Microsoft is finally removing the FAT32 partition size limit in Windows 11

https://www.theverge.com/2024/8/16/24221635/microsoft-fat32-partition-size-limit-windows-11

by tosh • 2 years ago

59 66 2 years ago

voidUpdate2• 2 years ago

FFS, DavePL is the reason it's 32gb? I thought there was some actual reason, but it was just arbitrary? The more I learn about him, the less I like him

EliasWatson• 2 years ago

He picked the limit in 1995. It's not his fault that Microsoft never updated it as storage sizes grew over the years.

sumtechguy• 2 years ago

I make up things all the time and then call them 'requirements'. Its just the way the industry works.

jsheard2• 2 years ago

Context: Dave Plummer left Microsoft to found a company which peddled fake antivirus/security crapware, and only after that grift fizzled out did he rebrand himself around the work he did at Microsoft.

https://www.atg.wa.gov/news/news-releases/attorney-general-s...

alt2272• 2 years ago

If he really wants to further this 'nice old Microsoft guy' image that he is pushing on youtube, he should really do a video on the truth behind the whole SoftwareOnline.com situation.

voidUpdate2• 2 years ago

He's also apparently threatening legal action against people who discuss it https://x.com/endermanch/status/1820726634485350727

abhinavk• 2 years ago

Have any people from Microsoft corroborated what he claims? Whatever I have heard of him is all from his channel and articles citing him.

But then Dave Cutler and Raymond Chen appeared on his channel for hour-long Windows history podcasts so maybe that's an endorsement of his claims.

ziml77• 2 years ago

Not surprising. That man seems so off. Like how he always says he's just doing his videos for the likes, while at the same time using the videos to advertise his book. Or how he leans so heavily into having worked at Microsoft but then doesn't actually seem to have worked on more than a handful of projects there (his videos get repetitive).

hypeatei• 2 years ago

The company has marketed its products through pop-up ads and unsolicited e-mails that offer a “free scan” of the computer. If a user elected to have the free scan performed, a software program downloaded, installed, and executed on the user’s computer.
Once the free scans were installed, consumers were trapped in a labyrinth of advertisements to purchase an upgrade,” Tassi said. “Each new advertisement increased the consumer’s sense of fear, repeatedly warning of threats the computer faced if the user didn't purchase the product. In some instances, the ads kept coming until the free scan software was uninstalled or the consumer purchased the product. But the uninstall option didn’t always work properly and parts of the software remained on the computer.

Kwpolska3• 2 years ago

Fortunately, Microsoft is slowly de-Plummering Windows. The task manager has been rewritten and made actually useful, they have libarchive for non-ZIP formats, and now this.

ToniCipriani• 2 years ago

One step forward several steps back though, with all the other terrible crap like copying your entire drive to OneDrive by default then attempting to make you subscribe when it fills up, adding all kinds of telemetry and ad tracking, shoving Copilot in your face whenever it can, just to name a few.

TiredOfLife2• 2 years ago

He had nothing to do with the limit. That was just another lie in the long list of his lies.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39812561

mikl3• 2 years ago

Kinda sad that a (by modern standards) slapdash file system like FAT32 is still the lowest common denominator, used for flash drives and all sorts of things. Would wish the industry could agree on using something more modern and reliable.

juliangmp• 2 years ago

Absolutely. We don't need the most modern system to be in that spot but it'd be nice to at least have journalling...

VWWHFSfQ• 2 years ago

what are the alternatives though?

NTFS? Won't work on Mac

HFS+? Won't work on Windows

EXT4? Won't work on Mac or Windows

alt2272• 2 years ago

exFAT is generally considered the more modern replacement.

mikl3• 2 years ago

Hence what I wrote above:

Would wish the industry could agree on using something more modern and reliable.

There’s no techical reason why we can’t use NTFS on Macs or APFS on Windows, if the industry was willing work towards that goal together.

znpy• 2 years ago

Zfs should be installable on all three operating systems afaik though

bitwize• 2 years ago

ZFS. There is never a good reason not to use ZFS. That's how it got its name -- "the last word in filesystems".

mananaysiempre3• 2 years ago

UDF should have been a viable alternative, but as I’ve said elsewhere it only works for disks smaller than 2T bytes with 512-byte sectors, and the Windows behaviour around it seems strange.

zaxomi• 2 years ago

Sure, we should create a new standard…

https://xkcd.com/927/

netsharc• 2 years ago

But they have: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ExFAT

qzx_pierri• 2 years ago

obligatory

https://xkcd.com/927/

noirscape• 2 years ago

Main reason that exFAT is less popular is because Microsoft still owns some of the patents on the underlying tech (but has permitted the Linux kernel access to those patents so Linux can have exFAT support). That makes it less popular for all the various pieces of niche hardware that accept microSD cards to extend storage.

