Working with ntfs

[krishna.murphy]

There are several problems with NTFS, and IMHO it should be avoided where possible. That said, M$oft being as ubiquitous as it is, it is frequently necessary to deal with it even if one chooses not to operate on/under/within their OS-s on a daily basis. Thus I am grateful that ntfs-3g is available, and included in Knoppix. My usage/reasoning is detailed below, but I am not a member of the "don't ever write to NTFS in Linux" camp - it's not SO bad, these days, and sometimes necessary (or at least convenient.)

I am using Knoppix version 6.2.0-DVD from the FAT32-formatted first partition of my hard drive, and there are no doubts that this imposes limitations. In addition to the 4GB of KNOPPIX itself, I have a persistent store of 2 GB, wherein all my system additons (e.g. Google Chrome) and some files kept in home, etc. (all under ext3) reside, leaving about 2GB of FAT32 storage for certain downloads, Windows-readable. Since this is the system my wife and I use to watch downloaded TV and movies (mostly), it follows that more storage for media is required. I fill this need by using slack space on TWO other NTFS partitions with large amounts of relatively dead storage. I often (daily) have several torrents running simultaneously (sometimes more), which can definitely ratchet up the processor load noticeably, especially as those partitions fill up and the files get more fragmented.

This brings us to the most serious drawback of the use of NTFS - it requires defragging, in some form or the other, relatively often. The Linux ext2/3/4 filesystems are relatively immune to fragmentation, and what does exist therein (always some, usually not much) is not a serious handicap and NEVER requires user (or admin) intervention, being automatic.

I have also used Knoppix copied to an NTFS (Windows) partition, and thereunder running, causing auto-mounting when booted. While this is an anecdotal report, and certainly NOT an endorsement of such a practice, I can report that the most serious trouble I had using that system on a daily basis was also processor load, perhaps due to allowing the automatic use of the Windows swap file. Experientially, I found that ntfs3g was quite capable, and robustly handled the access Knoppix required of it to fulfill the role of providing underlying filesystem support, and shares files with Windows with no trouble (unless I tried to hibernate Windows and then access files it thought were locked while it was asleep.)

So, on balance, while I am not thrilled with being forced, as it were, to use a substandard filesystem, and in the near future I expect to eliminate my daily NTFS-access needs, I am content for the time being with using ntfs3g. I don't lose ANY data, and if I keep an eye on the processor load (via the cute little graphic available on the taskbar called "CPU usage monitor") to avoid making the system unresponsive by overloading it, it works fine (sort of, anyway.)

Cheers!
Krishna