FAT32 is an old file system that is simple, well-documented, readable from a large number of OSs, and supported by a wide range of tools.
NTFS is a newer file system that is feature-rich, proprietary, undocumented at the raw bytes level, and subject to change - even within Service Packs of the same OS version.
You are obliged to use FATxx if you need access from DOS mode or Win9x, e.g. in a dual-boot scenario.
You are obliged to use NTFS if you need support for files over 4G in size, hard drives over 137G in size, and/or you need to implement some of NT's security management that devolves down to NTFS.
NTFS may be safer...
- transaction rollback cleanly undoes interrupted operations
- file-level permissions can protect data against malware etc.
- automatically "fixes" failing clusters on the fly (controversial)
...or more at risk...
- no interactive file system checker (a la Scandisk) for NTFS
- no maintenance OS for NTFS
- malware can drill right through NTFS protection, e.g. Witty
- transaction rollback does not preserve user data
- transaction rollback does not help other causes of corruption
- more limited range of maintenance tools
- automatically "fixes" failing clusters on the fly (controversial)
NTFS prevents changes from unauthorized users and prevents them from reading data from a computer. Where as FAT32 does not
The NTFS file system proves to be secure than FAT32 since it can alert users about security issues on identifying them. At the same time, it provides encryption options and other permission settings.
NTFS provides greater security and supports more storage capacity than the FAT32
Windows doesn't provide any tools for converting an NTFS volume to FAT or FAT32. You will have to copy the files on the volume to another location and then format the drive. Note that FAT32 is a much more limited file system than NTFS, and there is probably no advantage to doing so on a server.
No, but I suggest using NTFS anyway, as FAT32 only allows files that are less then 4GB. If you use that drive on both windows and mac, however, it is the only way to be able to use it on both.
NTFS is the file system that windows XP uses; I know that much. NTFS can handle bigger files than FAT32. FAT32 can handle 2GB files maximum. (So I'm told)
Probably not. There is a decent chance of corruption / data loss. it is better to back up your files, delete the partition, and create a new NTFS partition instead. ---------- Depends. It's recommended that you back up any important data on the disk. The down fall with FAT32 and NTFS is that FAT32 cannot interpret anything larger than 32GiB Volumes on the Hard Disk. FAT32 Volumes are becoming the primitive Format. However, older machines which use obsolete hardware won't be able to understand the NTFS Structured Volumes. xyr0x
Win2K is based on the same file system called as NTFS as of NT. But Win2K can also be set up using FAT32 file system a predecessor of NTFS. NTFS allows us to use long file names and is much faster than FAT32 file system.
NTFS allows more Fragmentation Than the FAT32 NTFS is capable to find the fragment quite fast, since the whole information is kept in several compact records. If a file is fragmented quite strongly, then, the HDD head has to implement many movements. It slows the process down.
If you are installing windows XP with Windows 9x or me than the I would recommend you to use FAT32 as if you use NTFS than you wont be able to access Windows XP with NTFS partition. If you are installing Windows XP with Windows NT or Windows 2000 than you can use any partition type. But I would recommend to use NTFS.
NTFS is a journaling file system, designed primarily for scalability and security. FAT32 is used in Windows 98 because Windows 98 requires MS-DOS to boot, and it would have been very difficult to port MS-DOS to boot off of an NTFS partition. Also, FAT32 has better performance on older computers and smaller hard drives. By the time Windows XP came out, computers were more powerful, and NTFS would actually perform better than FAT32 on the hard drives that were available by this time.
NTFS (New Technology File System ) prevents changes from unauthorized users and prevents them from reading data from a computer.NTFS (New Technology File System) automatically encryptsfiles.