alrighty, I have two hard drives on my computer...and i was looking into this whole DVD to DVD-R thing....

my C:\ drive is the one i have windows xp on ...

and my F:\ drive is my archive drive

can i convert my c:\ to have the ntfs file system while still having fat 32 on the other drive?

or is it recommended that I have the same file system for both drives?

both drives are extremely packed on for space (3 gigs free on each out of 160gigs) ...so doing the backup would be a big hassle....

so do i have to completely erase any of these drives to convert to ntfs?

are there any web pages that will tell me the pros and cons to comparing fat 32 and ntfs ?

thanks

:)

My primary drive (with xp and programs) is FAT32 ... and my secondary is NTFS. So you can have a combo. Dunno the answers to your other questions

No you don't have to completely erase the drives to convert but I think you may need to free up some space before converting say about 10 gigs, can't remember exactly how much read it somewhere. You can convert either drive or both its up to you although from what I've read ntfs is a better system and of course is needed for the larger dvd files. I have kept my system drive has fat32 because I like the idea of being able to just boot off almost any win boot disk to read it. I just converted my secondry drive but must say it does seem to be performing faster with ntfs.

hmmm this really does help me out a lot

if ntfs is what people are going to always use nowadays, then i guess ill have to do the convert

anyone notice any downfalls to ntfs ?

Hi Elemenno,

This WILL make it simple for your m8,

I would advise that both of your Hard Drives are NTFS.

NTFS is faster, more reliable, more secure, and most of all allows you to store files larger than 4GB. This is essential if you are copying DVDs.

Not sure if you can convert the drive to NTFS within XP but look on the net for a partition magic boot disk.

Download it and stick the files on a floppy. Boot from it and the program will let you convert no probs. Might take a while since you got big drives.

If you don't covert, you're gonna end up with 80% movies like a few others on this forum !!

Pretty sure that NTFS is not faster.. More reliable and secure, yes. To convert your C drive type convert c: /fs:NTFS

A Hard drive can access files faster in an NTFS partition because of the way it uses clusters as opposed to FAT32. It also has a smaller fragmentation scale than FAT32.

Ok, did a bit of reading.. not much mention of speed differences.. but:

NTFS and FAT32 are very similar in speed, but as the size of the disk increases, the gap widens. NTFS actually stores small files in the Master File Table (MFT), to increase performance. Rather than moving the heads to the beginning of the disk to read the MFT entry, and then to the middle or end of the disk to read the actual file, the heads simply move to the beginning of the disk, and read both at the same time. This can account for a considerable increase in speed when reading lots of small files.

Basically Celtic,

As you get more on your drive, with NTFS, it's quicker to access it.

Thats enough on NTFS eh? LOL ;-))

Why would my computer come from the factory as the primary drive FAT32 and the secondary (big drive) NTFS. There must be some kind of advantage to having FAT32 on your smaller drives correct? or incorrect? Should i convert my 13 gig primary drive that has xp and my progs on it to ntfs??? Would it run faster and more effecient?

If you are going to be doing DVD copying, i would recommmend it. I had to because only on ntfs are you allowed to have files over 3.999999 GB

you may only notice it nefarion if u use your c drive for encoding and other demanding tasks.

Ive done it the wrong way round (yes, i am a muppet :D )

I have an 80gb hard disk that hasnt been converted. ive only got about 7-10 GBs free on it. Can i convert it to NTFS so it would make my dvd life easier? i mean, is there any way of converting without emptying it?

Many thanks

NLB -- check out celtics 6 posts above.

i guess the bad thing about nfts is that you cant convert it back to fat32

yet you can go fat32 directly to nfts

.....weird

im guessing that ill be having my master nfts (dvd stuff...ripping, etc.)

and then my secondary hard drive as a fat32 (non-dvd stuff)

hopefully this will be the best plan

thats what i thought elemenno, but im paing for it now :(

i forgot to mention in my last post that my 80GB disc is my secondary drive. i wish i converted that too before i filled it up.

It may not be too late for you elemenno.

Thanks

Elemenno -

Just a thought - if you've got 160 GB of data you don;t want to loose - hadn't you better back it up anyway, in case of HD error?

Just wondered.

MBB

if u use partition magic 7 ,it has to be run from a fat 32 partition
so my scenario was
already had 2 x 40 gigs ntfs
backed up primary to secondary
repartitioned primary to 700 odd meg fat32 to run win98 and pm7 on the fly
installed boot magic 7 on both fat32 and ntfs
now dual boot all singing all dancing