Windows XP Pro: The Missing Manual, Second Edition

Choosing a File System

There’s one final decision you have to make: which file system you want to use for formatting your hard drive.

A file system is a scheme of formatting your hard drive, a system of dividing up its surface into little parking spaces for data. It’s a very technical issue, and, mercifully, one that’s largely invisible to you except for the day you install the operating system.

Windows XP offers a choice of two file systems, geekily named FAT 32 and . FAT 32 (file allocation table) is the descendant of the original DOS formatting scheme. NTFS (NT file system) is far more advanced and modern; it was introduced with Windows NT in 1993.

NTFS offers a long list of attractive features:

POWER USERS’ CLINICUsing FDISK to Partition a Drive

If you’re an old-time Windows user, the idea of using an old DOS program like FDISK might be no big deal. But scan the following instructions and confirm that they’re worth slogging through just to save yourself the price of a simpler formatting program like PartitionMagic. Remember that FDISK erases your entire hard drive; don’t use it until you’re confident you have a good backup.

Here, then, is how you’d create a two-partition setup so that you can have Windows 95, 98, Me, NT 4.0, or 2000 installed simultaneously with Windows XP on different partitions. (Note: After you make each selection in the following instructions, press the Enter key to proceed.)

Start up the PC from the Windows 95/98/Me/NT/2000 CD-ROM. On the first two screens, ...