Advanced Windows XP Skills

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Guidelines for Choosing a File System

After you create the installation partition, Setup prompts you to select the file system with which to format the partition. Windows XP Professional can be installed on two file systems:

File allocation table (FAT) Although Windows Setup references only file allocation table (FAT), there are actually two versions of FAT:
FAT and FAT32.

FAT is a 16-bit file system used in older versions of Windows.

FAT32 is a 32-bit file system supported by Windows 95 original equipment manufacturer (OEM) Service Release 2, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows 2000, and Windows XP.

NTFS The preferred file system for Windows XP, NTFS provides more security and flexibility than FAT32. Microsoft recommends that you always use NTFS unless there is a specific reason to use another file system (such as when you are installing more than one operating system on a computer and one of those operating systems does not recognize NTFS partitions). NTFS is supported by Windows NT 4.0, Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows 2003 Server.

Using NTFS:

Use NTFS when the partition on which Windows XP Professional will reside requires any of the following features:

File- and folder-level security NTFS allows you to control access to files and folders.

Disk compression NTFS can compress files to store more data on the partition.

Encryption NTFS allows you to encrypt file data on the physical hard disk by using the Microsoft Encrypting File System (EFS).

The version of NTFS in Windows XP Professional supports remote storage, dynamic volumes, and mounting volumes to folders.

Windows XP Professional, Windows 2000, and Windows NT are the only operating systems that can access data on a local hard disk formatted with NTFS.

FAT and FAT32:

FAT and FAT32 offer compatibility with other operating systems. You must format the system partition with either FAT or FAT32 if you will dual boot Windows XP Professional and another operating system that requires FAT or FAT32. FAT and FAT32 do not offer many of the features (for example, file-level security) that NTFS supports. Therefore, in most situations, you should format the hard disk with NTFS. The only reason to use FAT or FAT32 is for dual booting with an older operating system that does not support NTFS. If you are setting up a computer for dual booting, you need to format the system partition that contains the older version of Windows with FAT or FAT32. For example, if drive C is the system partition that holds Windows 98, you could format drive C as FAT or FAT32. You should then format the system partition that will hold Windows XP as NTFS. Finally, for multiple booting to be successful, the boot partition must be formatted using a file system that all installed operating systems can access. For example, if you are dual-booting between Windows XP and Windows 95, the boot partition (as well as the system partition on which Windows 95 is installed) would have to be formatted with FAT.

Converting a FAT or FAT32 Volume to NTFS:

Windows XP Professional provides the Convert command for converting a partition to NTFS without reformatting the partition and losing all the information on the partition. To use the Convert command, click Start, click Run, type cmd in the Open text box, and then click OK. This opens a command prompt, which you use to request the Convert command. The following example shows how you might use switches with the Convert command.

Convert volume /FS:NTFS [/V] [/CvtArea:filename] [/NoSecurity] [/X]

If you convert a system volume (or any volume that has files that are currently in use), the Convert command might not be able to convert the drive right away. Instead, Windows schedules the conversion to happen the next time Windows is restarted.