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Is there a performance difference between fat32 and ntfs?

S

squidman

Senior member
I still dont know the actual difference performance-wise. Which one is better? NTFS is compressing stuff, thus being slower? Im confused. Also, for some reason i get 1300 hdd marks in winme, and only 800 in XP. Sometimes is see my hdd struggling.
 
NTFS shouldn't be compressing things unless you've set various folders for compression. NTFS is based on HPFS; HPFS stands for High performance File System. NTFS is better than FAT32 in nearly every way...

I'd blame the drop in performance on Win XP, not the file system.
 
Thanks! Security doesnt matter to me (unless somebody wants to hack my savegames and home movies), but performance does. Oh well, when hopefully, new nForce2 drivers comeout, ill reformat.
Thanks again!
 
Xp uses more memory so It might be using more of the
HD to buffer data? I know what they say about NTFS as
being better. But to tell you the honest to God truth
I think Fat32 ran faster for me. I also defrag my drive just
as much with HTFS as I did with Fat32. The only thing that
is better is the security of file ownership rights. Other than
that I'd say there is not a whole heck of alot going for either
format. Oh.. you can have large Harddrive support for HTFS,
but I think FAT32 can do that now with a few patches.


As far as Sandra goes... Whatever.. sometimes it's just like that.

What chipset do you have now? Maybe you could try other IDE
chipset drivers?
 
Sandra shows lower performance than I expected with NTFS, but HDTach (unfortunately you need to buy it to test NTFS....🙁) shows the drive to be performing exactly as its rated.
 
Keep in mind if you're dual booting ME/XP that 98/ME won't be able to access your NTFS partitions. Don't know if you are, but seemed reasonable to point out 🙂
 
Originally posted by: TronX
Xp uses more memory so It might be using more of the
HD to buffer data? I know what they say about NTFS as
being better. But to tell you the honest to God truth
I think Fat32 ran faster for me. I also defrag my drive just
as much with HTFS as I did with Fat32. The only thing that
is better is the security of file ownership rights. Other than
that I'd say there is not a whole heck of alot going for either
format. Oh.. you can have large Harddrive support for HTFS,
but I think FAT32 can do that now with a few patches.


As far as Sandra goes... Whatever.. sometimes it's just like that.

What chipset do you have now? Maybe you could try other IDE
chipset drivers?
Click to expand...


Its NTFS, hot HTFS.


You are defragging too much.

Open 2k/XP's built in defragger and click Analyze. When finished a dialog box will appear telling you if a defrag is needed. If it says you do not need to defragment this volume then you really don't need to. Your just wasting your time.

And yes FAT32 can work with large volumes, it has always been able to. However to do so it will have to use a very large cluster size. Large cluster sizes are very ineffcient and wasteful. FAT32 just was not designed with large volumes in mind. NTFS is.

And NTFS has alot more then just security features. NTFS has many redundancy features to prevent file system corruption. The only "redundancy feature" FAT file systems have is that they keep 2 indentical copies of the FAT. And even that is not of much use as both copies are stored right next to each other. If one gets corrupted the other will most likely to be affected as well.

 
Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Leave FAT32 behind. It's old. NTFS is new and better.
Click to expand...

Actually, NTFS is older than FAT32... it's just better.
Click to expand...

Would the two Jeffs stop arguing with one another? 😛

You're both correct.

NTFS 1.0 < FAT32 < NTFS 2.0 < WFS (Longhorn's SQL-style FS)

- M4H
 
aren't they "NTFS 4.0" and "NTFS 5.0", so they match the NT versions? Or is this some crap I picked up somewhere...
 
Originally posted by: buleyb
aren't they "NTFS 4.0" and "NTFS 5.0", so they match the NT versions? ...
Click to expand...

yes, you are correct

in think windows NT4 has NTFS4, WIndows 2k NTFS5, XP NTFS 5.1
 
Originally posted by: Schadenfroh
Originally posted by: buleyb
aren't they "NTFS 4.0" and "NTFS 5.0", so they match the NT versions? ...
Click to expand...

yes, you are correct

in think windows NT4 has NTFS4, WIndows 2k NTFS5, XP NTFS 5.1
Click to expand...

They should have made it "XPNTFS5100+" LOL
 
Originally posted by: Jeff7181


They should have made it "XPNTFS5100+" LOL
Click to expand...

No: NTFS XP6500+

Because it performs JUST LIKE a 6500! Honest! 😉

And yes, I *do* use AMD chips. But that naming system is plain lame. 😉

 
Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Leave FAT32 behind. It's old. NTFS is new and better.
Click to expand...

Actually, NTFS is older than FAT32... it's just better.
Click to expand...

Would the two Jeffs stop arguing with one another? 😛

You're both correct.

NTFS 1.0 < FAT32 < NTFS 2.0 < WFS (Longhorn's SQL-style FS)

- M4H
Click to expand...

There were different versions of ntfs? I thought once the file format was introduced, only its security features were altered. WFS?! When is that coming out?
 
Originally posted by: squidman
Originally posted by: MercenaryForHire
Originally posted by: Jeff7181
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Leave FAT32 behind. It's old. NTFS is new and better.
Click to expand...

Actually, NTFS is older than FAT32... it's just better.
Click to expand...

Would the two Jeffs stop arguing with one another? 😛

You're both correct.

NTFS 1.0 < FAT32 < NTFS 2.0 < WFS (Longhorn's SQL-style FS)

- M4H
Click to expand...

There were different versions of ntfs? I thought once the file format was introduced, only its security features were altered. WFS?! When is that coming out?
Click to expand...

It's supposed to be the file system for a new version of Windows, yet to be named, but code-named Longhorn.
 
As far as I know, Microsoft admitted that WinFS isnt a new File system, just a new way of cataloging NTFS, because of NTFS's boot sector & MFT limitations.
 
I still like my Fat32. When windows blows up I can always pop my Win98 bootdisk in there and get at any files I need to. With NTFS you have to fool around with multiple bootdisks for win2k or find a util that will let you access NTFS. Fat32 may be a little slower but the difference in performance is negligible.
 
Perhaps, but then NTFS blows up less 😛

As far as performance, it often comes down to cluster sizes. The defaults for NTFS are smaller than those for FAT32, which are again smaller than FAT. They can be rejiggered with PartitionMagic and such. In any case, the differences are negligible relative to other factors such as the performance of the HDD hardware itself. So, use NTFS and don't fret.
 
I would go with NTFS. I hear it's faster, and there is no limit for how big a single file can be. With FAT32, you can only have a file that is 4GB large at maximum. I believe the original NTFS is older than the original FAT32. But the original NTFS is newer than the original FAT. FAT32 is based on FAT, so therefore NTFS is based on newer technology which is why it is better.
 
yes!
My corrupted bios/OS made me do yet another clean install (after flashing BIOS, cuz formatting/clean installing didnt help the infected BIOS). Yes, this is great: files copy faster - i had to put 7 gigs of mp3 from backup cd's on the hdd again. And overall, the internal-drive transfers are fast. Also, i realized, that i can record tv, for no matter how long using my video capture board, and then compress the single file into mpeg2!!! kick ass!
But....i still get 840 hdd marks! LOL! A pox on PcMark2002?
Thanks!
 
difference isn't important for most people. i use fat32 cuz i like booting to dos to use ghost. imaging partitions for safety is nice. sure u can do it with newer software i guess, but its a pain to swtich from easy ghost.

i also keep a bare copy of win98se installed. why? when xp is totally hosed its a nice backup os to recover files. copying stuff without a gui is a pain. 98 only sees fat.
 
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