Aaaargh! FAT32!

[LazyLion]

I just spent the entire morning setting up a rep's Acer (Windows XP Pro) Laptop with all the necessary updates and software, only to discover now, that Acer formatted the drive in 3 partitions all with FAT32. All three partitions, including the Recovery Image Partition are FAT32.

The Drive size is 120Gb. What is the danger in leaving it formatted as FAT32, or should I go back and format all as NTFS.

Why on earth do they do that at the factory???

What is the matter with NTFS, why can't they just use that?

and even if I wanted to format with NTFS, how do I recreate the Recovery Partition as an NTFS drive?

 

[LazyLion]

wasn't there a utility that used to convert FAT32 Drives to NTFS? Which OS was that?

 

[Gnome]

4GB file size limit, lower performance, lower security, I think higher fragmentation rate.

Windows XP has the ability to convert FAT -> NTFS

 

[xrapidx]

wasn't there a utility that used to convert FAT32 Drives to NTFS? Which OS was that?

XP

convert.exe

e.g. convert C: /fs:ntfs

 

[LazyLion]

ok, Ja... I am gonna have to do it. He is going to run into that File Size limitation the moment he starts playing around with DVD images.

Stupid Acer Company...

I found this good advice on converting to NTFS...

http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/ntfscvt.php

 

[The_Unbeliever]

XP

convert.exe

e.g. convert C: /fs:ntfs

Utility was in windowsNT as well.

Interesting, NT installed in a FAT partition, even though you selected NTFS, then it convert the partition over to NTFS. This was due to the installer's limitation - that it could not install to an NTFS partition

I have used the convert utility a couple of times, and haven't lost any data, but it would be prudent and safe to ensure a good backup exists before running said utility.

NTFS is so much better than FAT32.

 

[nocilah]

Interesting, NT installed in a FAT partition, even though you selected NTFS, then it convert the partition over to NTFS. This was due to the installer's limitation - that it could not install to an NTFS partition

heh

 

[milomak]

i once used that convert tool. it did the job.

 

[kronoSX]

Utility was in windowsNT as well.

Interesting, NT installed in a FAT partition, even though you selected NTFS, then it convert the partition over to NTFS. This was due to the installer's limitation - that it could not install to an NTFS partition

I have used the convert utility a couple of times, and haven't lost any data, but it would be prudent and safe to ensure a good backup exists before running said utility.

NTFS is so much better than FAT32.

it is faster yes