Converting HD from FAT32 to NTFS . . .

[sturgisrun]

Hi All:
I am new to DD 10.0- have been playing with it for about 4-5 days.

I have a total of 4 computers- all are NTFS File system on the HD except an Acer Ferrari 1004 Laptop (XP Pro) with FAT32-plus I have a WD Passport also wth Fat32.

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#1-> Can I convert these to NTFS ?
#2-> If so -> can it be done wthout losing data??
#3-> If so-> can it be done wth DD 10.0 & How???
#4-> If it can be done but not with DD 10.0-> what can I use to do it????
#5-> If this cannot be done with out losing data how could I do that ?????
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Sorry to have so many questions- but - I have found that this is the place to ask them since you get 'real time/life' answers here.

Thanx in advance for any help you can give me . . .

From the High Desert of New Mexico . . .

Terry
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[K0LO]

Terry:

This seems to be a popular question lately. DD won't convert FAT32 to NTFS but Windows will. Or, you can copy your data off temporarily, reformat the disk, and then copy the data back.

Here is a discussion (http://www.wilderssecurity.com/showthread.php?t=208279) of the same question. This thread has a link to another thread discussing the same thing. Hopefully some answers to your questions are in one of those 2 places.

[bigc73542]

Conversion from fat32 to NTFS is very simple.
here is the info from Microsoft http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307881

[Brian K]

sturgisrun,

You must convert to FAT32 4K Aligned before converting to NTFS. Otherwise you will get 1/2 kb clusters.

http://www.aumha.org/win5/a/ntfscvt.php

[Earthling]

-{ Quote: "... You must convert to FAT32 4K Aligned before converting to NTFS. Otherwise you will get 1/2 kb clusters ..." }-
It obviously doesn't do any harm to do this, but it isn't necessary if the FAT32 partition was created by XP or later. You can then use the convert command without any risk of the cluster size problem.

I have recently done such a conversion and it formatted to 4KB clusters.

[Brian K]

-{ Quote: "but it isn't necessary if the FAT32 partition was created by XP or later. " }-
Interesting. I converted from FAT32 to NTFS on one of my previous computers and got the small cluster issue. But I think the partition was created by Partition Magic. Thanks for the info.