frank_1
New member
I hear it's the best way to go, so how do I do it?
I have Win XP.
I have Win XP.
matty_boy
New member
How big is your h/d.
Would you mind losing everything on the drive.
Would you mind losing everything on the drive.
frank_1
New member
I have two HD's, one for audio and one for programs. They are both 40 gigs actually 37.?? gigs.
I don't know if I have to convert both or just the audio HD.
If it's just the audio HD then I can loose everything. I am assuming you are about to tell me that I have to reformate it... NO problem-o.
Bring it on!
I don't know if I have to convert both or just the audio HD.
If it's just the audio HD then I can loose everything. I am assuming you are about to tell me that I have to reformate it... NO problem-o.
Bring it on!
Stealthtech
LOGIC ABUSER
I believe that is correct, you may have to start from scratch and reformat, in the initial setup you can set it up for FAT 32.
R
RWhite
Well-known member
Microsoft provides a tool to convert from FAT32 to NTFS, but not the other way arround.
You have two choices -
(1) Reformat the drives and re-install
(2) Get a third party software product. I would recomend Partition Magic, it converts almost any file system to any other. I think the current version is 7.
I wont get into WHY you want to do this, personally there doesn't seem to be much difference as far as performance goes.
Also if you do decide to do thjis, you might want to boot from a Win98 startup disk and format your drives using FDISK. Win XP has a built-in limiter, it will not format a partition bigger than 32 gig using FAT32, although it will read any size. So don't format them using Win XP is you want a single partition for each drive.
You have two choices -
(1) Reformat the drives and re-install
(2) Get a third party software product. I would recomend Partition Magic, it converts almost any file system to any other. I think the current version is 7.
I wont get into WHY you want to do this, personally there doesn't seem to be much difference as far as performance goes.
Also if you do decide to do thjis, you might want to boot from a Win98 startup disk and format your drives using FDISK. Win XP has a built-in limiter, it will not format a partition bigger than 32 gig using FAT32, although it will read any size. So don't format them using Win XP is you want a single partition for each drive.
matty_boy
New member
Nothing to add except that RWhite is the man. Listen to this guy. He knows his stuff.
Matty
Matty
frank_1
New member
So your saying I shouldn't do this?
S
Sangram
New member
No.
I mean, you should not do it. FAT 32 will offer slightly more speed for smaller file sizes, but for larger files (as i imagine audio would be) NTFS is far more efficent. You're doing fine if it's NTFS. To find out, right-click on the drive and see the filesystem type.
I mean, you should not do it. FAT 32 will offer slightly more speed for smaller file sizes, but for larger files (as i imagine audio would be) NTFS is far more efficent. You're doing fine if it's NTFS. To find out, right-click on the drive and see the filesystem type.
Barometer
New member
Nothing wrong with NTFS, there should be no compatibility issues. I'd leave it if that's what it is now 
ola
Newbie
I use FAT32 on my W2k DAW for one simple reason - I have a W98 system on the same drive and W98 cannot read NTFS. When I get my dedicated DAW up and running, I'll probably use NTFS.
I have done lots of benchmarking on different file systems (FAT, FAT32 and NTFS) and tried other "tricks" such as having multiple partitions on the drive and using the "outer" partition as it would be faster. I've benchmarked 10k rpm SCSI vs. 7200 rpm IDE and nothing makes any substantial difference in DAW applications. Differences has been within a few percent and not even consistent.
The only thing I've found that increases HDD performace is defragging but then again, other say that it makes no difference.
Just my two cents
/Ola
I have done lots of benchmarking on different file systems (FAT, FAT32 and NTFS) and tried other "tricks" such as having multiple partitions on the drive and using the "outer" partition as it would be faster. I've benchmarked 10k rpm SCSI vs. 7200 rpm IDE and nothing makes any substantial difference in DAW applications. Differences has been within a few percent and not even consistent.
The only thing I've found that increases HDD performace is defragging but then again, other say that it makes no difference.
Just my two cents
/Ola
M
muskgrave
New member
Easy Way
RWhite was correct, but just in case you don't mind the 32gb limit... You may have already made up your mind to stay with NTFS which is perfectly fine, it is a much more efficient file system. But just for reference, If you have 2 drives/partitions and want to make the 2nd one fat 32 not caring about losing the contents of the drive you just have to go into disk administrator (i believe the path is start/programs/administrative tools/computer management/disk management.
From there you can select the 2nd drive and delete the partition and create 2 partitions on the drive as you wish. No need to restart and boot up with fdisk or any of that stuff. You may want to make a small partition just for the audio program setup files and make a ghost image of it or burn them to CD. Just another option.
dlv
RWhite was correct, but just in case you don't mind the 32gb limit... You may have already made up your mind to stay with NTFS which is perfectly fine, it is a much more efficient file system. But just for reference, If you have 2 drives/partitions and want to make the 2nd one fat 32 not caring about losing the contents of the drive you just have to go into disk administrator (i believe the path is start/programs/administrative tools/computer management/disk management.
From there you can select the 2nd drive and delete the partition and create 2 partitions on the drive as you wish. No need to restart and boot up with fdisk or any of that stuff. You may want to make a small partition just for the audio program setup files and make a ghost image of it or burn them to CD. Just another option.
dlv
R
RWhite
Well-known member
All good points.
