The advantage of NTFS file system is that it is fast and it has got security options. But the problem is that usually the USB drives are small enough that NTFS is not recommended for them. But nowadays the USB drives are coming with larger sizes. So it’s better to format a drive as NTFS than the traditional FAT32 of FAT file systems which have no security at all. Having NTFS file system on the USB drive has an advantage that one can configure the security of the drive so that it is write-able only on one system and becomes read only on all other systems. So you can read and write on your own system and transfer the files elsewhere without the fear of the virus infections etc as the drive becomes read-only in all other systems.
Usually when we want to format the USB drive, only FAT and FAT32 file systems are available for the format. Here is the trick by which you can format the drive with NTFS file system.
- Plug in your USB drive
- Go to Start –> Run –> devmgmt.msc
- Device manager will open up. Expand Disk Drives. Right Click your USB drive and select Properties.
- Go to policies tab and select Optimize for performance.
- Click OK
- Now go to My Computer, right click the USB drive and select Format
- In the File system selection combo, the option of NTFS will be available now
- Select NTFS and click Start.
- Your USB drive will be formatted with NTFS file system. Now you can configure it’s security by right clicking the drive and going to properties –> security tab.
Note: To be always safe with data using NTFS, always safely eject the USB drive. See my article
