File Systems

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twist

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As I'm still debating on whether or not to stick with NT for my "recording only" partition, I was doing some reading the other nite. I was reading about the advantages/disadvantages of various file systems, and 1 particular article claimed that FAT 16 was used more efficiently than either FAT 32 or NTFS, making it a good choice for audio.

Anybody got any opinions on this?


Twist
 
I would use Fat32 on a 98 setup and NTFS on everything else. Why are you using NT? 98 or 2000 are much better suited for audio/visual stuff.
 
Yeah I know, but I own registered copies of NT4.0 and 98se. All I've read said that NT was a more stable platform, so I thought I would try it.

Right now I'm dual booting 98 and NT. I may eventually decide to dual boot 98, or breakdown and buy 2000.

Twist
 
I would dump NT 4.0 as soon as you can. In terms of OS age, it is pretty old (circa 1996). It came out soon after 95 did and has no support for Plug and Play, USB, WDM drivers or even multiple monitors.

I have to use NT 4.0 at work only because the MIS dept. at my company does not want to do a company-wide upgrade to 2000 which would mean upgrading other software that is just as old and does not work with 2000.
 
Dual-booting 98 and NT is a bitch due to incompatible file systems. You're stuck with FAT16, and thus 2GB max partition, for your boot drive and you have to choose which OS can access which partitons (formatted in either FAT32 or NTFS) if you want partitions larger than 2GB.

You can get drivers called "FAT32 for NT" and "NTFS for W98", which will allow both OSes to read all partitions but you'll still be stuck with FAT16 for the boot partition. However, they cost a bit.

You could make a 2GB boot (primary) partition for your OSes and apps and format the rest of the disc (secondary partiton) in NTFS and store (non recording) data there. Then format your RAID setup in either NTFS or FAT32 depending on what OS you'll be using when recording.

Which OS to run depends on what your soundcard and your recording SW works best with.

Another solution, which was what I did before I switched to W2k, is (assuming w98 for games NT for recording) to make the FAT16 boot partition, format the secondary partitoin on that drive in FAT32 and format your audio drive in NTFS. That way, you cannot access the drives with the wrong file system from each OS but you souldn't need to access the audio drive when you're in W98 and you shouldn't need to access your games/mp3/etc drive when recording. Although you'll have three partitions, both OSes will show only two, the boot partition and the one with the correct file system.

As you can see, you don't want to dual boot w98 and NT.

FAT16 is (apparently) faster than FAT32 and NTFS but it is limited to 2GB partitions, which makes it a poor choice for your audio drive.

/Ola
 
Oh yeah...

Ola reminded me of the other annoying NT limitation. The primary partition of your first drive can be no larger than 4 Gb (if I'm not mistaken) when using NTFS. So basically if you are using any kind of HD larger than 4Gb, you have to partition the stupid thing into smaller logical drives. This little **inconvenience** alone is reason enough for me to never look back and just stick with 2000 and XP.
 
I think it's 8GB but still it's smaller than today's HDDs. I have some vague recollection that the size limit was for SCSI drive but I don't remember. I haven't used NT in a long time.

Heck I don't remember, nevermind.
 
Twist,

Stick with NT if it works for you. There are some audio applications that were written specifially for NT (I don't know which you are using).

If you are running an NT/98 dual boot and want to share files between platforms, you will want to stay way from NTFS as 98 can't see NTFS.

If you decide to take everyone's advice and change OS, stay away from XP. Especially, if you do simple things like adding new harddrives. Having to beg for activation on a product you've already paid for the use of, is lame.
 
twist said:
As I'm still debating on whether or not to stick with NT for my "recording only" partition, I was doing some reading the other nite. I was reading about the advantages/disadvantages of various file systems, and 1 particular article claimed that FAT 16 was used more efficiently than either FAT 32 or NTFS, making it a good choice for audio.

Anybody got any opinions on this?
Click to expand...

False.

Fat16, in nature *may* be slightly faster, it handles large partitions with large cluster sizes (meaning you loose more space). Plus, Fat16 only supports a maximum size of 2GB.

Fat32 uses smaller cluster sizes (in short, the drive uses its space far more efficently)

I can go into detail about cluster sizes... but I'm at work right now :P

I rec, using NTFS for everything... AND at least one (non shared)FAT32 drive where you can keep certain data files in. this way, if anything goes wrong, you can always boot up from a win98 boot disk and still be able to access the drive just incase something goes wrong.
 
