Use the NTFS file system. It is more stable than FAT and has better security. It is possible to convert from FAT32 to a NTFS file system after you setup your system using the CONVERT command. However, using the CONVERT command to convert a FAT32 file system to NTFS will result in a 512 byte cluster size. I read that a 512 byte cluster is considered too small and degrades overall performance. Whereas if you do a clean install and format your drive with the NTFS format in the beginning, you will get an optimum 4K cluster size. A larger cluster size means faster overall hard disk access.
If you used the Convert program and wound up with a 512 byte cluster size, there is a way to change it to 4K, but you will need 3rd. party software to do so. There are only 2 applications in the world presently that I know of that can do this trick: Paragon's Partition Manager and Powerquest's Partition Magic Version 8. Previous versions of Partition Magic do not have the the option to change NTFS cluster size.
I highly recommend dividing your hard disk into at least 2 partitions. The first partition should be only for your operating system and installed software. The second extended partition (D drive) should be for your data only, for example, documents, photos, mail boxes address books, etc. By partitioning your hard disk, you won't have all your eggs in one basket so to speak. If your system crashes and you need to reformat C drive, D drive will be untouched and you therefore lose none of your precious work. It is possible to tweak the default system folders like My Documents, Desktop, and Favorites so that the default is a folder on D drive, not C drive. To partition a hard disk you need to either do it from the beginning with FDISK or get a partition manager like Partition Magic. Using FDISK on a hard disk with data on it results in data loss.
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