Home computer use: file systems: exFAT vs NTFS vs FAT32

Self-tutoring about file systems: the tutor mentions differences among exFAT, NTFS, and FAT32.

I was backing up files from hard drive to usb drive when I ran into a problem: a file was over 4GB, so the usb drive couldn’t accept it. As it turned out, the usb drive had the FAT32 file system.

A peculiarity of FAT32 is, apparently, a file size limit of 4GB. However, the FAT32 system is the most compatible across systems.

exFAT is related to FAT32, but with a much larger file size limit.

It seems that a key advantage of FAT32 and exFAT is that they’re both read-write with both Windows and Mac. FAT32 is with Linux as well; exFAT can be, with the proper software. My experience is that adding software to a Linux system is straightforward.

NTFS, it seems, is meant for Windows, with variable compatibility among other platforms. Apparently, it allows very large files. When used with Windows, NTFS seems to have other features relating to data recovery and encryption.

Such is my understanding of the three file formats.

These days I only use Windows, but I used exFAT for the usb backup drive.

Source:

pcmag.com