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Thread ID: 35896 2003-07-24 23:22:00 Formatting boot partition as NTFS w/64k clusters KiwiTT (4082) Press F1
Post ID Timestamp Content User
162660 2003-07-24 23:22:00 I am looking at rebuilding my PC soon. Reading the PC world it mentions that a cluster size of 32 or 64kbytes is best. My current PC has 512bytes per cluster.

How do I format my initial c:\drive partition from the Win2K Install CD, i.e.

Boot off CD, follow prompts, delete existing partitions, create new partitions, then format as NTFS.

I would like to do this last step as "format c: /a:64k /fs:ntfs"

I did think of using an Win98 boot floppy and then format at 64k but as FAT32. Then as bove, install Win2K, with no partition delete or format. I would then convert the fs to NTFS. However, Win98 has a problem with recognising disks bigger that 32GB. I have 2 80 GB disks in my system.

Anyone got any ideas.
KiwiTT (4082)
162661 2003-07-25 00:08:00 Clusters apply to FAT formatting, not NTFS Merlin (503)
162662 2003-07-25 00:19:00 My work PC has the following NTFS partitions with different cluster sizes.

Volume (C:):
Volume size = 10,239 MB
Cluster size = 512 bytes

Volume (D:):
Volume size = 2,045 MB
Cluster size = 2 KB

Volume Programs (E:):
Volume size = 4,016 MB
Cluster size = 4 KB

Does you statement mean I can not use the /a: parameter under ntfs.
KiwiTT (4082)
162663 2003-07-25 00:23:00 Sorry about the smilies.

I also got this from the Windows 2000 command reference

"Unit size

FAT file systems restrict the number of clusters to no more than 65526. FAT32 file systems restrict the number of clusters to between 65527 and 268435445.

NTFS compression is not supported for allocation unit sizes above 4096"

Does this mean I do not get compression at sizes above 4096 or that it can't be done at all above 4096 bytes
KiwiTT (4082)
162664 2003-07-25 04:51:00 Partition and format the disk on another machine, then install without electing to leave the file system intact. I wouldn't suggest moving away from the default size of 4KB as you will find disk usage may go up quite considerably using an allocation size that large, and performance won't really improve much at all. BIFF (1)
162665 2003-07-25 05:12:00 According to PC World NZ (pcworld.co.nz), you can only do additional partitions as you say. However it does say that 64KB is better for NTFS and FAT32

Given that, what about this option with my
Disk 1 (80 GB)
10 GB Boot Partition: Default Cluster Size.
70GB Games/Apps Partition: 64KB Cluster size
Disk 2 (80 GB)
10GB Temp Partition: 4KB Cluster Size (Swapfile resides here)
70GB Other Partition: as for Games Apps

I heard 4KB is a magic number when you are talking RAM 'chunks'
KiwiTT (4082)
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