Again, in performance terms I don't think you will see a difference. In therory, NTFS is less likely to be corrupted that FAT32, although it is also harder to recover from if it does get corrupted. In theory, NTFS manages files on very large dives better. However I have one 120 gig drive formated FAT32 and it's working fine.
Ola's has a good point, if you ever want to duel-boot, it's best to keep things FAT32. I have one recording rig limited to Win98 - no working hardware drivers past Win9X for the sound card. Sometime soon I'm going to set it up duel-boot with Win 2000, and I'll want to keep it FAT32.
However - I might add that in a prior post, I piut up a link to a shareware driver that lets Win98/ME read NTFS partitions. I now have it on all my Win98 boot floppies. I like to boot from floppy in order to run Symantec Ghost to make disk backups. This driver now means I can run Ghost for a boot floppy (basicly DOS) and still read & copy NTFS partitions. The read-only version of the driver is free, the read-write costs some $$ I think it's called NTFSDOS, I don't have the link handy, but like I said its in an earlier post.
Again, in performance terms I don't think you will see a difference. In therory, NTFS is less likely to be corrupted that FAT32, although it is also harder to recover from if it does get corrupted. In theory, NTFS manages files on very large dives better. However I have one 120 gig drive formated FAT32 and it's working fine.
Ola's has a good point, if you ever want to duel-boot, it's best to keep things FAT32. I have one recording rig limited to Win98 - no working hardware drivers past Win9X for the sound card. Sometime soon I'm going to set it up duel-boot with Win 2000, and I'll want to keep it FAT32.
However - I might add that in a prior post, I piut up a link to a shareware driver that lets Win98/ME read NTFS partitions. I now have it on all my Win98 boot floppies. I like to boot from floppy in order to run Symantec Ghost to make disk backups. This driver now means I can run Ghost for a boot floppy (basicly DOS) and still read & copy NTFS partitions. The read-only version of the driver is free, the read-write costs some $$ I think it's called NTFSDOS, I don't have the link handy, but like I said its in an earlier post.
M
muskgrave
New member
Reading NTFS from DOS
man i wish i had had that this weekend! I have a 40gb drive that has 4 partitions: system, applications, audio (including audio applications), and backup (personal files, setup files for programs..etc). I was making a ghost image from another hard drive (doing a side job on a computer for some extra cash) and had to format my audio partition to fat32 so ghost would see it and save the image there. Of course I had it all backed up to my backup partition but it would have saved me the time having to reload the applications. I downloaded something once that claimed to see ntfs from dos but did not. What is the name of the program and the company/individual who makes it?
dlv
man i wish i had had that this weekend! I have a 40gb drive that has 4 partitions: system, applications, audio (including audio applications), and backup (personal files, setup files for programs..etc). I was making a ghost image from another hard drive (doing a side job on a computer for some extra cash) and had to format my audio partition to fat32 so ghost would see it and save the image there. Of course I had it all backed up to my backup partition but it would have saved me the time having to reload the applications. I downloaded something once that claimed to see ntfs from dos but did not. What is the name of the program and the company/individual who makes it?
dlv
frank_1
New member
Good ques. I am also looking for back up, but have no clue on how to go about it.
S
shackrock
New member
honestly, i see no difference with either as well.
if you got a fast computer, and use it just for audio, you're fine unless you're doing more then a homerecorder should be...haha.
with my delta44, xp, 1 60 gig harddrive in NTFS, AMD 2000+, 512 ram....
i run fast as HELL either formatting. and no partitions for files/audio either. its a rocket, and will do anything i want it to basically. i do get an occasional crash, but i expect its NTRACK that causes this most of the time.
if you got a fast computer, and use it just for audio, you're fine unless you're doing more then a homerecorder should be...haha.
with my delta44, xp, 1 60 gig harddrive in NTFS, AMD 2000+, 512 ram....
i run fast as HELL either formatting. and no partitions for files/audio either. its a rocket, and will do anything i want it to basically. i do get an occasional crash, but i expect its NTRACK that causes this most of the time.
R
RWhite
Well-known member
I think this is the web page for the NTFS driver -
http://www.winternals.com/trynow/
You want to download the "demo" version of the NTFSDOS pro edition. Like I said it's read-only, but thats all you need to run Ghost backups.
http://www.winternals.com/trynow/
You want to download the "demo" version of the NTFSDOS pro edition. Like I said it's read-only, but thats all you need to run Ghost backups.
B
bgavin
New member
Partition Magic 7.0 will convert NTFS to FAT32. You may have to uncompress multi-stream files on the NTFS partition first. Search the Partition Magic site for details on doing this. They have a utility for this purpose. I have used it successfully.
I also own NTFSDOS Pro 4 and it does exactly what it is supposed to do. Again, there are problems using it with Ghost v7, but there is also a fix (workaround) that works correctly. Details on the Winternals site.
I also own NTFSDOS Pro 4 and it does exactly what it is supposed to do. Again, there are problems using it with Ghost v7, but there is also a fix (workaround) that works correctly. Details on the Winternals site.