CONVERT FAT 32 to NTFS

Donald McDaniel wrote:
On Sun, 30 Jul 2006 14:16:14 -0700, "Ken Blake, MVP"
wrote:

Wayne wrote:

All replies are appreciated! Of course the "Try It" camp/position
is true in itself. What the CONVERT.EXE utility does not tell us
is the resulting size of the cluster ~ 512 bytes (or is that known
by the more experienced?)

Will follow through with Alex Nichol's paper and dwnld the
appropriate $40.oo utility to keep the cluster at 4k. (Is there a
no-cost, share-ware utility? If so, what would it be called???)


Yes, you can use BootIt Next Generation, as the page I cited
explains. As Alewx states, "priced at US$30 but with a 30-day fully
functional trial."


BTW, what is the downside of a 512 byte cluster vs a 4k cluster?
Speed?


Exactly. The use of 512-byte clusters will be slower.

In addition, 4k clusters are a much better use of larger HDs
space-wise, or so the experts say.



Actually, no--it's the other way around. The smaller the cluster size, the
less space is wasted to slack. Unless a file's size is exactly a multiple of
the cluster size, every file will waste a portion of its last cluster. If
you assume that how much of that last cluster is wasted is randomly
distributed (not strictly true, but close enough for our purposes here) on
the average every file wastes half of one cluster. So total waste due to
slack is roughly the number of files times cluster size. Since 4K is 8 times
512 bytes, waste is 8 times as high with 4K clusters.

But in these days of very cheap hard drives, the value of that waste in
dollars (substitute your own local currency, if not dollars) is so small as
to be insignificant. I don't think any decisions about cluster size,
partition size, or anything else should even take that kind of waste into
consideration.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

Interesting happened "on the way to the forum". I have two physical drives,
three partitions in each (each about 10Gb).

Before "I knew anything (!)", I used CONVERT on drive #2 (Part F, G, H).
CONVERT changed the FAT32 system to NTFS, 512 bytes per Cluster (512 bytes
per Sector, 1 sector to a Cluster).

For Drive #1, Partitions D & E I converted first before thinking, asking
about what might happen to the Root Partition, C. These converted to 8
Sectors per Cluster or 4k bytes! Driven by this "success" and w/o other
means ~ BootItNG which I did dwnld), I used Convert directly on "C". . . .
4k bytes per Cluster.

Question: Why did one drive convert to only One Sector/Cluster and another
to Eight Sectors/Cluster?

