How To Copy Large Files To FAT32?

Question

Ok, i need to copy files ranging from 4.5 to 18 gigs to an external hard drive. The problem is my hard drive MUST be FAT 32 format. It only allows copying files smaller than 4gigs. I need to know a way around this.
If i use win-rar and split the files to 3gb chunks and copy them to the external HD and then extract them back into one large file will this work? If anyone can test this out please let me know if it works.

Answer 1

You cannot. The File Allocation Table (that's what the FAT stands for) uses a 32-bit integer to store the size of the files (hence the 32). That means that the maximum size it can hold is 2^32-1, or just under 4 GB. It's not a limitation of Windows you're facing. It's a limitation of the file system.

Answer 2

Copy Large Files To Fat32

Answer 3

FAT32 has a 4GiB file size limitation that cannot be broken. You'd have to look into either burning backups to disc (either DVD-DL or BD-RE) or finding another solution to get the game data onto the PS3's hard drive (hint - that hard drive is removable...)

Answer 4

If the PS3 can play games larger than 4 GB, doesn't it have some file system other than Fat32?

Answer 5

1st answer is right. 4GiB maximum for file size. sorry. FAT32 is not your best choice for filesystem. yes, you can split the files into 3GiB chunks, you you might have less problems with the splitting program if you choose 2,000,000,000 bytes. something less than 2GiB.



ARJ is the only archiver/compression program I know of that is capable of splitting into numbered file chunks and reading from chunks it split without you having to join them. wonderful program that way. I suggest you get it. I think it's $45.



it can also make self-extracting archives. ask them if JAR32 does splitting into volumes. I just discovered that jar doesn't recognize disk sizes over 4GB. I am going to have to have a talk with them about this bug.

I tested it by spliiting with a 9GB file. I will try with ARJ32.

[failed]



I take that back. the software is thorougly broken. I am going to petition 7-zip to add volume splitting. it can split and merge files, but it's a separet function of the program, not something that the archiver does, and this would be a really important feature if ytour filesystem cannot handle files over 4GB.

Answer 6

Ya, that should work fine, I'm curious why you need to use fat32, both osx and linux can use ntfs, linux out of the box, osx with a little work. ntfs supports much larger files obviously. Why not switch?



Edit - In that case, if you use this with computers and with the ps3, why not partition it off so that part of it is fat32 and part is ntfs? best of both worlds

Answer 7

well, idk about ps3 games, but if it's a file...for backup. you can split the files up with winrar or hjsplit (google em) and just put em back together later.



otherwise, you'd have to ask on a ps3 scene forum or something for a solution to running backups from external