FAT32 Benifits Questions

[Abraham]

I am building the ideal Win98SE system:
Pentium III 1Ghz
768Mb SDRAM
7200rpm hard drives
double-layer mulit-format 16x DVD burner
etc.

Microsoft can pry Windows 98 from my cold, dead, hard drive!

Anywho, I know that there are advantages to using FAT32 over FAT16. But, at
what point is a hard drive so big that FAT32 stops being an advantage and
becomes a disadvantage? 120 gigs? 200 gigs?

Also, I heard somewhere that DVDs can store 4.7 gigs, but since Windows 98
can only make files up to 4 gigs big, I can only use 4 gigs of a DVD disk
that I make while using Win98. Is this true, or is it just another one of
Microsoft's lies to get me to downgrade to WinXP (yet another part of the
evil communist conspiracy against me)?
I intend to install a secondary mega-drive (300+ gigs), and thus I will use
one of those NTFS for Win98 drivers anyway. So, will rigging the DVD-burner
software to go though the NTFS drive to create DVDs fix that 4 gig Win98
limitation?

[Jeff Richards]

Using drives larger that 137Gb with Windows 98 won't work without special
hardware and very careful attention to drivers.

FAT32 works fine up to this size. Performance issues are associated with the
number of files per folder, not the absolute partition size. I don't know
whether formatting the drive as NTFS and using a driver to allow Windows 98
to access it will overcome this problem or not - I would recommend
researching that question with the provider of the driver. Most Windows 98
applications can't handle files larger than the W98 file systems can't
handle, so if you do overcome the size limitation it will only be effective
for some applications.

CD and DVD drives do not use FAT32. Maximum file sizes for these drives
follow their own rules. Provided you don't try to manage these files as part
of a FAT32 file system and stick with applications that understand files of
this size then you won't have problems. Any limitation in the size of files
that can be created on the DVD will be a limitation of the application you
are using to burn the DVD, not a limitation of the Windows file system.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

Post by Abraham
Pentium III 1Ghz
768Mb SDRAM
7200rpm hard drives
double-layer mulit-format 16x DVD burner
etc.
Microsoft can pry Windows 98 from my cold, dead, hard drive!
Anywho, I know that there are advantages to using FAT32 over FAT16. But, at
what point is a hard drive so big that FAT32 stops being an advantage and
becomes a disadvantage? 120 gigs? 200 gigs?
Also, I heard somewhere that DVDs can store 4.7 gigs, but since Windows 98
can only make files up to 4 gigs big, I can only use 4 gigs of a DVD disk
that I make while using Win98. Is this true, or is it just another one of
Microsoft's lies to get me to downgrade to WinXP (yet another part of the
evil communist conspiracy against me)?
I intend to install a secondary mega-drive (300+ gigs), and thus I will use
one of those NTFS for Win98 drivers anyway. So, will rigging the DVD-burner
software to go though the NTFS drive to create DVDs fix that 4 gig Win98
limitation?

[Abraham]

137 gigs? Cool.
Then what's NTFS for?
No one will ever need more hard drive space than that!

You also said that I can put large files on a DVD whether or not Win98 has a
file size limitation.
Does that mean that I could copy a 4.7 gig not-copyrighted DVD to my hard
drive and then to my blank disk?
Or must I do a direct DVD-ROM drive to DVD burner drive copying?


Last thing though, how do I program my posts to all say "Microsoft can pull
Windows 98 from my cold, dead, hard drive!" at the end of the message I type?

Post by Jeff Richards
Using drives larger that 137Gb with Windows 98 won't work without special
hardware and very careful attention to drivers.
FAT32 works fine up to this size. Performance issues are associated with the
number of files per folder, not the absolute partition size. I don't know
whether formatting the drive as NTFS and using a driver to allow Windows 98
to access it will overcome this problem or not - I would recommend
researching that question with the provider of the driver. Most Windows 98
applications can't handle files larger than the W98 file systems can't
handle, so if you do overcome the size limitation it will only be effective
for some applications.
CD and DVD drives do not use FAT32. Maximum file sizes for these drives
follow their own rules. Provided you don't try to manage these files as part
of a FAT32 file system and stick with applications that understand files of
this size then you won't have problems. Any limitation in the size of files
that can be created on the DVD will be a limitation of the application you
are using to burn the DVD, not a limitation of the Windows file system.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

Post by Abraham
Pentium III 1Ghz
768Mb SDRAM
7200rpm hard drives
double-layer mulit-format 16x DVD burner
etc.
Microsoft can pry Windows 98 from my cold, dead, hard drive!
Anywho, I know that there are advantages to using FAT32 over FAT16. But, at
what point is a hard drive so big that FAT32 stops being an advantage and
becomes a disadvantage? 120 gigs? 200 gigs?
Also, I heard somewhere that DVDs can store 4.7 gigs, but since Windows 98
can only make files up to 4 gigs big, I can only use 4 gigs of a DVD disk
that I make while using Win98. Is this true, or is it just another one of
Microsoft's lies to get me to downgrade to WinXP (yet another part of the
evil communist conspiracy against me)?
I intend to install a secondary mega-drive (300+ gigs), and thus I will use
one of those NTFS for Win98 drivers anyway. So, will rigging the DVD-burner
software to go though the NTFS drive to create DVDs fix that 4 gig Win98
limitation?

[Tim Slattery]

Post by Abraham
137 gigs? Cool.
Then what's NTFS for?

