Installing Vista x64 Ultimate on FAT32

[Jody Thornton]

It probably depends on your true needs. If XPx64 and all your current apps meet your needs for the foreseeable future, then I don't know that you need to be in a hurry to change. .... And even if XP is not updated much, if at all anymore, the advantage to that is that no new problems will be created. New ones might be "found" but none will be "created". .... I won't even tease you with suggesting Win8. I wouldn't do that to my worst enemy.

But I also do not really see a problem with Vista x64. It seems it would be the easiest change for you and would still give you official support for a while, and would give you a chance to get used to the newer ways that MS does things now, such as NTFS and WinSxS. ... Again, because of the hardware improvements, there is just not the need for the normal user to do the kind of "liting" of their OS as there used to be. Even if any improvements in performance could be measured or even noticed, it just won't make enough of a difference to matter in normal day-to-day use. .... If you choose to try Vista or Win7, I would suggest not trying to "lite" the OS at all at first. In fact I would suggest installing it with every option enabled and live with it a while.

Anyway, I don't know if anything I said will make any difference to you, but good luck with your decision.

Cheers and Regards

Some of your points I wanted to address. And this was exactly the sort of viewpoints I was looking for. I am a capable person when it comes to systems, but I like to hear others opinions. So no worries about being off-topic.

( a ) I didn't "Lite" the installation of Vista x64 when I used it last year, and it was on an alternate hardisk. I am the first to say that it ran VERY WELL. Other than the boot logo/welcome screen taking much longer than XP (I use classic logon with XP x64), once the desktop appeared, it was likety split fast. I even foucsed on authoring MMC plugins using the Trusted Installer creds (so for example, I could customize my services screen), running all of the apps I needed (I know now that I had to install Windows Help so that I could use "Help" on classic apps using the Help code based on v3.0. Everything ran pretty smoothly.

( b ) I did defeat services and processes, I found that turning off Indexing, and removing the Index Pointers on the NTFS partition gave a resonably noticeable performance boost (except of course with searching...lol, but that's OK). Defeating SuperFetch also performed better (I retained conventional Prefetch). An I have many years experience with NTFS parttions since the Windows NT 3.5x days, modifying cluster sizes, etc.... I have just always noticed that FAT32 performed better on small volumes (It certainly did in Windows 2000 and XP) and I didn't yet try to see if Vista followed suit. But given the difficulties, I'll stick with NTFS

( c ) I still hate to hate something bloated just because we have ample hardware resources to our disposal. I like things quick and tight. Just because I can get a 1 TB drive doesn't mean I want my OS to gobble up half of it. I want it so I can store insame ooodles of data.

( d ) I will definitely go with Windows 7 on my next machine (I am not a fan of Metro, so Windows 8 is out; though I hear that when using the Explorer shell and Explorer based apps, it's actually faster than Windows 7), but since I have the Vista OS and it's legit, I'll use this until 2017.

I really appreciate your comments. Have a super weekend.

[jaclaz]

( b ) I did defeat services and processes, I found that turning off Indexing, and removing the Index Pointers on the NTFS partition gave a resonably noticeable performance boost (except of course with searching...lol, but that's OK). Defeating SuperFetch also performed better (I retained conventional Prefetch). An I have many years experience with NTFS parttions since the Windows NT 3.5x days, modifying cluster sizes, etc.... I have just always noticed that FAT32 performed better on small volumes (It certainly did in Windows 2000 and XP) and I didn't yet try to see if Vista followed suit. But given the difficulties, I'll stick with NTFS

That is not an issue at all if you start using a good searching tool that parses the $MFT, such as :

http://reboot.pro/topic/18855-windows-file-search-utility-that-is-fast/

http://sourceforge.net/projects/swiftsearch/

jaclaz

[jaclaz]

I was just indirectly reminded of this thread, and - in order to keep things as together as possible - here are the results of some experiments with 7 (32 bit) on FAT32:

http://reboot.pro/topic/19643-winsxs-hardlinked-files/

The current 7-zip version is fine to "apply" the .wim, but the sheer number of stupid Winsxs Manifest files is the show-stopper (but user ztron has posted a possible way out ).

jaclaz

Edited April 12, 2014 by jaclaz

[oldskool]

I tried to read this thread and I just can't. Author of the thread is under the assuption that running vista on fat32 will be faster. So wants to do this. That being said an assumption is just that. So if OP wants to do this just becasue he/she can and wants to by all means do so. Without proof that vista will run faster on Fat32 or even run the idea or want to do this is entirely under false pretenses. I think by now OP has his answer so I will leave as that. Would like to add if you want a fast system why run vista. So basically the whole discustion is moot in my opinion.

[jaclaz]

Without proof that vista will run faster on Fat32 or even run the idea or want to do this is entirely under false pretenses.

Sure , but unless someone tests it (and reports), noone can say whether it will be faster or slower.

That's more or less the whole background of "experimenting" .

JFYI:

Life is "trying things to see if they work".

jaclaz

[dencorso]

I said this before, and nobody got interested... which really surprises me because XXCOPY is freeware.

Please do you all kindly give a good look at XXCOPY and Reparse Points...

I think it can solve the problem of WinSxS automagically during simple a NTFS to FAT32 copy.

[jaclaz]

I said this before, and nobody got interested... which really surprises me because XXCOPY is freeware.

Please do you all kindly give a good look at XXCOPY and Reparse Points...

I think it can solve the problem of WinSxS automagically during simple a NTFS to FAT32 copy.

Den, you have evidently NOT read the given link :

http://reboot.pro/topic/19643-winsxs-hardlinked-files/

There is NOT (anymore) the need to pre-install to NTFS and later copy the install to FAT32. <- tested with Windows 7

7-zip is OK to copy directly from the .wim the files to a FAT32 volume. <- no need for *anything else*, including the otherwise nice XXCOPY

The issue (with 7 32 bit) is the sheer number of Manifest files (and their stupidly looooong filenames) that exceeds the capabilities of the FAT32 filesystem.

I have NOT available/handy a Vista install DVD, it is well possible that a Vista has a "less populated" WinSxS directory and thus works fine, if you prefer the actual "news" are that seemingly there is no need for a pre-install of the system on NTFS.

jaclaz