Comparison of NTFS and FAT File Systems(网摘)

Comparison of NTFS and FAT File Systems

Subject of ComparisonNTFSFAT16FAT32

Operating system compatibility

A computer running Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003, Windows 2000, or Windows XP can access files on an NTFS partition. A computer running Windows NT  4.0 with Service Pack 4 or later can access files on the partition, but some NTFS features, such as Disk Quotas, are not available. Other operating systems allow no access.

File access is available to computers running Microsoft® MS-DOS®, all versions of Windows, Windows NT, Windows XP, Windows Vista, and OS/2.

File access is available only to computers running Microsoft® Windows 95 OSR2, Windows 98, Windows Me, Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Vista.

Volume size

Recommended minimum volume size is approximately 10 MB.

Recommended practical maximum for volumes is 2 terabytes. Much larger sizes are possible.

Cannot be used on floppy disks.

Volumes up to 4 GB.

Cannot be used on floppy disks.

Volumes from 512 MB to 2 terabytes.

In Windows Vista, you can format a FAT32 volume only up to 32 GB.

Cannot be used on floppy disks.

File size

Maximum file size 16 terabytes minus 64 KB (244 minus 64 KB)

Maximum file size 4 GB

Maximum file size 4 GB

Files per volume

4,294,967,295 (232 minus 1 files)

65,536 (216 files)

Approximately 4,177,920