Wayne





"databaseben" wrote in message
news
ps: when you do convert /? you will see an exampl of the command line.
Use
it.....
--
~~~~~~~~~~~
"To be a 0 or is it to be the 1 ?
That is the data".......W.Gatespeare


"Wayne" wrote:

Using XP on a machine that originally was driven by ME.

Have converted all drives/partitions that were FAT 32 to NTFS.

Can I safely convert the ROOT Drive, C, from the C Prompt within XP? [
C:\Convert C:/fs:ntfs ]

Wayne

Wayne wrote:

Interesting happened "on the way to the forum". I have two physical
drives, three partitions in each (each about 10Gb).

Before "I knew anything (!)", I used CONVERT on drive #2 (Part F, G,
H). CONVERT changed the FAT32 system to NTFS, 512 bytes per Cluster
(512 bytes per Sector, 1 sector to a Cluster).

For Drive #1, Partitions D & E I converted first before thinking,
asking about what might happen to the Root Partition, C. These
converted to 8 Sectors per Cluster or 4k bytes! Driven by this
"success" and w/o other means ~ BootItNG which I did dwnld), I used
Convert directly on "C". . . . 4k bytes per Cluster.

Question: Why did one drive convert to only One Sector/Cluster and
another to Eight Sectors/Cluster?


It has to do with how the clusters are aligned before conversion.. Read
he: http://www.aumha.org/a/ntfscvt.htm

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

CVTAREA is complex, can there much of a downside to not using it?

Jim



"Donald McDaniel" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:50:15 GMT, "Wayne"
wrote:

While in XP, then command prompt to execute CONVERT, I noticed that
CONVERT
process requires that the disk be unmounted (did this for other drives).
What will this do to the 'C' drive from where CONVERT is executed and XP
is
located?

Or am I complicating the problem???

Wayne

A UPS is in place.

You're complicating the non-problem. You will be asked to reboot,
then the conversion will be accomplished.

Of course, if you don't feel that's safe, just boot using the XP
install disk, and use the FIRST "Recovery" option, go the the Recovery
Console, and enter your Administrator account Password (NOT your user
account password, administratior privileges not-withstanding -- it
won't work. It MUST be the ORIGINAL Administrator account Password
you created when installing XP), and enter the convert command using
the flags you pointed out earlier. DON'T include the "\" part of
"C:", since you will be converting the DRIVE, not the root folder
(can't anyway).

Since the HD won't be mounted, you won't have to reboot.

ConvertConverts FAT and FAT32 volumes to NTFS.

Syntax
convert [volume] /fs:ntfs [/v] [/cvtarea:FileName] [/nosecurity] [/x]

Parameters
volume
Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon), mount point, or
volume name to convert to NTFS.
/fs:ntfs
Required. Converts the volume to NTFS.
/v
Specifies verbose mode, that is, all messages will be displayed during
conversion.
/cvtarea:FileName
For advanced users only. Specifies that the Master File Table (MFT)
and other NTFS metadata files are written to an existing, contiguous
placeholder file. This file must be in the root directory of the file
system to be converted. Use of the /CVTAREA parameter can result in a
less fragmented file system after conversion. For best results, the
size of this file should be 1 KB multiplied by the number of files and
directories in the file system, however, the convert utility accepts
files of any size.
For more information about using the /cvtarea parameter, see "File
Systems" at the Microsoft Windows XP Resource Kits Web
site.(http://www.microsoft.com/)

Important

You must create the placeholder file using the fsutil file createnew
command prior to running convert. Convert does not create this file
for you. Convert overwrites this file with NTFS metadata. After
conversion, any unused space in this file is freed. For more
information about the fsutil file command, see Related Topics.
/nosecurity
Specifies that the converted files and directory security settings are
accessible by everyone.
/x
Dismounts the volume, if necessary, before it is converted. Any open
handles to the volume will no longer be valid.
Remarks
You must specify that the drive should be converted when the computer
is restarted. Otherwise, you cannot convert the current drive.
If convert cannot lock the drive (for example, the system volume or
the current drive), it offers to convert the drive the next time the
computer restarts.
The location of the MFT is different on volumes that have been
converted from previous version of NTFS, so volume performance might
not be as good on volumes converted from Windows NT.
Volumes converted from FAT to NTFS lack some performance benefits
compared to volumes initially formatted with NTFS. On converted
volumes, the MFT might become fragmented. In addition, on converted
boot volumes, NTFS permissions are not applied after the volume is
converted.
Examples
To convert the volume on drive E to NTFS and display all messages,
type:

convert e: /fs:ntfs /v


==

