Any partition manager like freeware formatting out theree

O

oqvist

[H]F Junkie
Joined
Dec 24, 2001
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I am searching for a program that lets you create partitions and also let you format your harddrive with 16/32/64 ntfs or FAT32 clusters like Partition manager 8 allows you to?
 
http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/
has a ton of partitioning tools, but they are mostly for multiple OS bootmanagers
(if you would like to check another good boot manager out try www.xosl.org or http://xosl.sourceforge.net/index.html)

of course the OS will allow you to set the cluster size as well

http://support.microsoft.com/defaul...gb/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-gb;314878&ln=en-gb

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;140365

"If you do not specify a cluster size for formatting, Windows XP Disk Management bases the cluster size on the size of the volume. Windows XP uses default values if you format a volume as NTFS by either of the following methods:
By using the format command from the command line without specifying a cluster size.
By formatting a volume in Disk Management without changing the Allocation Unit Size from Default in the Format dialog box."

http://www.ntfs.com/ntfs_optimization.htm

"However, when you format the partition manually, you can specify cluster size 512 bytes, 1 KB, 2 KB, 4 KB, 8 KB, 16 KB, 32 KB, 64 KB in the format dialog box or as a parameter to the command line FORMAT utility"

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/tr...prodtechnol/winxppro/reskit/prkc_fil_lxty.asp

"In the Disk Management snap-in, you can specify a cluster size of up to 64 KB when you format a volume. If you use the format command to format a volume, but do not specify a cluster size by using the /a:size parameter, the default values in Table 13.4 are used. If you want to change the cluster size after the volume is formatted, you must reformat the volume.

Before you choose a cluster size other than the default, note the following important limitations:

For Microsoft® Windows® NT, Windows 2000, and Windows XP Professional, the cluster size of FAT16 volumes from 2 GB through 4 GB is 64 KB, which can create compatibility issues with some applications. For example, setup programs do not compute free space properly on a volume with 64-KB clusters and cannot run because of a perceived lack of free space. For this reason, you must use either NTFS or FAT32 to format volumes larger than 2 GB. The format command in Windows XP Professional displays a warning and asks for a confirmation before formatting a volume that has 64-KB clusters using FAT16.
Windows XP Professional, like Windows NT 4.0 and Windows 2000, supports file compression. Because file compression is not supported on cluster sizes above 4 KB, the default NTFS cluster size for Windows XP Professional never exceeds 4 KB. For more information about NTFS compression, see "File Compression" later in this chapter.
To check the cluster size of an existing volume, use the chkdsk command or the fsutil fsinfo ntfsinfo command. For more information about using Chkdsk, see "Troubleshooting Disks and File Systems" in this book. For more information about using Fsutil, see Windows XP Professional Help."
(follow link above to TechNet for embedded links and more info)

I would have found this faster in Data Storage :p
 
Great. I used the Ultimatebootcd to partition it. I couldn´t find NTFS so I went with FAT32. But extended LBA is that NTFS???

Anyway next time I will reformat how do I set clustersize. If I run the windows XP install CD I never get that option or?

Have heard I should have it at 16 or 32 for games for best performance. So to achieve this I set the format /a:32??

Or is this available to me when running my win xp cd?
 
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