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I currently have a FAT32 disk, and I wish to convert it to NTFS. I already have Windows XP installed on the disk.

I went to the Disk Manger and it gives the option to go ahead and convert the disk to a dynamic disk.

Is this safe?


Is there any safe way to convert to NTFS without wiping everything out?

There is no such thing as a truly safe way to do anything that major on your machine. Make sure you backup all the shit you want backed up, and make sure you have all the software you might have to reinstall somewhere convenient. Then go ahead with the changeover. FAT32 under NT 5.x is horrible. Convert to NTFS as soon as possible. Of course, what would make for a cleaner and more reliable machine is to simply reformat the disk under NTFS.

Don't convert to a dynamic disk.

Head into the DOS prompt and type this command:

CONVERT C: /FS:NTFS

I set up dynamic disk w/ software RAID on a friend's computer, however I can't get the C drive to work that way, so I just made another drive and stuck the swapfile on it. Is that ok? Anyways for future reference how do you put the C: drive on software RAID?

For me, I just formatted the whole thing to NTFS under windows setup. I think this is the most sure-est way to convert to NTFS.

Well I converted to NTFS. Even though it's not as good as starting with NTFS it's better than FAT32.


I'm still looking into that dynamic disk thing, wondering if it's something I want to change my system to.

Eh I've only used NTFS for about a month under Win2k. FAT32 is more compatiable since I used to dual boot. It also doesn't have the logging overhead. Now I'm running Windows 98 only, so it's not applicable.

Pu-239 wrote:I set up dynamic disk w/ software RAID on a friend's computer, however I can't get the C drive to work that way, so I just made another drive and stuck the swapfile on it. Is that ok? Anyways for future reference how do you put the C: drive on software RAID?

You can't boot off of a dynamic partition, thefefore the C partition cannot be on software RAID, unless you use a controller to create such an array.

Lord MJ wrote:Well I converted to NTFS. Even though it's not as good as starting with NTFS it's better than FAT32.


I'm still looking into that dynamic disk thing, wondering if it's something I want to change my system to.

It is only used for RAID or JBOD arrays.

Lord MJ wrote:I'm still looking into that dynamic disk thing, wondering if it's something I want to change my system to.

Dynamic disk is only really useful if you have more than one hard drive. Unless you actually have two or more physical hard drives, don't bother with it.

I wont bother with that dynamic disk stuff then.


I have a few questions though, how do you password protect shares in XP. You could easily do it in 9x/ME but it seems to be absent in XP.

Is remote desktop secure, it seems to be a great feature (even though UNIX had it YEARS before M$ even existed.) Is there any type of protection when you type in your password remotely, or is the password sent out in clear text like telnet?


Also I might decide to install linux again, burn a couple cds for Redhat 8.0 or Mandrake 9.0.

Buy a new 100gb hard drive for the new installation. Hopefully midi support will work this time around.

Lord MJ wrote:I have a few questions though, how do you password protect shares in XP. You could easily do it in 9x/ME but it seems to be absent in XP.

WinNT/2K/XP network security works on the basis of userids and passwords rather than simple access passwords. If you want to protect a share all you need to do is alter its permissions list such that only authorized userids have access to the share.

I've never suffered XP but under Win2K what you need to do is bring up the properties dialog for the share in question, click on the permissions button and remove the users who shouldn't be able to access the share from the list of authorized users at the top of the permissions dialog.

Note that it's possible to implement much finer grained share security with NT/2K/XP than with 9x/ME. You can for instance allow reads but deny writes for certain users. Under NTFS privilages can be set on a file-by-file or directory-by-directory basis as well so you can share your HD to all authorized users on your lan but block access to specific directories. Or vice versa, if the need arises.

Enlightenment wrote:I've never suffered XP but under Win2K what you need to do is bring up the properties dialog for the share in question, click on the permissions button and remove the users who shouldn't be able to access the share from the list of authorized users at the top of the permissions dialog.

It works the same way in XP Pro. I'm not sure if XP Home has ACLs.

IIRC...once you convert to ntfs, there's no going back. It has it's benefits but if you are like me and periodically find yourself being drawn back to ods(Old dos games) then getting them to run gets more than a little bit complex...especially with xp and it's mutilated 'dos'

Coaan wrote:IIRC...once you convert to ntfs, there's no going back. It has it's benefits but if you are like me and periodically find yourself being drawn back to ods(Old dos games) then getting them to run gets more than a little bit complex...especially with xp and it's mutilated 'dos'

Are you sure about that? I'm not sure but I think you can format or convert back to FAT through windows setup.

Shinova wrote:

Coaan wrote:IIRC...once you convert to ntfs, there's no going back. It has it's benefits but if you are like me and periodically find yourself being drawn back to ods(Old dos games) then getting them to run gets more than a little bit complex...especially with xp and it's mutilated 'dos'

Are you sure about that? I'm not sure but I think you can format or convert back to FAT through windows setup.

Well it is possible to go back to fat32...it just leaves your hd with so many holes you would think it's swiss cheese...It -really- screws hd's, worse so than compressing it

phongn wrote:

Enlightenment wrote:I've never suffered XP but under Win2K what you need to do is bring up the properties dialog for the share in question, click on the permissions button and remove the users who shouldn't be able to access the share from the list of authorized users at the top of the permissions dialog.

It works the same way in XP Pro. I'm not sure if XP Home has ACLs.

Internally it does, you (the user) just cant use it. In safemode, that functionality is apparently unlocked but I havent seen that for my self.

ggs wrote:Internally it does, you (the user) just cant use it.

The easiest fix for that problem is to play with the magic numbers in setupp.ini, generate an appropriate serial number, and reinstall the thing as either pro or corporate.