don't recall.

It's not sold new anymore it seems but Ebay always has a couple
copies.

Why do you want to do this btw? I am still in FAT32, because I have
both win98 and XP and want each OS to be able to read all the files.
Is that your situation, or do you have some special program in win98
you want to run?

1. If I did so, could I still store my Disk Images(Macrium Reflect)
from my C: NTFS drive and use
to them to restore the drive?

Maybe, depending on the imager that you use. AFAIK, only XXCLONE
doesn't care what file system is used and that it is the same in both
source and target. That's because it does a file-by-file copy, (and
the OS that is running takes the data and writes it to the other file
system, I guess. When the data is in RAM, is there a rile system like
FAT32 or NTFS? I don't think so, but what do I know?) and then makes
the partition bootable. Are you willing to use XXClone?

If #1 is doable, how do I convert the drive?
Info is extremely slim on how to do it.

I suspect some other partition managers will do what PM8 does.

 

[mm]

Are you sure it is only 120 Mb? It should be 120 GB.

Assuming it is 120 GB, you need to reformat the HD to convert it to
Fat32. Doing so, you are exposing yourself to risks associated with
fat32 file system i.e. there is no encryption and everybody can browse
the drive and do whatever they want to do with the files including
deleting them and corrupting them.

Also, FAT32 file system has limit of file size of 4GB. So if you are

I read this a lot, but until last week I had a 500Gig FAT32 partition
on the extennal drive. Maybe I couldn't use the whole thing, or maybe
I could, but that's the way it came from the factory. I used Parted
Magic to make it into 4 partitions, 90 gig, 30 gig, 60 gig, and an
empty extended partition for the rest.

On my almost 80 Gig internal drive, years ago I made two FAT32
partitions, 50 gig and 26, and I put 25 gigs of data in each.

Maybe some software came with the harddrives, but I don't think so,
certainly not for the external drive (MyBook by WD)

backing up your system using acronis or Norton Ghost then you will have
many small files created as backup files and if one file is damaged or
corrupted then the entire backup is rendered worthless.

?? Does the Acronis manual mention this?

 

[Bob CP]

I suspect some other partition managers will do what PM8 does.

Parted Magic is a live Linux boot disk that I think will convert formats
on disks with data.

http://partedmagic.com/download.html

 

[mm]

I read this a lot, but until last week I had a 500Gig FAT32 partition

I'm sorry. You said *file* size, not partition size, and my whole
reply was about partition size.

Yes, you're right of course. FAT32 has a limit of file size of 4GB.
That never affects me but it does some people.

on the extennal drive. Maybe I couldn't use the whole thing, or maybe
I could, but that's the way it came from the factory. I used Parted
Magic to make it into 4 partitions, 90 gig, 30 gig, 60 gig, and an
empty extended partition for the rest.

On my almost 80 Gig internal drive, years ago I made two FAT32
partitions, 50 gig and 26, and I put 25 gigs of data in each.

Maybe some software came with the harddrives, but I don't think so,
certainly not for the external drive (MyBook by WD)

Because it has to break files that are more than 4 gig into smaller
files? That won't happen unless someone has files over 4 gig, right?

 

[Mint]

I'm sorry.  You said *file* size, not partition size, and my whole
reply was about partition size.

Yes, you're right of course.  FAT32 has a limit of file size of 4GB.
That never affects me but it does some people.  




Because it has to break files that are more than 4 gig into smaller
files?  That won't happen unless someone has files over 4 gig, right?

Thanks for all the replies and info.

I had asked because I considered putting a DOS clone on my second
drive and boot to either XP on my primary C: drive or some other OS on
the second drive.

I thought that the second drive would have to be a Fat32.

But after doing some research, I decided it wasn't doable, or at least
safely.

I looked at Zboot manager and starting getting nervous after reading
that it offers to "backup your MBR."

I know that if your MBR gets toasted, you have pretty much lost
everything.

Yes, the second drive is 120 Gb which I salvaged from a DVR recorder.

Andy

 

[Yousuf Khan]

I am interested in seeing what's involved in converting a second drive
from NTFS back to Fat32.
Drive size is 120 Mb.

As others have said, you can't do a "live" migration from NTFS back to
FAT32. You can only reformat the drive, and restore from backups.

1. If I did so, could I still store my Disk Images(Macrium Reflect)
from my C: NTFS drive and use
to them to restore the drive?

Most files should be storable. However, if any file size is above 2GB,
that file will not storable on FAT32.

If #1 is doable, how do I convert the drive?
Info is extremely slim on how to do it.

Another thing to know is that the default format utility that Microsoft
supplies cannot create a FAT32 filesystem bigger than 32GB. You'll have
to download a third party utility to format to bigger sizes using the
FAT32 filesystem. Microsoft doesn't want you using FAT32 for anything
larger than 32GB because it doesn't consider it stable enough. However,
32GB is not an intrinsic limitation, that's why 3rd party util will
allow you to make bigger FAT32's.

Microsoft has a newer version of FAT called EXFAT, which is meant for
use on devices greater than 32GB. It has more security features, it can
be formatted beyond 32GB, and it can hold files greater than 4GB (in
both cases the limit is 128TB!). However, I don't see much point for it,
since NTFS already exists, and it should be faster than EXFAT at those
large sizes.

Yousuf Khan

 

[Mint]

As others have said, you can't do a "live" migration from NTFS back to
FAT32. You can only reformat the drive, and restore from backups.


Most files should be storable. However, if any file size is above 2GB,
that file will not storable on FAT32.


Another thing to know is that the default format utility that Microsoft
supplies cannot create a FAT32 filesystem bigger than 32GB. You'll have
to download a third party utility to format to bigger sizes using the
FAT32 filesystem. Microsoft doesn't want you using FAT32 for anything
larger than 32GB because it doesn't consider it stable enough. However,
32GB is not an intrinsic limitation, that's why 3rd party util will
allow you to make bigger FAT32's.

Microsoft has a newer version of FAT called EXFAT, which is meant for
use on devices greater than 32GB. It has more security features, it can
be formatted beyond 32GB, and it can hold files greater than 4GB (in

both cases the limit is 128TB!). However, I don't see much point for it,
since NTFS already exists, and it should be faster than EXFAT at those
large sizes.

        Yousuf Khan

The second drive I am using is already in my computer and being used.

I have a lot of 16 bit source code and would like to run it in it's
native environment.
Some of the code directly accesses the hardware which XP won't allow.

Andy

 

[Yousuf Khan]

I have a lot of 16 bit source code and would like to run it in it's
native environment.
Some of the code directly accesses the hardware which XP won't allow.

Andy

16-bit code as in Windows 16-bit code, or DOS 16-bit code?

Yousuf Khan