What is the difference between fat32 and ntfs

The most common method is to format this drive again, but that will erase everything on the drive. You can download the freeware and have a try. Step 1. Step 4. With the comparison of NTFS vs. FAT32, now you should know the basic difference between those two hard drive formats. Preface When you have a new hard drive, or reinstall the Windows operating system, you will be prompted to format the hard drive.

NTFS vs. Still Need Help? Have your problem been solved? Windows supports three different file systems. NTFS is the most modern file system. Windows uses NTFS for its system drive and, by default, for most non-removable drives. NTFS is the modern file system Windows likes to use by default. NTFS supports file permissions for security, a change journal that can help quickly recover errors if your computer crashes, shadow copies for backups, encryption, disk quota limits, hard links, and various other features.

Many of these are crucial for an operating system drive—especially file permissions. If you have a secondary drive alongside Windows and you plan on installing programs to it, you should probably go ahead and make it NTFS, too. Despite its advantages, where NTFS lacks is compatibility. For example, if you'd like to use the USB on older computers, or non-PC systems like digital picture frames, TV sets, printers or projectors, choose FAT32 because it is universally supported.

If you are choosing a file system for the backup hard drive, select NTFS. It has undergone many changes since then.

The number "32" in FAT32 denotes the number of bits needed to keep track of the files. FAT16 was popular until the arrival of 4GB hard disks. Since then it has developed and appears in recent versions of Windows like Vista, XP. Microsoft continues to hold on to NTFS patent. FAT32 is a fluff-free and simple system that is documented and mainly keeps track of file locations.

The simplicity of FAT32 has made it the file system of choice for portable storage mediums like in memory cards, mp3 players and flash players. NTFS file system is more complex and offers multiple enhancements that increase security as well as performance. NTFS file system allows automatic file compression prior to being written freeing up hard disk space and also has disk quotas which allows system administrator to allocate disk space to users.

The largest possible file is 4GB minus 2 bytes.