Windows 2000 File System

Windows 2000 supports several File Systems, the most important of File Systems are given below:

1. FAT-16: It is the old MS-DOS file system. It uses 16-bit disk addresses, so it supports only 2 GB. It is very important for the use of a FAT-16 hard disk. If FAT-16 is lost, the data on the hard disk can’t be used because it is unable to be located. FAT16 is used in MS-DOS and low-level versions.

2. FAT-32: FAT 32 is one type of disk partition format in Windows system. It uses 32-bit disk addresses and supports disk partitions up to 2TB.

Key Features of FAT-32:

i. FAT-32 is in support of a disk of 2TB (2048GB) at most, but it’s not in support of partitions less than 512MB. Windows 2000 based on FAT-32 is in support of partitions of 32GB at most.

ii. The adoption of the smallest cluster makes Information preservation more efficient in the FAT-32 system.

iii. FAT-32 system can relocate the root directory and use FAT to back up. In addition, the boot logging of partition in FAT-32 is contained in a structure with critical data and it reduces the possibility of a system crash.

3. NTFS: It stands for New Technology File System. It was developed specifically for Windows NT and carried over to Windows 2000. It uses 64-bit disk addresses and it can support disk partitions up to 2⁶⁴ bytes.

The individual filename in NTFS is limited to 255 characters, path names are limited to 32767 characters. NTFS fully supports case-sensitive names. NTFS is not just a linear sequence of bytes like FAT-32. Each NTFS disk partition contains file directories bitmaps and other data structures. Each partition is organized as a linear sequence of blocks.

Key Features of NTFS:

i. Recoverability: NTFS having high recoverability from the system crashes and disk failure.
ii. Security: It provides high security among all the files.
iii. Large disks and large files: NTFS supports very large disks and very large files so it is more efficient than FAT.
iv. Multiple Data Files: In NTFS, a file is treated as a stream of bytes. It is possible to define multiple data streams for a single file.
v. General Indexing Facility:In NTF, files can be indexed by any attribute.