- #Windows format external hard drive with exfat how to#
- #Windows format external hard drive with exfat windows 10#
- #Windows format external hard drive with exfat free#
#Windows format external hard drive with exfat windows 10#
Step 1: Type cmd in the Windows 10 Cortana search box and right click the best match Command Prompt to select Run as administrator. Note: If you don't use the Command Prompt to perform tasks very often, you’d better make a backup of the important files on your disk, as sometimes mistaken operations may cause unexpected data loss. So, by formatting the drive, you can reset the allocation unit size exFAT so as to meet your actual demands.
#Windows format external hard drive with exfat free#
With the Format Partition feature in MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition, you can clear all the partition data and then reconfigure parameters such as partition label, file system and cluster size for the specified partition. MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition is an all-in-one partition manager, which can help you manage NTFS, FAT32 and exFAT partitions in a simple way.Īs a powerful partition manager for Windows users, it can help to move/resize partition, format partition, extend partition, copy disk/partition, convert NTFS to FAT32, convert MBR to GPT and check file system and so on. Change Allocation Unit Size exFATwith MiniTool Partition Wizard If you want to change cluster size to improve your disk performance or enhance the disk space utilization, you can try the following two methods to change allocation unit size for exFAT partition. Now you should it is necessary to choose a proper allocation unit size for your exFAT, NTFS to FAT32 partition.
#Windows format external hard drive with exfat how to#
How to Change Allocation Unit Size for exFAT Besides, if you want to learn more information about the default cluster sizes for other file systems, you can check out this post from Microsoft: Default cluster size for NTFS, FAT, and exFAT. Which allocation unit size you should use for exFAT format? Now you should know that it depends on the size of the file you will store on the exFAT drive. For example, according to Microsoft, the executing standard of default cluster size for exFAT is: It will choose a proper cluster size for your drive based on the capacity. If you have no idea about your file size and unit, Default is also a good choice. If you plan to store lots of small files, it is advisable to set a small cluster size, which can improve the disk space utilization. So we get this conclusion: if the size of the files you want to store on the drive is large, then a large cluster size is recommended, which will increase the data read-write speed. And that’s why you should set cluster size reasonably. If you save small files to file system with large clusters, a lot of disk space will be wasted. Therefore, if you save large files to a drive that uses small clusters, data read-write speed will be reduced, because each file is broken into small pieces and it needs time to gather all the broken pieces and access them as one. If the file's actual size is more than a cluster, the file will take up two or more clusters. This is to say, if the file's actual size is smaller than the size of a cluster, it will still take up a cluster. One cluster can only hold one file, but one file may take up multiple clusters depending on the file size and the cluster size. What Allocation Unit Size Should I Use for exFAT?Īs mentioned before, cluster size represents the smallest amount of disk space that can be used to hold a file. And before changing cluster size for your partition, you can check out the following contents to learn what the best allocation unit size is or what allocation unit size should you use for exFAT. So it is very necessary to change cluster size reasonably. If the allocation unit size is not set properly, it may reduce the data read-write speed and waste a lot of disk space. And some users don't even notice the allocation unit size option.Īctually, the allocation unit size or cluster size can influence your disk performance or disk space utilization. So they just use the default value for the allocation unit size. And usually, the allocation unit size will be set as Default, as many people don't know what it is and how to set it.
When you create or format a partition, you can set the allocation unit size for the partition.