Converting FAT32 to NTFS - Without Formatting

[GoatyGoat]

I want to convert a 19GB Drive to NTFS.

I understand that if using the convert utility built-in with Windows XP, then it'll be forced to use 512Bytes because the FAT32 partition will not be aligned to 4K Clusters (it's currently 16KB clusters).

So, is there a utility to align it to 4K clusters?? Can I use PM8 to convert? Or will it be esier to use Windows XP's conversion utility, then use PM8 to change cluster size??

Also, how long will all this take?

 

[bcastner]

The default for XP Convert is 4k clusters.

 

[bcastner]

On NTFS volumes, clusters start at sector zero; therefore, every cluster is aligned on the cluster boundary. For example, if the cluster size was 4K and the sector size was 512 bytes, clusters will always start at a sector number that is a multiple of 4096/512 — for example, 8.
However, FAT file system data clusters are located after the BIOS Parameter Blocks (BPB), reserved sectors, and two FAT structures. FAT formatting cannot guarantee that data clusters are aligned on a cluster boundary.

In Windows 2000, CONVERT handled this problem by forcing an NTFS cluster size of 512 bytes, which resulted in reduced performance and increased disk fragmentation. In Windows XP, CONVERT chooses the best cluster size (4K is the ideal and default).

 

[gpalmer711]

GoatyGoat,
You have already asked this question in thread779-683913 and thread779-683908.

Greg Palmer

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Any feed back is appreciated.

 

[GoatyGoat]

This is slightly different.

Are you sure that 4K clusters are used?? Whats if it does and up as 512Byte clusters....can I change that with PM8?