NTFS vs FAT32

[Ron]

I bought a external hard drive to back up all my pictures.

It backs up using more space than I anticipated because my computer is NTFS and the external drive is FAT32.

Is this just the way it is or do I have options?

I haven't read the literature that came with the drive yet so I will research on my own also.

Figured someone here could give me the lowdown for dummies, I know just enough to be dangerous, lol.

[mtnbkr]

NTFS has many benefits over FAT32, but FAT32 means you'll be compatible with the most systems.  How often do you connect this to other computers?

Chris

[Ron]

Initially I was just going to back up my pictures so I don't lose them in a hard drive failure. I just backed up "my Documents and settings" and there was zero issue.

Then I edited a new batch of photos and when XP gave me back up options I chose "all information on this computer". I didn't have enough room to do that.

What should I be backing up to protect myself in the event of a hard drive failure? Is my documents and settings enough to get me back up and running?

I will not be hooking up to any other systems.

[mtnbkr]

You need to identify what you can't afford to lose.

I backup everything in My Documents, Outlook's .PST and config files, and the IE and Mozilla bookmarks to my server (just a plain old manual file copy).  I don't back up programs or system stuff. 

Chris

[Ron]

I think all I need is what is contained in "my Documents and settings".

I am not sure if that includes my config files, I would like to back them up also. Is that the same thing that is contained on a boot disk?

Thanks for the info so far, I'll running out for a bit and check in later. I think as long as I stick with just backing up the one set of files I'm good to go.

[mtnbkr]

That folder probably has 99% of the stuff you'd want to back up, if not 100% (depends on the apps and where they store stuff).  However, it also contains a lot of stuff I don't feel the need to save.

Chris

[charby]

+2 for NTFS

[Phyphor]

Fat32 is fine for drives that may need to work with multiple operating systems, or for backwards compatability (say, if you use old DOS games and you boot Win98 on the drive to run them.)

You probably don't have to be too concerned with backing up system settings, as most of those should be recreated when you reinstall.

[Cromlech]

FAT32 is nice for stuff I want to use with a Linux OS (usually a live CD), but it is not as good as NTFS for my bigger files. I have many large ISO image files on my video hard drive.

[mtnbkr]

Also, NTFS gives you file permissions and compression capabilities you can't get with FAT32.  That may or may not be useful, but it's a factor.

Chris

[Sergeant Bob]

In addition, NTFS uses hard drive space a bit (no pun intended ) more efficiently than FAT 32.

NTFS uses a maximum cluster size of 4 KB

Drive size                   
   (logical volume)                     Cluster size          Sectors
   ----------------------------------------------------------
     512 MB or less                            512 bytes           1
     513 MB - 1,024 MB (1 GB)     1,024 bytes (1 KB)    2
   1,025 MB - 2,048 MB (2 GB)    2,048 bytes (2 KB)    4
   2,049 MB and larger               4,096 bytes (4 KB)    8


FAT32 uses a max cluster size of 64 KB.

Drive size           
   (logical volume)      FAT type   Sectors     Cluster size
   -----------------------------------------------------------------------
       15 MB or less          12-bit       8           4 KB
       16 MB - 127 MB       16-bit       4           2 KB
      128 MB - 255 MB      16-bit       8           4 KB
      256 MB - 511 MB      16-bit      16           8 KB
      512 MB - 1,023 MB   16-bit      32          16 KB
    1,024 MB - 2,048 MB  16-bit      64          32 KB
    2,048 MB - 4,096 MB  16-bit     128          64 KB

What that means is, for every file which uses more than an even or multiple of 64 KB in FAT 32 i.e., 68 KB, it will actually use 128 KB of disk space, wasting 60 KB's of space.

With NTFS, that same file would only use exactly 68 KB as opposed to 128.

Its probably not going to make a major difference in how much data can be stored but, its something else to consider.