NTFS vs. FAT32 - Round 2

[pmk24]

and correct me if im wrong but with ntfs carnt you set more security rights on the drives then FAT32?

[KraniX]

i'm getting so fed up of this ntfs vs. fat32 stuff, ntfs is great if you have machines running databases etc. but for outright performance fat32 totally beats ntfs, run a few benchmarks and you'll see it for yourself.

can someone explain to me why ntfs is 'secure' and fat32 is not?

and also i would like to hear people explain the stabilty issue, in this kind of debate i constantly hear 'ntfs is much more stable' - why? what actually makes this file system stable (bet most of you don't know and have to google this). i can't say i've noticed many topics in any forum where people are moaning about fat32 and stabilty issues, or they had a machine that was unstable and changing to ntfs fixed all their problems.

i lost 600 marks in 3dmark 2001, pc spec was 100% the same, just changed to ntfs. 3dmarks aren't the be-all-end-all, but i noticed my machine was much slower with an ntfs drive, and bootvis confirmed that a restart took around 10-12 seconds longer, not loads but enough to prove ntfs buggered summit.

[Ethos]

I doubt very much that you lost 600 marks just by going ntfs...

[Rys]

Originally posted by KraniX

can someone explain to me why ntfs is 'secure' and fat32 is not?

and also i would like to hear people explain the stabilty issue, in this kind of debate i constantly hear 'ntfs is much more stable' - why? what actually makes this file system stable (bet most of you don't know and have to google this). i can't say i've noticed many topics in any forum where people are moaning about fat32 and stabilty issues, or they had a machine that was unstable and changing to ntfs fixed all their problems.

i lost 600 marks in 3dmark 2001, pc spec was 100% the same, just changed to ntfs. 3dmarks aren't the be-all-end-all, but i noticed my machine was much slower with an ntfs drive, and bootvis confirmed that a restart took around 10-12 seconds longer, not loads but enough to prove ntfs buggered summit.

Secure? FAT32 doesn't support file or directory ownership. You have access to the filesystem, anyone can read or write the files on it. NFTS can apply complex permissions to any of the objects stored inside it, ownership, access rights etc. You can control access to everything on the filesystem, read, write, change, owner etc.

NTFS also supports locked secure file streams on all of its objects. You can be the only person with access to a file at any given time, with various IOCTL's, making it pretty secure in that regard. That's not even close to being the case with FAT32.

As for being more reliable, NTFS is a journalled filesystem. It can roll back to a previous state in the event of a problem. FAT32 doesn't even journal metadata, never mind actual files. That's where the reliability claim comes in.

Add in things like native compression, support for large partitions and files, and it's a comprehensive beating for FAT32.

Performance wise, yeah FAT32 is marginally quicker, but given the feature tradeoff, who cares? I'd rather run a slower, secure, journalled file system than a slightly faster one with no real features.

Rys

[Apex]

Well said

[spikegifted]

Originally posted by Rys
Performance wise, yeah FAT32 is marginally quicker, but given the feature tradeoff, who cares? I'd rather run a slower, secure, journalled file system than a slightly faster one with no real features.

Excellent summary and to the point. I jump on NTFS the moment I installed Win2K. (Apart from my server which is running NT4 Server and has been NTFS for a long time...)

[Agent]

Originally posted by KraniX
and also i would like to hear people explain the stabilty issue, in this kind of debate i constantly hear 'ntfs is much more stable' - why? what actually makes this file system stable (bet most of you don't know and have to google this).

i lost 600 marks in 3dmark 2001, pc spec was 100% the same, just changed to ntfs.

Whys it matter if people know the technical reasons behind it ?.
As long as people know which is better, it doesn't make a difference if people have to google to find out why.

600marks ? in 3dmark ? - well ill guarantee you that wasn't because of NTFS. No way would you loose that many marks because of the file system of NTFS over FAT32, especially as it calculates the score based on the FPS of the scenes and not the loading time of them.
Unless your drive couldn't give 3d mark the data quick enough causing a sudden drop in FPS in the scene's (which means you have other issues somewhere else anyway) then something was different on each of the installations.

[spikegifted]

Benchmarks like of WinBench99 which test mainly 2D Windows performance is actually the best indicator of HDD performance in 'real world' application environments.

[St3v3]

Did u reformat it? or is it still blank?

If it's still blank use this:

http://www.runtime.org/gdb.htm

It'll recover your drives at least 99% of the time.

[St3v3]

oh yeah, never use FAT32 anymore. I wouldn't use it again, same goes with a floppy drive

[Dragonb4llz]

k....my main drive is fat32 and has lots of data on it. If i just convert to ntfs will i lose any data?

[Gozzy]

Dudes FAT32 is WAY Faster than NTFS, I did a test, I took my 80gb 7200RPM 8mb cache, full format the drive as NTFS, installed WinXP pro, run sisoft sandra 2002, Got 28000 score, then FORMAT again as FAT32, installed winxp, ran Sisoft sandra 2002, and it scored just over 33000!, I dont give a damn about Secure bla bla bla, I want PERFORMANCE!

[KraniX]

Originally posted by Rys
Secure? FAT32 doesn't support file or directory ownership. You have access to the filesystem, anyone can read or write the files on it. NFTS can apply complex permissions to any of the objects stored inside it, ownership, access rights etc. You can control access to everything on the filesystem, read, write, change, owner etc.

NTFS also supports locked secure file streams on all of its objects. You can be the only person with access to a file at any given time, with various IOCTL's, making it pretty secure in that regard. That's not even close to being the case with FAT32.

As for being more reliable, NTFS is a journalled filesystem. It can roll back to a previous state in the event of a problem. FAT32 doesn't even journal metadata, never mind actual files. That's where the reliability claim comes in.

Add in things like native compression, support for large partitions and files, and it's a comprehensive beating for FAT32.

And if I was running a company from my PC then all this stuff about ownership, and permission rights might actually be of some interest, I do take the point that NTFS has some excellent features but for the 'normal' home user what do these things actually do?

Xp has a roll back facility, okay so it ain't perfect and it may not be as great as a similar NTFS thing but it has saved me a couple of times after using manky drivers or summit.

As for speed and performance, FAT32 is way faster, fact (well it's a fact as far as I'm concerned, lol). Okay so index searching databases or other such stuff may be super quick but it ain't gonna improve the loading times of Battlefield.

And if NTFS is soooo amazing and secure, how comes people who have a NTFS file system can still be affected by viruses and hacking? I don't know any company that says "well we have NTFS, don't need norton or a firewall now."

I use avg anti virus and the windows firewall (zonealarm screwed my pc) and i thought this was a standard practice for most peeps, not just us lowly fools using FAT32.

Comments???

[Re-Invented]

Nother vote for NTFS

Lee

[KraniX]

reasons please?

[Gozzy]

Yeah Im with u all the way KarniX, wtf am i gonna do with all those features!, NOTHING....


So we win, FAT32 > NTFS