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    USB Pen Drives and large files?

    Discussion in 'Windows OS and Software' started by ravenmorpheus, Jul 8, 2008.

  1. ravenmorpheus

    ravenmorpheus Notebook Deity

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    Hi guys

    I just bought myself a Kingston DataTraveler USB Pen Drive - 4gb in size.

    I notice that it's formatted to FAT32 and I can't re-format it to NTFS in XP but I can in Vista.

    I know that you can only transfer files up to a certain size when a drive is FAT32 (at least that's how I understand it).

    Is this a problem and is there anyway around it?

    Also why can I not use the USB pen drive for Readyboost - is there only a certain type of USB pen drive that can be used?

    Thanks in advance for any help/advice :)
     
    ravenmorpheus, Jul 8, 2008
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  2. Diablo

    Diablo Metalhead

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    readyboost tests the drive to see if it will meet certain speed requirements for read/write, if it doesnt meet those requirements, vista wont use it as a readyboost drive. formatting it to ntfs would certainly help the speed test if you really want to use it as a readyboost drive.

    as for your other question: http://www.irongeek.com/i.php?page=security/usb-flash-thumb-drive-ntfs-filesystem go there, let us know if it works
     
    Diablo, Jul 8, 2008
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  3. Nebelwand

    Nebelwand Notebook Consultant

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    You can, you just need to go into the device's properties dialog and change a setting from "Optimise for quick removal" to "Optimise for performance" first.
     
    Nebelwand, Jul 8, 2008
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  4. ravenmorpheus

    ravenmorpheus Notebook Deity

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    Oh ok. Thanks guys. Much appreciated. :)
     
    ravenmorpheus, Jul 8, 2008
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  5. THAANSA3

    THAANSA3 Exit Stage Left

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    Only certain drives can be used for Readyboost. Normally, you'll know when you read the specs if you purchase from Newegg. I don't know about other retailers, though. How much RAM do you currently have installed? I've read that Readyboost really doesn't make a difference if you have more that 1GB installed, so you may not be missing out on much.
     
    THAANSA3, Jul 8, 2008
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  6. srunni

    srunni Notebook Deity

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    That's correct—the maximum size of a file on a FAT32 partition is 4 GB. There is no way around this—you have to use another filesystem if you want to store larger files. What exactly are you trying to store that's so large? Perhaps you could use WinRAR to create a compressed archive of the file that's split into multiple smaller files? Note that this would be impractical if you're going to be regularly accessing the file.
     
    srunni, Jul 8, 2008
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  7. ravenmorpheus

    ravenmorpheus Notebook Deity

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    Nothing bigger than 4gb. I didn't realise that was where the limit is set. I guess seeing as the pen drive is 4gb I don't need to worry. I though the limit was something around 2gb...

    I have a Dawn of War Soulstorm mod folder that is 2.2gb in size before using winrar or anything similar that I need to transfer between laptops, just wondering if I'd be able to transfer it the pen drive wholesale rather than compressing, thinking of saving time you see...
     
    ravenmorpheus, Jul 8, 2008
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  8. FusiveResonance

    FusiveResonance Notebook Evangelist

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    ofcourse you could. just drag and drop the folder
     
    FusiveResonance, Jul 8, 2008
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