USB flash drive nowadays has 8GB and more GB as a standard and comes formated with FAT32 file system that has limit of 4GB files, so you cannot save largest file on it, for example DVD iso or larger movie or project file. Also the data on USB are not protected becouse FAT32 doesn’t have options for data protection. NTFS on the other side, has more advantages allowing larger file sizes, encryption, compression, and permissions, so an NTFS file system lets you to add allow and deny permissions on individual files and folders for specific Windows users, something you cannot do with the FAT file system. You can also encrypt files using Windows XP’s built-in encryption.

If you want to format USB flash drive in Windows XP with right click/Format option there will be only FAT32 file system as a choice. NTFS is disabled by default. To enable it follow next steps:

1. Connect your USB drive
2. Right click on My Computer ->Properties->Hardware Tab
3. Choose Device Manager and go to Disk Drives -> find your USB drive and right click to select Properties -> Policies tab and choose “Optimize for performance”.
4. Click OK

Now, when you try to format your USB drive you will see the NTFS option in the format dialog.

Tags | Howto, Newbie Windows tips, Tips and Tricks, Windows