#50 Mike

FAT32 has a filesize limit of 4gb, not 2gb. Can't imagine what else you got wrong in your "long research".

I would avoid this software at all costs.

No offence meant [sic] to you, im, but your criticism of TK would hold more weight if it, itself, used the proper term for what you are recommending.
You're suggesting that TK has his spelling checked (yes, it would help), so he would use a spelling checker. Two words, using the gerundive form of 'spell'.
Best.

"Please comment only on the software here. (??) So much babble about "made in China" wow! When I was a kid Hong Kong meant good chow great fireworks and everything else was junk. Oh how that has changed!
Kudos! That said, this site sounds more like the Phil Donahue show
(an ole favorite of mine.) Moderators?

Your tool sounds really phenomenal! Converting from NTFS to FAT32 without rewriting all the files on the partition is like a miracle to me!
I did not know, that FAT32 and NTFS are widely compatible in structure so that a conversion needs only some bits of the file entries changed.

The central question for me is, why MS did not make such a tool theirselves... They want us to buy newer operating systems and never look back.

FAT 32 has some signifant limitations like a maximum of 2GB filesize and a limited partition size of 32GB, but it has also some strong benefits over NTFS cause it uses much less "overhead" and does not store unnecessary information like e.g. last changed date and user privileges and many unducomented scrap, which makes it much faster than NTFS.

Btw.: NTFS and FAT32 are both still sensitive to file fragmentation which slows file access down.


Thank you for that great tool, it might become handy in some certain cases and it is good to know, that it is possible to convert filesystems in such an easy way! Best wishes and GOOD LUCK to your company!!!

Thanks,
Although it is a good software, i'd like to use AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard (http://www.disk-partition.com/free-partition-manager.html). Because it is not only built-in conversion between NTFS and FAT32, but also has lots of disk partition management features (such as resize partition, merge partitions, copy partitions, etc).What's more, it is FREE！！！

I for one, tend to respect a company who has a representative actually posting here in the comments and interacting with the GAOTD users. One should evaluate software on its own merit, not merely on the basis of what country its maker comes from.

Has anyone else noticed that the SharpNight logo is exactly the same as the Microsoft Zune logo?

I don't like companies that rip off others' logos, is that even legal?

Hi all! Hay can any of you people out there can please tell me what this giveaway is used for?
Thanks for your times.
Phlan-Michelle

The old saying holds true . Why screw with something if its working correctly and take a chance you will lose all your data . Most people do not back up there files on a computer . (ask they will tell you ) And in the event someone does something incorrectly there goes all your data

To TK,

No offence to you, but why don't you use a spellchecker. It is quite a pity to see your good contributions getting spoiled by your very embarrassing spelling errors.

To #39 jmjsquared,

Once you install the software, you have no control about it when they try to update, force you to visit their web site or a back door attack can happen without you ever knowing. No software on earth can detect malware intermingled into the source code partially or fully spread around into small pieces in different files.
A click on a help button or any other button can be programmed to trigger the compilation of bad software in the memory only and can attack and or collect and send info to the base, depending on what is targeted.

I disagree with Giovanni for the first time! LOL!

I used to think that FAT32 had become obsolete for large HDDs and I would never be using that file system again.

I was WRONG.

Several months ago I purchased a standalone bluray / dvd player which has a USB slot. This enables you to connect external USB sticks and HDDs to the player in order to play avi, mp4, mkv, mp3 etc..

I went out and bought a 750 Gb. HDD and an external enclosure in order to backup my blurays and dvds to it and play my movies out of the HDD instead of using the actual discs.

After several hours making backups of my movies to the HDD, I went to the bluray player, hooked up the HDD and the darn thing would not recognize the hard drive. It would recognize and load every single usb stick I plugged into it except for the external Hdd.

After a long time of trouble shooting and online research, I realized that the bluray player would only recognize FAT32 drives and not NTFS drives. Most USB sticks use FAT32 till this day.

I used the format utility which comes with windows to format the external HDD to FAT32 only to find out that windows has a 32gb partition limit. This meant that I would only be able to use 32 gigs out of the 750 gig drive. What a waste!!

I did a little more research and I found a great little FREE app which does the job without the 32gb restriction. It´s called: CompuApps SwissKnife.

You can get it here:

http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/compuapps_swissknife.html

FAT32 has a 2gb maximum file size, so you will have to split your movies or media into 2gb chunks. Just a heads up. There is no way around this.

