What is Fat32 and NTFS?

[Brian V]

What is Fat32 and NTFS? I see NTFS on one drive on my computer, and I see
Fat32 files also. What do they mean and how do they releate to windows?

Thank you.

 

[Larry]

What is Fat32 and NTFS? I see NTFS on one drive on my computer, and I see
Fat32 files also. What do they mean and how do they releate to windows?

Thank you.

Brian, here is the easiest explanation (and the most accurate):

http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/ntfs.htm

Note also the conversion article:

http://aumha.org/win5/a/ntfscvt.htm

HTH

 

[Shenan Stanley]

What is Fat32 and NTFS? I see NTFS on one drive on my computer, and
I see Fat32 files also. What do they mean and how do they releate
to windows?

You mean you have multiple partitons/drives of some sort and some are
formatted with NTFS and some with FAT32?

Those are disk file systems.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_system#Disk_file_systems

NTFS is what has been pushed by Microsoft since Windows NT (obviously) and
the lines that have been derived from the original NT (Windows 2000, XP,
2003, 2008, Vista, 7, etc...) It has security built into it and lots of
other useful features.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NTFS

FAT32 is a more cross-platform compatible system - meaning that other OSes
often have no issue reading the files stored on such a disk file system. It
does have some limitations (like no single file can be larger than 4GB,
etc) - but if you will be going between OSes - it has its definite
advantages.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_Allocation_Table
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FAT32#FAT32

exFAT is also readily available on Windows systems now.

Now is a great time to point you to one of the easiest ways to find
information on problems you may be having and solutions others have found:

Search using Google!
http://www.google.com/
(How-to: http://www.google.com/intl/en/help/basics.html )

 

[John McGaw]

What is Fat32 and NTFS? I see NTFS on one drive on my computer, and I see
Fat32 files also. What do they mean and how do they releate to windows?

Thank you.

There are these things called Google and Wikipedia which can answer almost
any question about computers you might dream up. Much faster and more
accurate than asking here too.

 

[Rich Barry]

Brian, for more detailed definition do a google search. They are file
systems that hard drives are formatted with. NTFS is the superior of the
two. Allowing for larger partitions and
more security.

 

[Brian V]

Thank you.

 

[Paul]

What is Fat32 and NTFS? I see NTFS on one drive on my computer, and I see
Fat32 files also. What do they mean and how do they releate to windows?

Thank you.

One important difference, from a user perspective, is FAT32 has a 4GB
maximum file size. If you were downloading a DVD file, which was larger than
4GB, and the partition happened to be FAT32, you'd get a weird error and
the file would not get any larger than 4GB. NTFS, on the other hand,
allows much larger files, large enough you can use NTFS for your
downloads without having to worry about the file size. For example,
just yesterday, I recorded a movie with a WinTV card, and the file
was 132GB in size (no compression CODEC). NTFS handled that with ease.

If you don't like Wikipedia articles, you can find tabular comparisons like this one.
You'll still need Wikipedia, to explain things to you, like "what is an ACL
and why do I want one?".

http://www.ntfs.com/ntfs_vs_fat.htm

A disk can have multiple partitions. A file system can live inside each partition.
It is possible, to have an NTFS partition and a FAT32 partition on the same disk.
WinXP can be installed on a FAT32 partition, or on a NTFS partition, but the
OS makes it difficult to support large FAT32 partitions. Each Windows partition
can have a drive letter, so this might show as "C:" and "D:".

+-------+-----------+------------+
| MBR | FAT32 | NTFS |
+-------+-----------+------------+

If you want to format a large partition to FAT32 (i.e. do something which
WinXP doesn't support well), you can always use a tool like this. Otherwise,
you may find WinXP trying to convince you to only use NTFS (the more modern
file system).

http://www.ridgecrop.demon.co.uk/index.htm?fat32format.htm

One of the benefits of FAT32, might be perceived to be the ease with which
a disk can be moved from one piece of equipment to another. But Linux now,
has reasonable support for NTFS as well, so in that regard, the two file systems
may be used without worrying as much about what happens when another operating
system sees it. For that matter, I can even mount Linux EXT2 file systems
in Windows, so there is enough interoperability that the choice of file
system doesn't have to be a forced issue any more.

Paul

 

[ANONYMOUS]

Fat32 is an obscene word describing obese smelly people like MVPs (Most
Valuable Pigs) who hang around here asking people to defrag, scan and
install useless anti-spyware packages to keep themselves amused!!

..

 

[Unknown]

ANONYMOUS is an obscene word describing an obese smelly person
who hangs around here trying to impress other posters via nasty name
calling,
foul sex oriented language and unlike MVPs offers no help.