Device makers that do support exFAT have to pay Microsoft for every sale. It's why for example the Nintendo Switch enables exFAT as a "system update"; that way Nintendo doesn't have to pay Microsoft for every single switch sold, only the ones that are actually using exFAT for external storage.

I think the last of those patents will expire by 2027? You'll probably see an uptick in exFAT use by then.

mananaysiempre3• 2 years ago

Something where you don’t risk being hit by a Microsoft patent even when you’re not Linux?

(Also that’s still a floppy-grade filesystem, no journalling or anything.)

im3w1l• 2 years ago

I think it's quite logical. A simple filesystem with few features is obviously easier to implement.

blueflow2• 2 years ago

Few features - yes. Easier to implement - absolutely not. The first sector has 9 different formats that cannot be reliably distinguished and are partially incompatible / overlapping each other: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BIOS_parameter_block

And then there is the thing with the long file names extensions because FAT originally could only do 8.3 names.

I know because i tried to write a FAT driver myself.

numpad0• 2 years ago

The industry requires a filesystem that has free and robust sample codes that runs on a 500kHz CPU with 512 bits of RAM, and Microsoft didn't provide one for exFAT, nor for NTFS, so...

eigenvalue• 2 years ago

Everyone should just use ReiserFS

dmitrygr• 2 years ago

IIRC, windows Mac and Linux all support R/W access to UDF as well. You can format a usb stick using that and try

mananaysiempre3• 2 years ago

For drives under 2T bytes (assuming 512-byte sectors), and the Windows behavior I’ve seen around it seems a bit strange—it takes a very long time to write out its cache before allowing you to disconnect the drive, for reasons I don’t understand.

AshamedCaptain• 2 years ago

Sad why? This industry needs to start celebrating when a technology lasts 20+ years, not feel "sad".

lxgr10• 2 years ago

I'll happily celebrate standards that have stood the test of time, but FAT32 really hasn't. The 4 GB file size limit has been very painful for anything recording videos to SD cards.

throwoutway• 2 years ago

This drove me crazy for so many years, but I haven't had the issue in a while (since switching to linux and apple) I forgot it was still a problem for the rest of us

lxgr10• 2 years ago

It’s still a problem for almost everyone wanting to exchange files via detachable storage devices. Using Linux doesn’t make your DSLR understand ext4.

And I actually find this problem even worse between Linux and macOS than between Windows and either of the two. Until quite recently, there was no meaningful common denominator between those two for USB drives.

yjftsjthsd-h• 2 years ago

And I actually find this problem even worse between Linux and macOS than between Windows and either of the two. Until quite recently, there was no meaningful common denominator between those two for USB drives.

I thought exfat was ~universal and decent?

Edit: Also UDF, thanks to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41265870 for reminding me

ck2• 2 years ago

If you've ever had FAT32 partition table corruption, you'd understand why you never want a single massive FAT32 partition

Your best bet is to break it up so if one drive letter gets taken out by power failure, etc. that the others survive.

Doesn't even have to be power-loss, if you've ever dealt with a "USBC" corruption from improper USB disconnect https://www.disktuna.com/sudden-appearance-of-usbc-named-fol...

lxgr10• 2 years ago

If you care about file system consistency, there isn’t really any way around a journaling file system.

But even that does not save you from data loss due to broken hardware semantics.

ape4• 2 years ago

According to Wikipedia the max file size is 4GB - 1.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_Allocation_Table

lxgr10• 2 years ago

That’s an inherent limitation. Windows was imposing an additional artificial one on partition/FS size at creation time.

jmclnx• 2 years ago

Will this change patent encumber FAT32 ? I think the patent expired recently.

withinrafael• 2 years ago

No, this only applies to the format tooling.

ChrisArchitect• 2 years ago

Related from March:

Dave Plummer's behind-the-scenes story of developing the Format dialog

The Format Dialog in Windows NT

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39811604

TiredOfLife2• 2 years ago

Unsurprisingly another case of Dave "The Scammer" Plummer exaggerating/lying.

Microsoft is finally removing the FAT32 partition size limit in Windows 11

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