Comments on: Windows XP exFAT File System Driver

By: marinheiro

marinheiro — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 14:03:00 +0000

maybe it’s for a good cause, but, in my case, it’s a big pile of shit…

i’m a programmer and i use a bunch of small files (2, 4, 5kb) but exfat uses 128kb of the disk to store them… resuming, i’ve 56.2gb in files that are occupying 86.8gb!!!

By: Michael

Michael — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 08:11:00 +0000

Can exFat be seen in dos ??

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:54:02 +0000

DOESNT WORK!!!!!Help me!!! i have 3 days arround this fuckin problem

By: Mercy

Mercy — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 08:08:05 +0000

If I have to do anything extra its worth using it,but for me available space in my device itself seems to be extra :-)

By: scientus

scientus — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 16:02:13 +0000

@gokudomatic: for ext3 for windows, this works just fine, esp when you forget a certain file on your linux partition. http://www.fs-driver.org/ i havent used it in a year, but at that time the only downside was that journaling was not enabled using the windows side, so if something got messed up while you were using it, the fs would just revert back to the last time you booted linux ;)

By: exFAT File System Driver for Windows XP

exFAT File System Driver for Windows XP — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 10:19:06 +0000

[...] Source: gHacks [...]

By: Reult

Reult — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 23:00:22 +0000

Write/read access in MB/s to a NTFS USB-flash becomes slow as cluster size is chosen small. Typically the flash is accessible not more than some thousands times a second and this fact reduces the speed of it.

But if to choose cluster size, say, 64 kB, then at a speed of 15 MB/s (write) only 15 * 16 = 240, or less than 10% of max., writes are needed, thus reducing the speed just by the same low percentage.

The standard 4 kB cluster size reduces the speed twice or even more. Fragmented files show, surely, the worst speeds. To prevent this, exFAT is needed.

By: devlin19

devlin19 — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 18:13:06 +0000

I agree with Jake if I have to do anything extra its ot worth it

By: MakeMoneyFastAndEasy

MakeMoneyFastAndEasy — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 21:23:16 +0000

you can change any fat32 usb key to ntfs file system..you don’t need split files on 4gb.

By: TK

TK — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 09:57:11 +0000

@Doc:
FAT32 has a FILE limit size of 4GB, some programs impose a file limit of 2GB like the older win9x AVI format.
Just recently I wrote a 57G byte backup image to my 1TByte FAT32 formated external USB drive and it was split into just under 4GByte files.

General comment on the new exFAT format, I imagine that the exFAT system also does not support journaling like NTFS does so will have same FAT32 vulnerability to improper shutdown or removal resulting in the need for a scandisk in pre-vista operating systems or disk check in vista and above.

By: Window XP Repair Utilities

Window XP Repair Utilities — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 18:39:29 +0000

[...] Windows XP exFAT File System Driver Microsoft has released an update for Windows XP SP2 and SP3 system that adds exFAT file system drivers to the operating system. The exFAT file system is … [...]

By: gokudomatic

gokudomatic — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:03:10 +0000

@Jake:
Alas, a lot of times. DVD iso files, I’m sure you know that.
And that doesn’t concern only usb sticks, but also shared partitions between Windows and Linux.

But I use now NTFS because it works well enough now in Linux. I can write without fearing a total break.

But still, I’m more interested in ext3 driver for windows.

By: Jake

Jake — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 16:00:25 +0000

I use FAT32 for one simple reason. I can plug in a drive into almost any OS (Windows, OSX, Linux, and so on) and be able to not only read the file, but write to the drive without doing anything special. The moment I have to install anything to make it compatible with whatever system I am trying to us make is pointless to use FAT as all. The whole reason to use FAT32 is because it just works. The size limit can be a pain, but how often are you moving a file that large anyway.

By: Doc

Doc — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 15:38:42 +0000

“removal of the 4 GB file size limit”

FAT32 has a file size limit of 2GB, not 4.

By: Dave

Dave — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:12:16 +0000

The exFAT system was not developed for current flash media, but for the SDXC card with up to 2TB coming by this March. If you want to learn more, google “SDXC card”.

http://www.sdcard.org/developers/tech/sdxc

By: Transcontinental

Transcontinental — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 13:36:48 +0000

Charax, I was wondering the same thing. I just tried to read the ExFAT formatted (and filled) USB stick on my neighbor’s computer, and the stick appeared to be not formatted… so, it may be a security benefit, but not in terms of universality at this time ;)

By: Charax

Charax — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 13:25:01 +0000

Won’t an exFAT-formatted USB stick be unreadable in most operating systems (all XP ones without this system driver and all Vista pre-SP1 systems)?

In that case unless you’re only using your USB stick on your own systems, formatting it in exFAT seems like a phenomenally bad idea.

By: Transcontinental

Transcontinental — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 13:14:33 +0000

ExFAT has disadvantages on NTFS, but none, on the opposite, on FAT32 and moreover FAT, is that correct?
I’ve just installed this ExFAT driver, and formatting a USB key proposed indeed ExFAT as well as previous FAT and FAT32. All seems correct at this point.

By: Martin

Martin — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 13:03:24 +0000

Well devices that are using the exfat file system cannot use Readyboost. The NTFS system supports advanced data structures among other things.

By: DarkGenesis

DarkGenesis — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 11:35:48 +0000

You wrote: ” but also a few disadvantages in comparison to both the FAT32 and NTFS”

What ares theses few disadvantages ? I don’t find anything about that in the MS article ?

Thank you in advance Martin.