How does FAT32 affect system performance?
To quote the Microsoft Knowledge Base article referenced below: “For most users, FAT32 will have a negligible performance impact. Some programs may see a slight performance gain from FAT32. In other programs, particularly those heavily dependent on large sequential read or write operations, FAT32 may result in a modest performance degradation.” I have seen seemingly reputable information stating that “the more clusters, the slower the performance.” For instance, the closer to 8GB your partition gets, the more 4K clusters, and the slower the performance. (However, as your partition gets bigger, your slack vs. FAT16 improves.) The FAT32 aware versions of Defrag and Scandisk do run slower, though, and the Advanced Power Management (APM) feature of OSR2, which spins down the hard disk when inactive, may give an impression of slower performance. To turn off APM, go to Control Panel > Power and uncheck the “Allow Windows to manage power use on this computer” box. Benchmarking: If you publish