Donald L McDaniel
Please Reply to the Original Thread.
================================================== ======

On Tue, 1 Aug 2006 09:26:20 -0500, "Jim Gainsley"
wrote:

CVTAREA is complex, can there much of a downside to not using it?

Jim



"Donald McDaniel" wrote in message
.. .
On Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:50:15 GMT, "Wayne"
wrote:

While in XP, then command prompt to execute CONVERT, I noticed that
CONVERT
process requires that the disk be unmounted (did this for other drives).
What will this do to the 'C' drive from where CONVERT is executed and XP
is
located?

Or am I complicating the problem???

Wayne

A UPS is in place.

You're complicating the non-problem. You will be asked to reboot,
then the conversion will be accomplished.

Of course, if you don't feel that's safe, just boot using the XP
install disk, and use the FIRST "Recovery" option, go the the Recovery
Console, and enter your Administrator account Password (NOT your user
account password, administratior privileges not-withstanding -- it
won't work. It MUST be the ORIGINAL Administrator account Password
you created when installing XP), and enter the convert command using
the flags you pointed out earlier. DON'T include the "\" part of
"C:", since you will be converting the DRIVE, not the root folder
(can't anyway).

Since the HD won't be mounted, you won't have to reboot.

ConvertConverts FAT and FAT32 volumes to NTFS.

Syntax
convert [volume] /fs:ntfs [/v] [/cvtarea:FileName] [/nosecurity] [/x]

Parameters
volume
Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon), mount point, or
volume name to convert to NTFS.
/fs:ntfs
Required. Converts the volume to NTFS.
/v
Specifies verbose mode, that is, all messages will be displayed during
conversion.
/cvtarea:FileName
For advanced users only. Specifies that the Master File Table (MFT)
and other NTFS metadata files are written to an existing, contiguous
placeholder file. This file must be in the root directory of the file
system to be converted. Use of the /CVTAREA parameter can result in a
less fragmented file system after conversion. For best results, the
size of this file should be 1 KB multiplied by the number of files and
directories in the file system, however, the convert utility accepts
files of any size.
For more information about using the /cvtarea parameter, see "File
Systems" at the Microsoft Windows XP Resource Kits Web
site.(http://www.microsoft.com/)

Important

You must create the placeholder file using the fsutil file createnew
command prior to running convert. Convert does not create this file
for you. Convert overwrites this file with NTFS metadata. After
conversion, any unused space in this file is freed. For more
information about the fsutil file command, see Related Topics.
/nosecurity
Specifies that the converted files and directory security settings are
accessible by everyone.
/x
Dismounts the volume, if necessary, before it is converted. Any open
handles to the volume will no longer be valid.
Remarks
You must specify that the drive should be converted when the computer
is restarted. Otherwise, you cannot convert the current drive.
If convert cannot lock the drive (for example, the system volume or
the current drive), it offers to convert the drive the next time the
computer restarts.
The location of the MFT is different on volumes that have been
converted from previous version of NTFS, so volume performance might
not be as good on volumes converted from Windows NT.
Volumes converted from FAT to NTFS lack some performance benefits
compared to volumes initially formatted with NTFS. On converted
volumes, the MFT might become fragmented. In addition, on converted
boot volumes, NTFS permissions are not applied after the volume is
converted.
Examples
To convert the volume on drive E to NTFS and display all messages,
type:

convert e: /fs:ntfs /v



Jim, I didn't write anything but what I wrote. All else is cut and
pasted from Help And Support's article for the convert command.

To be honest, the /cvrtarea flag seems to be rather complex to me
also. I personally like to avoid complexity when able, so I just
format my partitions as NTFS in the first place, and never bother with
the convert command. But I back up my data, and have no problems
installing XP clean each time as a result. I've never had good luck
with doing upgrade installs, especially upgrading from an older OS to
a newer one.

Of course, someone who fails to back up his data, then wants to do
low-level disk changes is counting on the luck of the draw. I prefer
not to gamble when it's not necessary.

Sometimes, you just have to bite the bullet, and wipe your drives if
you want a good install of XP.


==

Donald L McDaniel
Please Reply to the Original Thread.
================================================== ======

On Mon, 31 Jul 2006 08:41:00 -0700, "Ken Blake, MVP"
wrote:

Donald McDaniel wrote:
On Sun, 30 Jul 2006 14:16:14 -0700, "Ken Blake, MVP"
wrote:

Wayne wrote:

All replies are appreciated! Of course the "Try It" camp/position
