View Full Version : The difference between NTFS & FAT?
On my flash thumb drive thing, I can format it in FAT, FAT32 or NTFS. What's the difference? Advantages, disadvantages? Any help, thanks. Honestly I'm clueless about this. :confused:
ooh, three hundred posts... ^_^
Pannonian
03-08-2008, 11:19
FAT is the subdivision format used by old versions of Windows. It's reasonably efficient up to around 1 GB or something. FAT32 is the version brought in for Windows 98. It is reasonably efficient up to around 4 GB. NTFS is the system brought in for Windows NT, and unlike the other two, it also has a variety of security features, compression options, etc. built in. I can't remember what size partition it can reasonably cope with.
FAT16 has been all but superseded by FAT32. The advantage of formatting your flash drive in FAT32 is that you will be able to plug it into Win9x or UNIX/Linux machines and they will be able to read/write to it straight away. NTFS would be a bad idea Because Win9x cannot read/write to it at all and UNIX/Linux requires special drivers (that are reliable but still in the alpha stage and not everyone will have this installed anyway). Also there is not much gain in using a file system like NTFS on a portable storage device.
Ahh, I see it all now that you two have shed light on the subject. Thanks. :2thumbsup:
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