Microsoft righted an age-old “wrong” (at least for those who geek out about disk formatting) earlier this week. With its latest Windows 11 Insider Canary Preview Build, the company increased the maximum FAT32 partition size limit from 32GB to 2TB when using the command line.
I love how the arstechnica article words it like you will never need FAT32 and it’s silly to consider it.
I had to download fat32format I don’t know how many times because I needed to format an extra large SD Card or USB drive for some device. Microsoft really shafted exFAT’s adoption with their licensing.
Rufus is your friend
Yep, many smart TVs still only accept FAT32 format. I have to split my HDR videos into multiple files to be able to watch them on TV — because of 4GiB size limit.
I personally haven’t had to touch it in over a decade, but I guess there’s probably some uses for it still, yeah.
Personal computers and flagship phones? Yeah you can probably use exFAT.
Video game consoles and handhelds? Dashcams? Car entertainment centers? Cheap android devices? 100% going to be FAT32 partitioned with a Master Boot Record
I needed it for a printer the other day!
Yup, I had to download a program to format my 64Gb micro SD card for my 3ds last year.
Low end motherboard BIOS flashing
You think high end motherboards are going to flash from XFS?
I’ve seen a few that can read ExFAT
I just flashed my mobo last night and it wanted a fat32 fs. It’s not low-end at all.
FAT32 is also really simple to implement. Supporting exFAT may require a larger microcontroller with more memory, which results in a more expensive product.
FAT32 is the java of file systems. Works everywhere, on anything. But everyone hates it.
Even my speaker can read fat32, but I never format any storage in that system