is true in itself. What the CONVERT.EXE utility does not tell us
is the resulting size of the cluster ~ 512 bytes (or is that known
by the more experienced?)

Will follow through with Alex Nichol's paper and dwnld the
appropriate $40.oo utility to keep the cluster at 4k. (Is there a
no-cost, share-ware utility? If so, what would it be called???)


Yes, you can use BootIt Next Generation, as the page I cited
explains. As Alewx states, "priced at US$30 but with a 30-day fully
functional trial."


BTW, what is the downside of a 512 byte cluster vs a 4k cluster?
Speed?


Exactly. The use of 512-byte clusters will be slower.

In addition, 4k clusters are a much better use of larger HDs
space-wise, or so the experts say.



Actually, no--it's the other way around. The smaller the cluster size, the
less space is wasted to slack. Unless a file's size is exactly a multiple of
the cluster size, every file will waste a portion of its last cluster. If
you assume that how much of that last cluster is wasted is randomly
distributed (not strictly true, but close enough for our purposes here) on
the average every file wastes half of one cluster. So total waste due to
slack is roughly the number of files times cluster size. Since 4K is 8 times
512 bytes, waste is 8 times as high with 4K clusters.

But in these days of very cheap hard drives, the value of that waste in
dollars (substitute your own local currency, if not dollars) is so small as
to be insignificant. I don't think any decisions about cluster size,
partition size, or anything else should even take that kind of waste into
consideration.

Thanks, Ken, I wasn't thinking too clearly when I wrote my last post.

In these days of 1gig or larger files, I am told that 4k clusters are
"better". Whether this means "better physical disk usage-wise" or
"better file storage/access-wise", or "better for sales of hard
drives" I'm not quite sure. But evidently the programmers at
Microsoft thought that 4k clusters are better (for some reason,
whatever it is) than 512 byte clusters, and made 4k clusters the
default for NTFS.

I really don't want to believe they intentionally created a file
storage system which WASTES most of our physical disk space, as you
say 4k clusters do.

==

Donald L McDaniel
Please Reply to the Original Thread.
================================================== ======

Donald McDaniel wrote:

On Mon, 31 Jul 2006 08:41:00 -0700, "Ken Blake, MVP"
wrote:
In addition, 4k clusters are a much better use of larger HDs
space-wise, or so the experts say.



Actually, no--it's the other way around. The smaller the cluster
size, the less space is wasted to slack. Unless a file's size is
exactly a multiple of the cluster size, every file will waste a
portion of its last cluster. If you assume that how much of that
last cluster is wasted is randomly distributed (not strictly true,
but close enough for our purposes here) on the average every file
wastes half of one cluster. So total waste due to slack is roughly
the number of files times cluster size.


Sorry, typo. That should have been the number of files times *half* the
cluster size.


Since 4K is 8 times 512
bytes, waste is 8 times as high with 4K clusters.

But in these days of very cheap hard drives, the value of that waste
in dollars (substitute your own local currency, if not dollars) is
so small as to be insignificant. I don't think any decisions about
cluster size, partition size, or anything else should even take that
kind of waste into consideration.

Thanks, Ken, I wasn't thinking too clearly when I wrote my last post.


You're welcome, Donald. Glad to help.



In these days of 1gig or larger files, I am told that 4k clusters are
"better". Whether this means "better physical disk usage-wise" or
"better file storage/access-wise", or "better for sales of hard
drives" I'm not quite sure.


No, none of the above. In this case, "better" simply means faster.


But evidently the programmers at
Microsoft thought that 4k clusters are better (for some reason,
whatever it is) than 512 byte clusters, and made 4k clusters the
default for NTFS.

I really don't want to believe they intentionally created a file
storage system which WASTES most of our physical disk space, as you
say 4k clusters do.


No, sorry, I didn't mean to say anything like that at all. Two points:

1. a 4K cluster size is actually small and it wastes very little compared to
typical waste on FAT32 drives. The following numbers are very rough, but
will give you an idea of the amount of waste. Let's say you have 100,000
files in 40GB of disk space with 4K clusters. That's a average waste of
about 2K per file. and 2K time 100,000 is a total waste of 200MB, or about
half of 1% of the drive. Certainly not "most of our physical disk space."

2. My other point is one I made in my previous message, and I'll repeat it:
"But in these days of very cheap hard drives, the value of that waste in
dollars (substitute your own local currency, if not dollars) is so small as
to be insignificant. I don't think any decisions about cluster size,