Don't sweat the file system thing in terms of performance. FAT32 and NTFS both perform in the same range, with FAT32 being a little faster. Both are fast enough, however. Let's say that you need to do 15MB/sec to support the number of tracks your running. Well, NTFS on a 7200RPM drive might give you 25MB/sec, and FAT32 might give you 27MB/sec. Sure it's obvious who the winner is....but nobody's watching the race!

I prefer NTFS.

Slackmaster 2000
 
I know 98/NT is a bitch to dual boot, cause I did it. Couldn't have done it without Emerics' dual boot tutorial.


Anyway, thanks for the replies. You've pretty much confirmed what I already suspected.

I haven't given up yet (masochistic tendencies) but the wierdest thing is under normal use, NT is crashing far more often than 98.
And the whole reason I was using it was for stability.

twist
 
Angie said:
If you decide to take everyone's advice and change OS, stay away from XP. Especially, if you do simple things like adding new harddrives. Having to beg for activation on a product you've already paid for the use of, is lame.
Click to expand...

**BUZZER SOUNDING**

WRONG!

XP only starts to complain if you change more than 6 devices in your computer. Swapping HD's out will not cause problems.

Anyways, XP has been the most stable and speediest OS I've used so far for audio. My latency is the lowest I've ever had. Over the past 3 months XP has performed better than 98,SE,ME or 2000 ever did.
 
Actually, changeing either a single Network card or a SCSI card will cause XP to demand renewing your license. Or the motherboard. Or any other collection of other devices totalling 6. However in fairness I have heard that calling in to do the re-submission is pretty painless.

If you are thinking about upgrading to XP, here is a good site to check out -

http://www.wxperience.com/index.php
 
RWhite said:
Actually, changeing either a single Network card or a SCSI card will cause XP to demand renewing your license. Or the motherboard. Or any other collection of other devices totalling
Click to expand...


And companies wonder why people pirate software... :D
 
Personally I find Microsoft's call in activation to be fucking disgusting. Recent microsoft licensing changes (including activation, which doesn't really affect me since we use open licensing), and its continued involvement with the BSA, has me seriously considering moving away from their products. Granted I just spent more money on Office XP licensing than most people spend on a new car, so my plan is to phase out Office by 2004 and *possibly* phase out Windows by 2006. If I still work here...god I hope not.

So far I hate XP. But I've only had it on 6 machines so far.

Slackmaster 2000
 
Don't know what is difficult in dual boot 98/NT, did it for years. In my opinion, it is still the easiest/stable OS of the windows line. Maybe not as fast as W2K, but at least easy to mess about with. You could set it up just as you liked. Any volunteers to change an IRQ in W2K? Someone wants a talking paperclip?
 
I dunno man, sure seems more logical to map IRQ's at the BIOS level than to let the OS muck it up. Configuring NT4 isn't real fun since it doesn't have a centralized device manager or decent PnP support. Not to mention that its local driver base is very small so you absolutely have to have all your drivers present to bring the system up fresh.

I feel that Win2k gives the user more control over the system, a lot more than NT4, especially when configured for a Standard PC instead of ACPI. Not to mention benefits like WDM, USB, DirectX, etc. Plus you don't ever have to boot into 9x because you don't have to install it :)

The paper clip guy is an MS Office convention, not Windows, but I hear you and feel your pain. I hate that guy :)

Slackmaster 2000
 
Slackmaster2K said:
I dunno man, sure seems more logical to map IRQ's at the BIOS level than to let the OS muck it up. Configuring NT4 isn't real fun since it doesn't have a centralized device manager or decent PnP support. Not to mention that its local driver base is very small so you absolutely have to have all your drivers present to bring the system up fresh.

I feel that Win2k gives the user more control over the system, a lot more than NT4, especially when configured for a Standard PC instead of ACPI. Not to mention benefits like WDM, USB, DirectX, etc. Plus you don't ever have to boot into 9x because you don't have to install it :)

The paper clip guy is an MS Office convention, not Windows, but I hear you and feel your pain. I hate that guy :)

Slackmaster 2000
Click to expand...

Geez slack, You have the EXACT same mindset as me when it comes to computers. Everytime I read your posts I'm thinking, damn, I thought I was the only one who thinks like that. I mean that whole concept of controlling IRQ strictly in the BIOS is something I've always wondered why it hasnt become a reality yet. Well, I mean, a lot of boards can somewhat force IRQ's to a certain slot, but in a lot of cases, I find it's not perfect. Plus, you still have to contend with the OS making a mess of things. (Which thankfully has been rare lately)

Well, anyway, so far and few.. true PC Gurus.... but we ain't no geeks!...
 
I know this will probably get me in trouble (it is my first post)....
But here goes...................

BUY A MAC!!!
......:D................
 
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