FAT vs NTfs

  • Thread starter Thread starter BattleAngel444
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B

BattleAngel444

Hi All

just see if there are any limitation to using FAT instead of NTFS, such
as not being able to implement HORM, EFW or other features that i may
need NTFS.

thanks for letting me pick your brains
-BA4^3
 
BattleAngel444,

There is no limitations on using FAT or NTFS file systems. Either of these will work fine with EWF.
HORM is also not a problem as long as you implement it properly (dismount unprotected volumes before hibernation).

There is however some optimizations points for using FAT instead of NTFS if EWF is implemented. Basically, you don't gain much of
nice features of NTFS (like reliability, stability, etc.) if EWF protects the volume. Also, NTFS is more chatter than FAT (more
writes) and that puts it behind FAT while selecting a FS for image with EWF or to run on CF.
 
Hi BA. There are some basic differences between FAT and NTFS, but as far as
I know, those differences shouldn't affect such features as HORM or EWF.
The main differences between the two file systems affect security stuff,
such as file sharing and per-file permissions - NTFS will allow you to
specify permissions on a file-by-file and folder-by-folder basis, as well as
for file sharing, whereas FAT does not give you this ability. If you have a
need to take advantage of the added security of NTFS, I would recommend
using that system.

On the other hand, FAT is generally cleaner for use with EWF and El Torito
configurations, as the OS doesn't do nearly as many "maintenance" writes to
the file system in FAT. Windows regularly updates an NTFS partition with
last-accessed information, etc., that it doesn't do with FAT (theoretically,
it should only modify the FAT tables whenever any new data is written to the
partition). Therefore, if you're using EWF, you may find FAT will use less
overall overlay space. (However, regardless of the file system you use, the
efficiency of your overlay will depend greatly on how your configuration is
set up.)

--
Matt Kellner ([email protected])
STE, Windows Embedded Group

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
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