NTFS vs FAT32 Formatting - Windows XP SP2

Question

I have a Western Digital My Book 250 GB external harddrive connected
via USB 2.0 to an XP SP2 system. It came formatted via FAT32 from the
vendor with a footnote in the instruction manual that I might want to
re-format it in NTFS mode.

This is the second drive I purchased, the first had to be returned
before 30 days were up due to numerous problems shown in the event
viewer and the fact that the drive would disapper and I had to reboot
to get it back. This second Harddrive has been running perfectly for the 7 days that it has been installed, other than the slow transfer rate. I re-formatted the 1st drive as NTFS which seemed to
make it much faster, but I wonder was this the cause of my problems.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Mike

fireberd · Answer

The NTFS most likely was not the problem.  In fact an NTFS drive is more efficient and has more security. If you are not going to use the external drive with an older operating system I would format it for NTFS.

PETER345 · Answer

I second what fireberd said. NTFS is rock solid compared to FAT. Except when you need to read/write from DOS or Linux, I always use NTFS. You can also get Linux to read (maybe even write by now) NTFS and you can do the same from DOS.

Peter

kupchik · Answer

Thanks for both of your responses.

I have re-formated the drive to NTFS, it took less than a minute to delete the old partion and do a quick format using Disk Management. I got the instructions on the WD site, does this seem correct? I am in the process of running an extended test using WD software and then will watch the drive for a few days to insure everything is ok this time. I have copied files to the new drive and it takes about 1/3 the time, which is great.

After a few days I will provide more feedback.

msgale · Answer

Minor point, the is a Windows XP command 'convert' that will convert an FAT/FAT32 partition to NTFS.

Windows General

NTFS vs FAT32 Formatting - Windows XP SP2

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