Format to Fat32

I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
up with this-
Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
putting in-
format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,


--
biggmat
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I believe that Vista will not make a partition/format Fat32 greater than a
small size (32GB comes to mind).
It will USE a larger fat partition but not create/format one.

I think that if you can find an XP machine it can format large partition.
However there is a limit on file size in a fat32, (2 GB is what I remember)

Michael

"biggmat" <> wrote in message
news:...
>
> I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
> it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
> under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
> can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
> up with this-
> Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
> all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
> putting in-
> format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
> no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
> drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
> what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,
>
>
> --
> biggmat
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> biggmat's Profile: http://forums.techarena.in/member.php?userid=36994
> View this thread: http://forums.techarena.in/showthread.php?t=868956
>
> http://forums.techarena.in
>

biggmat wrote:
> I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
> it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
> under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
> can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always
> end up with this-
> Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
> all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
> putting in-
> format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
> no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
> drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
> what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,

FAT 32 cannot handle files larger than 4Gb.

Em Segunda, 10 de Dezembro de 2007 23:49, Michael Walraven escreveu:

> However there is a limit on file size in a fat32, (2 GB is what I
> remember)

4Gb! the single file size on fat32 filesystem is 4Gb

About 130 gig is the limit size.

NIK

"Michael Walraven" <> wrote in message
news:%...
>I believe that Vista will not make a partition/format Fat32 greater than a
>small size (32GB comes to mind).
> It will USE a larger fat partition but not create/format one.
>
> I think that if you can find an XP machine it can format large partition.
> However there is a limit on file size in a fat32, (2 GB is what I
> remember)
>
> Michael
>
> "biggmat" <> wrote in message
> news:...
>>
>> I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
>> it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
>> under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
>> can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
>> up with this-
>> Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
>> all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
>> putting in-
>> format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
>> no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
>> drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
>> what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,
>>
>>
>> --
>> biggmat
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> biggmat's Profile: http://forums.techarena.in/member.php?userid=36994
>> View this thread: http://forums.techarena.in/showthread.php?t=868956
>>
>> http://forums.techarena.in
>>

"biggmat" <> wrote in message
news:...
>
> I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
> it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
> under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
> can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
> up with this-
> Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
> all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
> putting in-
> format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
> no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
> drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
> what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,
>
>


You definately do not want fat32....NTFS would be best.

The file system over a network does not matter...
not sure why you think it needs to be fat32
> --
> biggmat
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> biggmat's Profile: http://forums.techarena.in/member.php?userid=36994
> View this thread: http://forums.techarena.in/showthread.php?t=868956
>
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>

On Mon, 10 Dec 2007 18:49:17 -0500, "Michael Walraven"
<> wrote:

> I believe that Vista will not make a partition/format Fat32 greater than a
> small size (32GB comes to mind).


Yes, 32GB is correct.


> It will USE a larger fat partition but not create/format one.


Correct.


> I think that if you can find an XP machine it can format large partition.


Only NTFS.

For larger FAT32 partitions, you can use a diskette with the Windows
Me fdisk and format commands.


> However there is a limit on file size in a fat32, (2 GB is what I remember)


No, it's 4GB.



> "biggmat" <> wrote in message
> news:...
> >
> > I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
> > it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
> > under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
> > can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
> > up with this-
> > Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
> > all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
> > putting in-
> > format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
> > no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
> > drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
> > what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,
> >
> >
> > --
> > biggmat
> > ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> > biggmat's Profile: http://forums.techarena.in/member.php?userid=36994
> > View this thread: http://forums.techarena.in/showthread.php?t=868956
> >
> > http://forums.techarena.in
> >

--
Ken Blake, Microsoft MVP Windows - Shell/User
Please Reply to the Newsgroup

thanks for all the responses... For some reason the only way the drive
will work on the network is if it's fat32. it's an iomega home network
drive or something like that. It's not the latest version but it's not
that old. I've been reading through the net and from what I've read
it's seems possible to do so what I've been trying. It even gives you
an option if you use "help format" in the window? Thanks again for all
the help.


--
biggmat
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Hi,

Why would it matter the file system? That isn't read by the machine
accessing the drive, only by the machine that it is physically attached to.
As long as the system housing can read the drive and it is properly shared,
any system on the network can access and read it. Plus, you can't use less
than 512k clusters with FAT32, nor would you want to - way too inefficient
and the number of entries in the fat itself would severely limit the drive
capacity.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP
http://mvp.support.microsoft.com/
Windows help - www.rickrogers.org
My thoughts http://rick-mvp.blogspot.com

"biggmat" <> wrote in message
news:...
>
> I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
> it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
> under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
> can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
> up with this-
> Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
> all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
> putting in-
> format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
> no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
> drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
> what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,
>
>
> --
> biggmat
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> biggmat's Profile: http://forums.techarena.in/member.php?userid=36994
> View this thread: http://forums.techarena.in/showthread.php?t=868956
>
> http://forums.techarena.in
>

biggmat wrote:
> I've come across a Network HDD for dirt cheap and would like to use
> it... The only way it'll work with the network is if it's formatted
> under fat32... however, I have many very large files(12-25gb) that I
> can't use with it. I've tried formatting through cmd, and I always end
> up with this-
> Specified cluster size too small for fat32(at 32k). so I try smaller,
> all the way down to 512 and it says the same thing. here's what i'm
> putting in-
> format j:/fs:fat32/v:j/q/a:32k
> no other errors pop up. Am I doing something wrong. It's a 500 gb
> drive? any help would be greatly appreciated as I sort of understand
> what i'm trying to do, but not completely. Thanks,

XP and higher have an artifical format limit for FAT32
of 32GB. You need an external tool for format larger
drives with FAT32:
http://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbtrouble_e.html#format


Uwe