As for today´s giveaway, I´m sure it has a lot of features which swissknife lacks, but if you are only looking to format a large HDD to FAT32, this is the way to go.

My 2 cents for today.

Got this From BDJ few days ago it works O.K. suppose but did not work on all the drives I tested- on an extended board, and other files were gibberish similar to data recovery attempt, maybe it's the drive maybe the software, but windows won't touch it either. So maybe the Data is lost?? Thanks for the second look at this. Keep it coming GOTD. Always come here for the education and the many helpful posts and links the community provides besides checking out the offerings.

@#26 Fredward:

I didn’t realize the Chinese were a race, I thought they were members of a nation which is not considered a “friendly” to the Western world. Claiming that someone’s concern is based on racism IS racist (in other words, you are the racist). You are assuming that anyone who casts the hairy eyeball at software from China is (1) not Asian and (2) doing so simply because they were born a racist, which is pretty much the definition of racism. I don’t trust every person of my race, especially if they are from an unfriendly nation. If I express my distrust of companies/people from an unfriendly nation are you going to start labeling me a racist as well? Can I be a sexist of my own gender too?

With that said, I would surmise that the biggest issue people have with Chinese companies is mostly from their repeated hacks against critical national security systems here in the US, at least as reported by the media, including the risk to the aforementioned infrastructure article. From my understanding, we’re in a cyber war with them (and others). Quiet, but still happening. Even if it is just rumor and completely unfounded, this alone will cause wariness to download and install software from any Chinese company for fear that one will willingly download malicious software intended for nefarious purposes. If the cyber war is true, I am sure there are Chinese companies not involved, but because of the Communist rules and the stranglehold on free speech and expression in that nation, we won’t really know who is safe and who isn’t.

Personally, I have some Chinese made software that I like, but many I’ve tried just don’t work. Just like in real life, I’m tired of being forced to buy cheaply made Chinese knock-offs. The difference is, in the cyber world, I actually do have a choice. So I won’t be downloading some cheap knock-off from China in the hopes it won’t crash my system or install something malicious when I can just as easily get something with a good reputation, especially for something as useless as this. China has over 5 BILLION people - their companies aren’t starving for customers. Why they making such a huge push with software (and bad software at that) in the US makes me ponder and hesitate, like everyone else.

Call me a Culturalist or even an Nationalist, but you can’t call me a racist for this one.

You can use built-in windows tools to convert FAT32 to NTFS.
There's not much point in converting the other way, except maybe for flash drives (which are usually small enough, so you can simply do a backup, reformat and copy your data back).

Also, there are tons of free tools which can do formatting and partitioning (eg. Easeus, Gparted).

There's no point in making another formatting tool, let alone selling it.

#32 TK

Giovanni: Why convert external media from NTFS to FAT32? most digital media capable devices use FAT32 and not NTFS as FAT32 is easily implimentable in small dedicated embeded systems and NTFS is not.


Ok, thanks for your info, but is this enough for you to charge 40 bucks?

FAT32 is usually required only if you need access from DOS mode ...other than that you don't need it because it's slower and less secure than NTFS....and doesn't support for files bigger than 4GB in size!!

Installed easily on Windows 7 Lenovo laptop. I had to close it after registering and re-open to get rid of the unregistered notice at the bottom.

I converted an 8GB flash drive from NTSF to FAT32 that had several video files on it. Now I can share the files with a Mac user who's computer did not recognize the NTSF formatted flash drive. Conversion was simple, quick (< minute), and appears effective. My Zentimo Storage Manager still recognizes the flash drive as well, and shows the changed format when checking properties. I like it, but can't see needing it frequently, nor paying $39 for it. Thanks though. A keeper, and thumbs up for doing what it promises, flawlessly as well as I can tell with one test.

I just checked my other computer running Win 7 & it will do the same as my previous comment regarding Vista OS.

I have a HDD Transcend 500Gb
First, it's FAT32 so it's can't copy movie hd size larger than 4Gb so i convert it to NTFS smoothly
After that, i relize that my dvd player can't not play mp3 music store in this HDD because it's only support FAT32 so i decide convert back to FAT32 but not work i try everything i can find by google and i almost get error '
Now i know this software by SharpNight
Thanks Million Times GOTD if it's work for me
in my HDD there are some file movie hd size larger than 4Gb now i have to move them to other location before convert
hope it's work
Thanks Again GOTD

I have Vista as my OS & it already will convert the disk so this software is NOT NEEDED for those that have Vista. I may assume that other OS may have the same ability. Go to NTFS or back to FAT32.