partition size, or anything else should even take that kind of waste into
consideration." If that hypothetical 40GB drive cost $40US, the cost of
wasting that 200MB is 20 cents.

--
Ken Blake - Microsoft MVP Windows: Shell/User
Please reply to the newsgroup

Thanks, Donald
Jim

"Donald McDaniel" wrote in message
...
On Tue, 1 Aug 2006 09:26:20 -0500, "Jim Gainsley"
wrote:

CVTAREA is complex, can there much of a downside to not using it?

Jim



"Donald McDaniel" wrote in message
.. .
On Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:50:15 GMT, "Wayne"
wrote:

While in XP, then command prompt to execute CONVERT, I noticed that
CONVERT
process requires that the disk be unmounted (did this for other
drives).
What will this do to the 'C' drive from where CONVERT is executed and
XP
is
located?

Or am I complicating the problem???

Wayne

A UPS is in place.

You're complicating the non-problem. You will be asked to reboot,
then the conversion will be accomplished.

Of course, if you don't feel that's safe, just boot using the XP
install disk, and use the FIRST "Recovery" option, go the the Recovery
Console, and enter your Administrator account Password (NOT your user
account password, administratior privileges not-withstanding -- it
won't work. It MUST be the ORIGINAL Administrator account Password
you created when installing XP), and enter the convert command using
the flags you pointed out earlier. DON'T include the "\" part of
"C:", since you will be converting the DRIVE, not the root folder
(can't anyway).

Since the HD won't be mounted, you won't have to reboot.

ConvertConverts FAT and FAT32 volumes to NTFS.

Syntax
convert [volume] /fs:ntfs [/v] [/cvtarea:FileName] [/nosecurity] [/x]

Parameters
volume
Specifies the drive letter (followed by a colon), mount point, or
volume name to convert to NTFS.
/fs:ntfs
Required. Converts the volume to NTFS.
/v
Specifies verbose mode, that is, all messages will be displayed during
conversion.
/cvtarea:FileName
For advanced users only. Specifies that the Master File Table (MFT)
and other NTFS metadata files are written to an existing, contiguous
placeholder file. This file must be in the root directory of the file
system to be converted. Use of the /CVTAREA parameter can result in a
less fragmented file system after conversion. For best results, the
size of this file should be 1 KB multiplied by the number of files and
directories in the file system, however, the convert utility accepts
files of any size.
For more information about using the /cvtarea parameter, see "File
Systems" at the Microsoft Windows XP Resource Kits Web
site.(http://www.microsoft.com/)

Important

You must create the placeholder file using the fsutil file createnew
command prior to running convert. Convert does not create this file
for you. Convert overwrites this file with NTFS metadata. After
conversion, any unused space in this file is freed. For more
information about the fsutil file command, see Related Topics.
/nosecurity
Specifies that the converted files and directory security settings are
accessible by everyone.
/x
Dismounts the volume, if necessary, before it is converted. Any open
handles to the volume will no longer be valid.
Remarks
You must specify that the drive should be converted when the computer
is restarted. Otherwise, you cannot convert the current drive.
If convert cannot lock the drive (for example, the system volume or
the current drive), it offers to convert the drive the next time the
computer restarts.
The location of the MFT is different on volumes that have been
converted from previous version of NTFS, so volume performance might
not be as good on volumes converted from Windows NT.
Volumes converted from FAT to NTFS lack some performance benefits
compared to volumes initially formatted with NTFS. On converted
volumes, the MFT might become fragmented. In addition, on converted
boot volumes, NTFS permissions are not applied after the volume is
converted.
Examples
To convert the volume on drive E to NTFS and display all messages,
type:

convert e: /fs:ntfs /v



Jim, I didn't write anything but what I wrote. All else is cut and
pasted from Help And Support's article for the convert command.

To be honest, the /cvrtarea flag seems to be rather complex to me
also. I personally like to avoid complexity when able, so I just
format my partitions as NTFS in the first place, and never bother with
the convert command. But I back up my data, and have no problems
installing XP clean each time as a result. I've never had good luck
with doing upgrade installs, especially upgrading from an older OS to
a newer one.

Of course, someone who fails to back up his data, then wants to do
low-level disk changes is counting on the luck of the draw. I prefer
not to gamble when it's not necessary.

Sometimes, you just have to bite the bullet, and wipe your drives if
you want a good install of XP.


==

Donald L McDaniel
Please Reply to the Original Thread.
================================================== ======