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Subject: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

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Original Message 1/13 31-Jul-98 @ 12:41 AM - FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

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I was wondering whether anybody would know if FAT 16 is actually better for audio than FAT 32. At
first I assumed FAT 32 because of smaller clusters
on large drives, but one person said go back to
FAT 16, its faster. Is this really true ? Wouldn,t
audio take up more space and I thought if the FAT
is 32 that means 32 bit right. Also, are smaller partitions really better or a big roomy 6 or 7 gig drive ? ALL COMMENTS GREATFULLY APPReCIATED

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Message 2/13 31-Jul-98 @ 03:23 AM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

Islandman

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Due to the 4K cluster in FAT32 some people believe that reading the data off the drive (audio or otherwise) is slower. For a real life test find a friend with a different type table and do some audio recording and playback. Has anyone actually tried this?? Regardless, the main factor still remains the seek time of the drive, 10ms or less if you can...

Peace

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Message 3/13 02-Aug-98 @ 11:17 AM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

Purple Haze

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Well, fat 32 should be faster... I don't know the theory behind it, but heard different people say it IS faster, and I've got a 6 gig quantum fireball, and the fat16 partition does about 5-6 meg a sec, the fat32 partition more than 7meg a sec.

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Message 4/13 02-Aug-98 @ 01:10 PM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

Rouge

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Doh!!!!!

Its a well known fact that FAT32 should NOT be used for digtal audio purposes and hard-disk recording!
Its something to do with that 4k thing that Islandman's on about.

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Message 5/13 02-Aug-98 @ 01:26 PM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

The Pimp

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FAT 32 is far faster then 16 bit. Hypothetically at least. I will admit FAT 32 is not the ideal but it's far better then 16. While I have not done a formal test I will say that when I first changed my system to a FAT 32 from 16 I knowticed a signifigant performance gain. Overall I had far more problems when it comes to lost clusters and the like when using FAT 16. Anyway I'm not quite sure why 16 would be better for audio cause that just doesn't make sense to me at all.

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Message 6/13 02-Aug-98 @ 07:18 PM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

Clemens.Kurtzt-online.de

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Well, I�ve checked out both on my SCSI equiped PC:

16 bit FAT AND 32 bit FAT. There was really NO difference.

But: I have got an UltraWide SCSI Adaptec busmaster controller (2940).

With E-IDE you should use 16 bit FAT, with Ultra DMA IDE there should be no measurable differences too.

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Message 7/13 02-Aug-98 @ 10:07 PM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

Purple Haze

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Rouge:
Who says it's a well known fact you shouldn't use fat32 for hd recording ? If this is the case, I'd like to know why. My fat32 partition is faster (tested with that IQS tool), isn't that one of the criteria for hd recording ?

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Message 8/13 03-Aug-98 @ 02:51 AM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

daniel

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my FAT 32 is faster than the 16... and it seems to be more stable.

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Message 9/13 03-Aug-98 @ 03:47 PM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

Rez

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FAT16 vs FAT32.
Question: Which is better for audio?
Answer: Depends.

FAT16: Stores files in larger cluster sizes (which can eat hard drive space), is a BIT (but only a wee bit) more stable and can interact with other file systems more easily.
FAT32: Stores files in smaller cluster sizes (which saves hard drive space), is faster then FAT16 by a long shot, but sometimes has problems with other file systems. FAT32 exists only with certain versions of Win95 (there are 5 versions BTW.)

So to make a long story short, use FAT16 is you have plenty of HD space, a fast CPU and you are on some sort of a network, otherwise, rebuild your system with FAT32.

***WARNING*** Backup EVERYTHING before converting. There are conversion utilities available but they are not always stable or thorough. SO USE AT YOUR OWN RISK!!!!

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Message 10/13 03-Aug-98 @ 04:04 PM - RE: FAT 16 or FAT 32 for digital audio ?

99devils

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From a computer programmer's prospective:

FAT32 is a significantly better filesystem. It's faster and more stable, and unless you enjoy dealing with the clunky way Windows deals with multiple drives, you don't have much of a choice when formatting a large drive. The cons, as was mentioned before, are that a Windows 95 OSR2 system running on a FAT32 drive WILL NOT want to interact with a FAT16 volume. The issue raised in an earlier post regarding networking actually does not apply because the clients and protocols involved in sharing data over a network are designed to be storage independant. In my home I have a PC with a FAT16 drive, a PC with a FAT32 drive, and a PC running NT with NTFS volumes. Interoperability is not a problem.

I want to restate, though, that you NEED TO MAKE A BACKUP. Although the conversion process in Windows '98seems to be very good, I've found that the best way to change a filesystem is back up system data, FDISK and reformat the drive, and reload the OS and applications from scratch.

Feel free to e-mail me at 99devils@mindless.com any time you have a computer-related problem like this and want advice from someone who is a computer professional. You will eventually get screwed if you keep listening to some dude off the net who watches Wired-TV once a week and thinks A is better than B because he read it in PC weekly or something.

-Craig

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