NTFS or FAT 32 for my windows partition

[Sossity]

Which would be best? I like the idea of being able to read & write files between mac os x & windows, but have read that NTFS is more efficient & a better performer.

would going with NTFS for the windows part on my mac & getting something like NTFS for mac get the best of both worlds?

 

[Hellhammer]

Windows 7 and Vista will only install to NTFS formatted volume

 

[sup3r1or]

ONLY NTFS, what the guy said above is true.
Also FAT32 has 4GB file limit on it, meaning if you have a file 4.3 gb or more you wont be able to copy it into the drive (at least not in windows).

Also NTFS is more secure, it saves file structure incase of not proper shutdown so the files are recovered easily later.

 

[edtorious]

If I convert the windows part of my mac hd to NTFS and I decide to remove the windows later on and restore the partition back to my OSX will I be able to restore the NTFS part? I'm worried that if I convert that windows partition to NTFS, I won't be able to use that partition later on to use as part of my OSX if I decide to remove the windows later on? Any help or suggestions will be greatly appreciated. Thank you.

 

[balamw]

If I convert the windows part of my mac hd to NTFS and I decide to remove the windows later on and restore the partition back to my OSX will I be able to restore the NTFS part?

Boot Camp Assistant will restore your drive to a single Mac OS X HFS+ partition. You can also do this manually in Disk Utility.

B

 

[edtorious]

Boot Camp Assistant will restore your drive to a single Mac OS X HFS+ partition. You can also do this manually in Disk Utility.

B

Thanks!

 

[vistadude]

You can make an NTFS partition for windows and its programs, but have an additional FAT32 data partition so windows and mac both have write and read access. FAT32 is not slower than NTFS and the 4 GB file size limit is unlikely unless you have a huge Outlook inbox that's 10 years old.

 

[balamw]

You can make an NTFS partition for windows and its programs, but have an additional FAT32 data partition so windows and mac both have write and read access. FAT32 is not slower than NTFS and the 4 GB file size limit is unlikely unless you have a huge Outlook inbox that's 10 years old.

Note that once you have multiple partitions like this Boot Camp Assistant can no longer remove the partitions you must do so on your own in Disk Utility.

Funny that you mention 10 year old Outlook, since Outlook 2002 and earlier have a 2 GB maximum PST size that was a real pain to deal with since it didn't warn you when you got close to that http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Storage_Table#Size_and_formats wouldn't have been a problem on FAT32.

B

 

[vistadude]

Funny that's the exact problem I ran into. Had a few pst files from Outlook 2002 approaching 2 GB so I upgraded to Outlook 2007. Now I have about 8 GB worth of PST files and the windows partition is nearly full and getting very slow. Can't move these to the FAT32 data partition because these files are approaching 3 GB already.

Note that once you have multiple partitions like this Boot Camp Assistant can no longer remove the partitions you must do so on your own in Disk Utility.

Funny that you mention 10 year old Outlook, since Outlook 2002 and earlier have a 2 GB maximum PST size that was a real pain to deal with since it didn't warn you when you got close to that http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_Storage_Table#Size_and_formats wouldn't have been a problem on FAT32.

B