Go to Windows help, put into open space, open disk management, Can I repartition my hard disk, Click to open computer management, then click on Disk Management to do whatever you want with hard drives.

I have 13 external hard drives that I use this utility to do what is needed & the larger ones are 3TB each.
Another method to get there is to go to explorer & right click on Computer then click on Manage & you will be at the same place “Computer Management.”

It helps to know what your computer is capable of doing for free!!

Chinese are selling you what you already have on your computer! (SUCH A DEAL!!!!)

From win XP and up this functionality is build-in the OS and it CAN convert your OS drive. Useless peace of software imho.

Neither Malwarebytes or McAfee flags this company's website. Matter of fact, McAfee has scanned it TODAY for any infections, malware, redirects,etc., etc., and declares it "Safe". I am pretty certain that GOTD vetted this Developer, checked the offered software and website before putting their reputation on the line. So when I see comments like #35 Morris', either s/he is smarter than all the professional security folks or s/he is, well, something else.

I wanted to post a few words as a reminder or maybe as warning... Whomever posted as V is a great example of a rapidly expanding on-line trend -- post links to published material misrepresenting what it says, banking on your readers never following through & actually clicking those links. In this case the 3 article titles were helpful, likely written by editors hoping to *hook* more readers. The lesson is that whenever someone posts a link as a reference, backing up whatever they said, it's actually no proof of anything at all -- except maybe that the person doing it counts on you being too short on time or too lazy to bother clicking & reading.

#21, V, posts the following link to a 2011 ZDNet article "US warns China software risk to public infrastructure". Read beyond the headline however & you get something very different... Dillon Beresford, "a researcher with private security firm NSS Labs", has a [likely justified] concern about the old fashioned systems running things like power plants & water treatment & distribution facilities, in that they were never designed to be connected to the Internet, & so lack any built-in security... ""The point of my putting this information out... because these systems are inherently flawed by design,". The article also says: "Beresford acknowledged that Sunway had come up with software patches to plug the holes...". Why the DHS involvement? 1st off it's part of their job, though the nature of the DHS response also hints at the political nature & motives of this controversial US gov dept. [Anyone interested can research or read the recent report from the IP Commission &/or the very considerable criticism of its [IMHO very flawed] recommendations, that to me anyway seem more designed to build up the gov's straw man argument perhaps leading up to an attempt at something like SOPA II.]

http://www.zdnet.com/us-warns-china-software-risk-to-public-infrastructure-2062300799/

V posts a link to a Christian Science Monitor article detailing how a guy maybe committed fraud -- he paid someone else to do his work without his employer's consent or knowledge. The only connection the article makes to China is that that's where the subcontractors in this case lived & worked, and the article goes on to say: "But the episode serves as a warning to the thousands of US companies that opt to outsource their software development work to firms abroad". The article quotes Robert Huber, "'a principal investigator with Critical Intelligence in Idaho Falls, Idaho, a company specializing in security for critical infrastructure providers. "Without a thorough security review by someone in your organization, you have no idea of the issues that are being introduced to your networks that may expand your attack surface."'

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2013/0130/Tale-of-Bob-Does-outsourcing-new-software-pose-cyber-security-risk-video/%28page%29/2

And V posted a link to a SearchSecurity article: "The Huawei security risk: Factors to consider before buying Chinese IT" Now there are issues revolving around Huawei -- Google. But regardless the article's title, the author closes saying: "Much of the rhetoric surrounding Chinese companies such as Huawei is short on facts and long on xenophobia, motivated more by political and financial concerns than any substantiated threat."

http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/feature/The-Huawei-security-risk-Factors-to-consider-before-buying-Chinese-IT

#8: "While Asians hold a solid reputation for being math savvy, a lot of software coming from that region cannot corroborate this. The code is often more than buggy and the functionality is limited."

Respectfully, I think you're wrong. The percentages of software bugs, poor design etc. isn't really higher at all. Corel is a Canadian company, & like many others I've had buggy installation issues with the last 2 versions of PaintShop Pro Ultimate, and it's been developed, improved for a very long time. It has a MSRP I believe of $99, & at PCMag, with 3.5 out of 5, rates only slightly better than ACDSee 14 & Serif PhotoPlus 6 -- one of their main complaints was lack of usability. Higher end apps from Adobe & Sony Creative's Vegas Pro set you back hundreds of dollars, & again have been developed for many years so are very mature, yet it's very easy to find loads of user complaints because of bugs & poorly designed features, & both are American companies. Nero, a German company that's been around about as long as CD burners, has been having problems living down the reputation for buggy & bloated software that IMHO peaked around v. 9 or 10 -- FWIW they've been trying to overcome that with v. 12, very aggressively cutting prices, & making several of the apps in their flagship suite optional & free downloads.