Lots of things. Very large files, very large partitions, more
security, less likelihood of getting messed up and needed a CHKDSK
run...

Post by Abraham
No one will ever need more hard drive space than that!

That has a familiar ring to it.....

Post by Abraham
You also said that I can put large files on a DVD whether or not Win98 has a
file size limitation.

Win98 does not have a file size limitation. FAT32 does (and programs
written for Win98 may not know how to deal with larger files).

Post by Abraham
Does that mean that I could copy a 4.7 gig not-copyrighted DVD to my hard
drive and then to my blank disk?

If there are multiple files on that DVD and none are larger than 4GB,
then you will be able to do that. If any file on the DVD is larger
than 4GB, you won't be able to copy it to your FAT32 hard drive
partition.

[Abraham]

What I meant was that programs that copy not-copyrighted DVDs, but only have
one DVD drive to copy with, first copy the DVD to a temp file on the hard
drive, and then copy from the temp file onto the blank disk.
If I have a not-copyrighted DVD with 4.7 gigs of video on it, does that mean
that I won't be able to make an exact copy of it while using Win98?
Would I be able to work around this problem by copying directly from one DVD
drive to another, on-the-fly mode?

And no, no one will ever need more than 137 gigs of hard drive space.

Post by Tim Slattery

Post by Abraham
137 gigs? Cool.
Then what's NTFS for?

Lots of things. Very large files, very large partitions, more
security, less likelihood of getting messed up and needed a CHKDSK
run...

Post by Abraham
No one will ever need more hard drive space than that!

That has a familiar ring to it.....

Post by Abraham
You also said that I can put large files on a DVD whether or not Win98 has a
file size limitation.

Win98 does not have a file size limitation. FAT32 does (and programs
written for Win98 may not know how to deal with larger files).

Post by Abraham
Does that mean that I could copy a 4.7 gig not-copyrighted DVD to my hard
drive and then to my blank disk?

If there are multiple files on that DVD and none are larger than 4GB,
then you will be able to do that. If any file on the DVD is larger
than 4GB, you won't be able to copy it to your FAT32 hard drive
partition.
--
Tim Slattery
MS MVP(DTS)

[Jeff Richards]

You won't be able to put a file larger than 4Gb on a FAT32 drive, whatever
the application or file type. However, an intelligent application could, in
theory, split a file into parts or store it in some compressed way so that
you can rip a DVD (or clone it) by saving to a FAT32 partition, and burn a
copy. In other words, your question can't really be answered without knowing
the application you are using for the job and what provision has been made
within that application for handling FAT32 partitions. My guess is no-one
has bothered to build their applications like this as the simple answer
would always be to upgrade to an OS that supports NTFS. However, you might
find a video editor allows you to rip the DVD into components (menus,
scenes, etc), each of which would be much less than 4Gb, and then to
re-create it and burn it on the fly. Whatever, you will not be able to save
a file larger than 4Gb to that partition, and you will not be able copy a
file from a DVD to a FAT32 partition using Explorer (or similar) if it's
larger than 4Gb. Of course, you wouldn't usually do this, as a file larger
than 4Gb is going to be a movie file that cannot be manipulated in Explorer
anyway.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

Post by Abraham
What I meant was that programs that copy not-copyrighted DVDs, but only have
one DVD drive to copy with, first copy the DVD to a temp file on the hard
drive, and then copy from the temp file onto the blank disk.
If I have a not-copyrighted DVD with 4.7 gigs of video on it, does that mean
that I won't be able to make an exact copy of it while using Win98?
Would I be able to work around this problem by copying directly from one DVD
drive to another, on-the-fly mode?
And no, no one will ever need more than 137 gigs of hard drive space.

[Abraham]

So is the short version of your answer , 'ask the folks who made your burning
software if they took the FAT32 4gig file limit into account when they wrote
their software'?

Post by Jeff Richards
You won't be able to put a file larger than 4Gb on a FAT32 drive, whatever
the application or file type. However, an intelligent application could, in
theory, split a file into parts or store it in some compressed way so that
you can rip a DVD (or clone it) by saving to a FAT32 partition, and burn a
copy. In other words, your question can't really be answered without knowing
the application you are using for the job and what provision has been made
within that application for handling FAT32 partitions. My guess is no-one
has bothered to build their applications like this as the simple answer
would always be to upgrade to an OS that supports NTFS. However, you might
find a video editor allows you to rip the DVD into components (menus,
scenes, etc), each of which would be much less than 4Gb, and then to
re-create it and burn it on the fly. Whatever, you will not be able to save
a file larger than 4Gb to that partition, and you will not be able copy a
file from a DVD to a FAT32 partition using Explorer (or similar) if it's
larger than 4Gb. Of course, you wouldn't usually do this, as a file larger
than 4Gb is going to be a movie file that cannot be manipulated in Explorer
anyway.
--
Jeff Richards
MS MVP (Windows - Shell/User)

Post by Abraham
What I meant was that programs that copy not-copyrighted DVDs, but only have
one DVD drive to copy with, first copy the DVD to a temp file on the hard
drive, and then copy from the temp file onto the blank disk.
If I have a not-copyrighted DVD with 4.7 gigs of video on it, does that mean
that I won't be able to make an exact copy of it while using Win98?
Would I be able to work around this problem by copying directly from one DVD
drive to another, on-the-fly mode?
And no, no one will ever need more than 137 gigs of hard drive space.