Thread: How to ntfs your hard drive

Hey, so I searched the forums and didn't find anything regarding how to ntfs your hard drive so i came across this..

Basically what this ntfs means is it allows you to download more than 4gbs at once to your hard drive. If your hard drive is fat16 or fat32 it wont let you download bigger than 4gigs. Youll recieve an error saying "exceeds file limit".

So in order to check what file system you have go into my computor and right click the hard drive you want to check.Then scroll down to properties, under the general tab it will say near the top left, file system:(whatever system you have). Below are the steps to follow if you want to convert.

DISCLAIMER Proceed at your own risk! The information here is accurate to the best of our knowledge. I will not be held responsible if this document causes your computer to explode or burst into flames. In real serious terms, if any corruption of data, hardware damage or any other kind of damage/losses/etc. arises from the use of this document, I will not be responsible for it. If you don't like this, please don't read any further. The offical link is here How to convert a FAT16 volume or a FAT32 volume to an NTFS file system in Windows XP




Note Although the chance of corruption or data loss during the conversion is minimal, it is recommend that you perform a backup of the data on the volume that you want to convert before you start the conversion.

To convert an existing FAT or FAT32 volume to NTFS, follow these steps:

1. Click Start, point to All Programs, point to Accessories, and then right click Command Prompt run as administarter.
2. At the command prompt, type the following, where drive letter is the drive that you want to convert:convert drive letter: /fs:ntfs
   For example, type the following command to convert drive E to NTFS: convert e: /fs:ntfs
   Note If the operating system is on the drive that you are converting, you will be prompted to schedule the task when you restart the computer because the conversion cannot be completed while the operating system is running. When you are prompted, click YES.
3. When you receive the following message at the command prompt, type the volume label of the drive that you are converting, and then press ENTER:The type of the file system is FAT.
   Enter the current volume label for drive. Basically the name of your hard drive. mine was called "My Book".
4. When the conversion to NTFS is complete, you receive the following message at the command prompt:Conversion complete. Note it does tak awhile 10-30min and when its running it may look like nothing is happening but just be pateint.
5. Quit the command prompt.

Troubleshooting

• When you try to convert a volume to NTFS, you receive the following error message at the command prompt: Convert cannot gain exclusive access to the drive letter drive, so it cannot convert it now. Would you like to schedule it to be converted the next time the system restarts? <Y/N>
  
  
  This issue occurs when the volume that you are trying to convert is in use, for example, if the drive that you want to convert is the same drive where Windows XP is running.
  
  To resolve this issue, type Y at the command prompt. The volume or drive is converted to NTFS the next time that you start your computer.
• When you try to convert a volume to NTFS, you receive the following error message at the command prompt:Convert cannot run because the volume is in use by another process. Convert may run if this volume is dismounted first. ALL OPENED HANDLES TO THIS VOLUME WOULD THEN BE INVALID. Would you like to force a dismount on this volume? <Y/N>
  
  
  This issue occurs when there are files that are being used on the volume that you are trying to convert. This includes files that are accessed by users over the network.
  
  To resolve this issue, use one of the following methods:
  
  • Quit all the programs that are using the files on the drive, and then type y at the command prompt to convert the drive to NTFS.
  • At the command prompt, type Y.
  
  

You receive the following error message: Convert cannot gain exclusive access to the drive letter drive, so it cannot convert it now. Would you like to schedule it to be converted the next time the system restarts? <Y/N>


Type Y at the command prompt. The volume or drive is converted to NTFS the next time that you start your computer.

If this helped you please rep me thanks ;)

Great tutorial, going to convert my external once I get home :)

Great! My HDDs are already NTFS, but thanks!

Cool tut..Thanks..I have a couple dual and triple boot machines, had to learn that NTFS doesn't play well with HFS+ in mac..Luckily there's a couple proggies to help with that..

NTFS first step
Truecrypt second step :D

mine are already, but cool it will helps in future :)

Nice one thanx

That's pretty basic stuff but... you can do it even easier in UI form using Windows Explorer. Not bashing you man.

nice i will need that someday i am sure