My PC is now running Windows XP. When I upgraded from Windows Me, I formatted the two internal hard disks as FAT32. I recently purchased a Maxtor One-Touch External 300GB hard disk, which i want to use for two main purposes : digital video editing, burning DVDs and the like, and secondly as a back-up for everything on my two internal 40GB disks. I have the option of formatting my new external disk with either FAT32 or NTFS. The latter has the advantage that a file would not be limited to 4GB in size. However, is it possible to have two formats running side by side? Can a back-up can be done on a NTFS disk when the system and data itself is on my FAT32 disks and what will happen if i subsequently have to make use of the back-ups to restore my system and the data onto my FAT32 internal disks? Can anyone help me out? Thank you in advance.

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I think everything should be fine. FAT32 and NTFS should be able to work with each other, and not give any complications if you ever need to restore anything. Having one drive as FAT32, and another (on the same disk?) as NTFS should be ok.

===>>> But get other opinions before you take my word for it. <<<===

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Hi cryptique91,
There are some potential problems when transfering data between FAT32 & NTFS drives. A NTFS drive will be able to "read" data from a FAT32 drive ... but a FAT32 drive may not be able to "read" all the data from a NTFS drive. I know what MS says..but I've encountered this problem before with certain file formats. Therefore..
if you are going to let Windows(or a windows based program) do a standard backup to your 300GB NTFS drive..you might have problems when you "restore" or copy the backup back to the 40GB FAT32 drives. The data might be all "garbled" and un-recoverable/unreadable.
You can get around this limitation two ways:
- by using a program like Norton Ghost or Acronis True Image which makes an "image" of your data and store it in a special container... called a .IMG file. Usually, the image can be restored from the NTFS to the FAT32 drive.
OR
Just make all drives the same. by..
-format your 300GB to FAT 32 OR
-transfer all your data to the 400GB NTFS drive... then.. re-install Windows as NTFS on both your 40GB drives & re-transfer the data from the 400GB drive back to the 40GB drives.(probably the best solution for you if you want to beat the 4GB file size limitation..for video editing etc.).
In summary, AVOID MIXING FAT32 & NTFS IF AT ALL POSSIBLE... it's just asking for trouble.
Hope this helps,
RGPHNX

 

 

 

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Well first off, i think XP will run way better on NTFS, rather than FAT, but i think that you should be able to transfer files with no problem, as long as you are not running programs from the NTFS to the FAT, i think you would be in good shape.

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Thanks for your help guys.
I've already consulted my PC technician. Now i'm just sharing the information he gave to me. Please don't misunderstand me. This is what my technician told me:

Like what Dark God said in the previous post, it is quite possible to run both NTFS and FAT32 partitions on the external hard disk. NTFS is better for back-ups as it can cope with larger file sizes and is more reliable. I should be able to backup the FAT32 disk to a NTFS disk but double-checking with the back-up software is essential. However, NTFS disks cannot be used with Windows 98 or Me so if the external hard disk is gonna be used to share files, a partition should be set up as well.

Once again, thanks for your help guys. I appreciate that.
(Or should i say sorry for causing the trouble )

Sincerely,
cryptique91

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