July 28, 1997
What ever happened to FAT-32?
By Bob O'Donnell
Not many technologies can promise to magically improve your computer's resources
without drawing attention to themselves, but the FAT-32 feature incorporated into the
latest version of Windows 95 does just that. That is, if it's been installed on the new
machines you're buying.
FAT-32 (or file allocation table, 32-bit) offers a more efficient mechanism for storing
files on your hard disk by essentially breaking the disk up into a larger number of
sectors (see "FAT-32: a
technology whose time has finally come" for a more detailed explanation of
FAT-32). As a result, you regain a great deal of hard disk space, space that under current
implementations of FAT-16 is wasted. FAT-32 also helps avoid the need for multiple hard
disk partitions, which is becoming an increasing problem as systems with 4GB and 6GB hard
disks become commonplace.
Unfortunately, despite all these and other important benefits, very few currently
shipping systems come with FAT-32 enabled. I find the situation both surprising and a bit
disturbing because FAT-32 was touted as one of the major new benefits of OSR2, aka Windows
95B, when it was released back in November 1996. In fact, Microsoft loudly promoted the
increased storage space that FAT-32 provides, as well as the convenience and ease of
having large single partitions. So, I expected FAT-32 to start showing up in systems
shipped around the holidays.
Instead, OEMs chose not to enable FAT-32, opting to stick with FAT-16. Nine months
after FAT-32 was introduced, the situation hasn't really changed. Initially, there were
some legitimate reasons for not installing FAT-32. Early versions of Windows NT 4.0, for
example, couldn't even recognize FAT-32 partitions on Win95 machines attached to the same
network. But patches to NT that fix that problem have been available for months. FAT-32
also makes it more difficult (though not impossible) to create a dual-boot system that can
launch either Windows 3.1 or 95, but that only affects a tiny fraction of the corporate
and end-user marketplace.
So why are we still waiting? Admittedly, FAT-32 is a fundamental change to the way the
computer operates because it completely changes how files are written to and read from the
disk. As a result, it can cause problems with certain applications. Older utilities, for
example, that depend on files being in particular locations can be broken by FAT-32, but
the technology wasn't exactly foisted onto an unsuspecting developer marketplace.
Microsoft has been working with many ISVs for years now on FAT-32-related issues and most
of the drive-utility products, such as Symantec's Norton Utilities, PowerQuest's
PartitionMagic, etc., had FAT-32-enabled versions of their products on store shelves
months before FAT-32 was released.
Apparently, some ISVs have been slow to adapt their applications to support FAT-32
(ironically, Norton's AntiVirus was problematic until just recently), but how long are
system vendors going to wait before they enable this well-needed improvement? I understand
the need for a bit of caution when it comes to important new technology, but I think this
delay has gone on far too long.
The situation is going to get even more problematic in the future because FAT-32 will
be incorporated into Windows 98, the next version of Windows, and may even be the default.
In addition, FAT-16-formatted drives are unable to access any address larger than 8GB
(which means storage space beyond that point is unusable), yet drive technology is rapidly
approaching this limit. In fact, I've heard reports that 8GB 10GB drives are due this
fall.
IS managers and power users who want to enable FAT-32 on systems currently shipped with
OSR2 can do it, but without a utility such as PartitionMagic, the process is incredibly
tedious and time consuming. The only way that this technology is going to really benefit
most of us is if the system vendors start to offer it as part of the base installation.
Unfortunately, I don't see a lot of progress there, though there are a few glimmers of
hope. Gateway, for example, will apparently start offering systems with FAT-32 enabled in
about a month's time. Other system vendors may then join in, but we won't start seeing
real progress until the OEMs hear a loud chorus of customers demanding the feature. If
you're in the market for new systems, I encourage you to join in. Only then will we be
able to enjoy the silent, "secret" benefits offered by FAT-32.
©
Copyright 1997, by InfoWorld Publishing Corp., a
subsidiary of IDG Communications, Inc. Reprinted from InfoWorld,
155 Bovet Road, San Mateo, CA 94402. Further reproduction is prohibited.
