FAT32 vs NTFS, for 1.5TB External HDD

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[F3RL]

I purchased a 1.5TB WD USB External HDD and the hard drive was already formatted with FAT32. Considering I *might* have files larger than 4GB, like ghost image, I did 'quick' format to NTFS and now I am concerned..

I'm cosidering to buy a Mac Mini to use as a primary computer and I remember that Macs can not wrtie to NTFS unless I install an app or do a system tweak or something. So, I dont know what to do.

I want to access the hard drive from Mac and Windows and sometimes Linux, should I use FAT32, risking the safety of data? or go for NTFS or any other alternatives? I was thinking to use either HFS/ZFS Journaled or EXT3.

Your opinion is greatly appreciated

By the way, I will be storing, music, movies, photos and documenet backups.

Eric.

[Samker]

FATxx 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. 

Since you need better security and want to store larger files, I'll recommend NTFS.

I was also find for you one very interesting article: http://www.testfreaks.com/blog/information/usb-flash-drive-comparison-part-2-fat32-vs-ntfs-vs-exfat/


Related to your question about Mac... My recommendation is MacFUSE: http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/23729
MacFUSE allows you to extend Mac OS X's native file handling capabilities via 3rd-party file systems. It is used as a software building block by dozens of products.

[F3RL]

Thank you for the info and related article. Some intereseting results with USB sticks but not external hard drives. By the way, I found something interesting. When I formatted my 1.5TB HDD with FAT32 it took me about 12 seconds to load on My Computer while NTFS loaded in 3 seconds in ready-to-use state. I just might go with FAT32 though. Data security is not my concern I guess?!?!

Thanks again for the articles

[Samker]

You welcome my friend.

More details

NTFS may be faster...
   - smaller RAM footprint as avoids large FAT held in RAM
   - indexed design more efficient for many files per directory
   - small file data embedded in dir level, avoids seek to data chain
   - above factors make fragmentation less onerous than for FATxx
   - 4k cluster size matches processor's natural paging size
...or slower...
   - extra overhead of security checks, compression, encryption
   - small clusters may fragment data cluster chains

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 may be more space-efficient...
   - smaller cluster size than FAT32 above 8G
   - may include data of small files within the directory level
   - NTFS's bitmap structure is smaller than FAT32's dual FAT
   - sparse files and compression can reduce data space usage
...or less so...
   - NTFS has large MFT structure
   - larger per-file directory metadata space


Either choice, you will win some and lose some but obviously it's easy to make a switch.

[hazedaze]

I knwo this is a bit late but.......Just as a thought as this is a problem I ran into with me on PC and my mate on MAC, your right there are tweaks you can do in the MAC os, But the most simple method I used was to partition the External drive into two partitons but dont format or assign drive letters to the 2nd partition,

You should then find that when you plug the external drive into the MAC it will format the 2nd partition into the MAC Format for oyu or at least ask you if you wish to format the drive.

ENSURE THERE IS NOT DATA ON THE DRIVE JUST IN CASE THE MAC PICKS THE WRONG PARTITION!!!

This worked for me.....

[cybero2912]

I'd suggest NTFS
reason: it is a secured FS and I am also not shure if FAT32 can handle 1,5TB properly

[krrjhn]

Interesting post !!

[zocker]

FAT32 can handle partitions up to 8TB. -> No problem, maybe alternative tools needed
Maximum filesize is 4GB (-1 Byte). -> Could be a problem, especially with videofiles and images of DVDs and HDDs

Here you can see all limitations of FAT32:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/184006/en-us

[devnullius]

Why not share the NTFS drive through the network. Use network share with full access to 'do' ntfs without tweaking?

Peace!

Devvie


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