Is Fat32 so slow ?

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Level 2

461 points

Is Fat32 so slow ?

Hi,
I just wish to have some feedback to know if all is right. I am copying all my important files to a 2TB USB2, which I left in it's original Fat 32 format to maximize exchange possibilities. Even if they are all large image files, it takes ages to copy. So far 750GB took 35 hours! That's about three times slower than HFS+. I'm wondering if that's normal or if something is not right. Any experience?

iMac Intel 24" white matt screen !!! - G4 Dual 500 - Cinema 22 - Powerbook 5,5, Mac OS X (10.5.8)

Posted on Apr 15, 2010 8:59 AM

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Answer 1

Kappy

Level 10

362,007 points

Apr 15, 2010 9:52 AM in response to alpshiker

That's about 21 GB/hour which is actually not bad for USB and FAT32. And, yes, it is slow because it's USB. If you wanted speed you should have gotten a Firewire 800 drive and formatted it HFS+. FW800 would be roughly 3 times faster than USB.

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Answer 2

alpshiker Author

Level 2

461 points

Apr 15, 2010 2:03 PM in response to Kappy

That's about 21 GB/hour which is actually not bad for USB and FAT32. And, yes, it is slow because it's USB. If you wanted speed you should have gotten a Firewire 800 drive and formatted it HFS+. FW800 would be roughly 3 times faster than USB.

USB2 is in fact plenty for me when the drive is formatted HFS+, with a consistent throughput of 60 GB per hour with the latest drives. I assume that using the older FAT32 partition scheme slows things down. I am just puzzled at how much it does! I'm not sure that a faster bus would circumvent that bottle neck though.

Thanks!

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Answer 3

Kappy

Level 10

362,007 points

Apr 15, 2010 2:42 PM in response to alpshiker

The drives and the enclosure are not the limiting factors. Mostly it's the nature of what is being transferred over the port.

It's not the best idea to use a FAT32 filesystem to backup OS X data. There are differences in the filesystems that can result in damage to files or failure to backup files that contain illegal characters in the filename or have filenames that are too long. My suggestion would be to partition the drive so your OS X files are backed up to an HFS+ partition and the Windows files to the FAT partition. Just a thought.

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Answer 4

alpshiker Author

Level 2

461 points

Apr 15, 2010 2:50 PM in response to Kappy

It's not the best idea to use a FAT32 filesystem to backup OS X data.

Have you another idea for contents that need to be shared between the two?

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Answer 5

Kappy

Level 10

362,007 points

Apr 15, 2010 3:02 PM in response to alpshiker

Not really unless you want to format the drive NTFS and then use a third-party solution for reading and writing to NTFS drives:

MacFuse with ntfs-3g-2010.1.16-macosx filesystem
NTFS Mounter 0.4.dmg.zip

Both are freeware and available at VersionTracker or MacUpdate.

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Answer 6

alpshiker Author

Level 2

461 points

Apr 15, 2010 3:14 PM in response to Kappy

That's interesting! I don't know how practical, but if it would allow faster write rates on this current PC format, it is worth investigating. Thanks for suggesting that solution!

It would be nice however if Apple would work out an agreement to include NTFS in a future OS-X release. FAT 32 seems almost outdated.

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Answer 7

alpshiker Author

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461 points

Apr 15, 2010 3:50 PM in response to alpshiker

By the way if I may, is there a shareware to check file names for compatibility problems?

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Answer 8

alpshiker Author

Level 2

461 points

Apr 16, 2010 1:57 AM in response to alpshiker

Well, I carried some testing with the same FW drive formatted successively from HFS+ to NTFS and FAT32, and the write rates are just about the same! (40 GB / hour with a pocket FW). So the format is not the culprit for the performance loss.

The USB2 / 2TB FAT32 drive took an average of 21 GB per hour while copying with DejaVu, but as I tried to drop folders on it now, the copy rate jumps to 33 GB per hour, which is normal for this type of drive. So the slow results are probably due to the use of DéjàVu for the backup. I will disable the progress monitoring to see if performances improve.

BTW
I have installed a trial version of Paragon NTFS for OS-X, and this is neat! Fits in Disk Utility seamlessly, adding the NTFS and NTFS compressed options. Of course any Mac would have to install this or another NTFS plugin to read the disk produced. Good to know.

thanks again
Paul

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