How do I convert a harddrive to NTFS?

[mikewg]

I have Windows XP and have two hard drives... an 80 Gig for my C: and a 60 Gig for my E:. I'm fairly sure both drives are FAT32, but I'd like to convert only my E: (the 60 Gig one) to NTFS so that I can unlimited capture size on that drive. How can I go about doing this for only that drive on XP? Thanks!

[AceYu]

Assuming that you can completly back up the data on the drive elsewhere then using the Disk managment util, called somthing like diskmgmt.msc ?? you can do pretty much anything you like, inlcuding setting up your drives in a RAID config as long as your OS partition is a basic partition. I'd set it up with the 80gig partitioned into 20 gig and a 60 gig patition, then set the two 60gig partitions in a Striped raid config which will give you one 120gig partition and increase your access speed by up to 100% (70-80% realistically).

I don't have all the info info of me right now but I post it probably ASPA, although a simple format should give you the option to set the format as NTFS.

If you can't back up your drive then somthing like the latest version of partition magic should solve all your problems, but even somthing like partition magic needs some free space to be able to work

Later BRETT

[mikewg]

I'll be able to back it all up, so I'll need to clear off the hard drive and try formating it. I didn't want to do all that work if the NTFS option wasn't going to be there when I formatted it.

I didn't quite catch everything you were talking about partioning the drives into a 20 Gig and a 120 Gig, that was a little over my head... plus I wouldn't be able to empty the 80 Gig hard drive. I'll stick with formatting the 60 Gig into NTFS unless someone wants to break that explanation down for me. Thanks!

[ya_jai]

You can convert from FAT32 to NTFS without re-formatting your harddrive. You have to use command promt (dos promt) in this, just type " convert E: /fs:ntfs " . To do this way you should not lost any files on the drive, but make impartant data backup just to be in case.

But If you can and you wanna make sure every files will be there, you should back up all files then format E: drive with NTFS volume.

[AceYu]

Bugger!!! I shouldn't write responses from work at 4 in the morning, I knew there was an easier way.... oh well.... but the software raid idea is still really good, you do need to be able to clear off most of both drives. Anyway I'm glad your problem is sorted.

Brett

[mikewg]

Actually I cleared the hard drive and formatted it... and the option for NTFS was right there. Worked perfectly, thanks for the advice!