Now a lot of Asian & Indian software companies are younger, so they don't have large banks of re-usable code built up like older companies, & that means their software products may lack some features that you'd find in apps that've been around maybe 8-10 years or more, but the same can be said of any young software companies in the US, EU, or anywhere else.

* * *

#9: "My fat 32 HDD has 2 partitions C (with win XO sp3 as OS)and D.
-installed the soft on D
- tested Fat32 to Ntfs: only D is displayed
- unstalled the soft from D and installed it on C
- tested Fat32 to Ntfs: only D is displayed too."

When you want to change [or copy or backup] Windows files that are in use [because Windows is running] you often have to exit Windows 1st so those files are no longer being used. So changing the entire partition, in this case Fat32 -> NTFS, is something apps normally do when you reboot or when you boot to another OS, e.g. a boot disc or USB device. TO convert Fat32 -> NTFS you can also use XP's Convert.exe -- here's what Microsoft has to say [Note: these pages also mention you need a certain amount of free space available on C: -- I don't know if that's a requirement for today's GOTD or not.]

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb456984.aspx
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307881
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/314097

@34

This is for conversion the other way, which Windows cannot do.

@35

You can always scan before and after installation to see for sure.

@Awsomegotduser: I don't believe most people hate Chinese developers, but as a software developer myself, I have seen and worked with code created by them. And while the Chinese are very good at what they do, I have personally had to correct them over and over again with their coding techniques when I worked with them as a Lead SE. Some are good, some are very bad - JUST LIKE SOME AMERICAN CODERS. However, I think the problem is that almost everywhere you go, whether in a store or elsewhere, you see MADE IN CHINA and I think THAT is what has people up in arms over ANYTHING made by the Chinese. It's called narrow mindedness. But, having said that, be careful with ALL software you download and install - ALL SOFTWARE. Put it thru your AV and Malware tools IMMEDIATELY. I have seen software from some chinese developers that was so buggy and full of malware, I just deleted it and then warned others.

Just my 2 cents.

Hi, This is a wonderful tool. It just changes the file system bothways without loss of actual data already saved in the device. I have checked this with my pen drive and in seconds, my 1.87 g.bstored data converted as ntfs without any data loss. If you normally convert the file system, this only could be dealt with formatting the pendrive. I love this software by Sharpnight
Little confusion, when i read the comment is the GOTD gives standard full version of the software. Some says 8g.b limitations. If you just rerun, and copy the GOTD and the key contrained in the TXt folder in the copied folder, then if you register, you get the full version.
There are two tabs. Ntfs to fat and fat to ntfs. Hovering around ntfs to fat tab, there is mention of no loss of data. But the same has not been mentioned in the fat to ntfs, which also does not lead to loss of data while converting. Great tool and i recommend this wholeheartedly

Surely, this is not worth all the bother for the very occasional use it will have? Just copy the data off the drive, reformat as required, and copy it back.

The reason why I am of the opinion that your site without Giovanni's contribution is a waste of time for me is because most of your offering are SECOND CLASS restricted products,not only restricted in respect of support but restricted, like this one, in their functionality.

#21, have you actually read the articles you have linked to? They are not relevant. One is about a software company in China using infrastructure software that is used widely by the people there and not elsewhere that might take time to patch a security bug and the other relates to a telecommunications company and regarding Chinese companies in general it concludes: "Much of the rhetoric surrounding Chinese companies such as Huawei is short on facts and long on xenophobia, motivated more by political and financial concerns than any substantiated threat." So what is your point?

"I don’t understand why they hate Chinese software company so much." Well, this could be a clue. Conform or be cast out.

I don't like seeing the Chinese or anyone getting dissed, especially by someone making spelling errors in the false claim. While I ended up uninstalling yesterdays giveaway (IMG slice tool thing), it was because the website registration was overwhelmed, not that the software was bad.

And I have a little lesson for those who treat other races bad. When I was in third grade, my best friend, who was Chinese, I was a little the little blond hair blue eye Irish boy. I taught him how to play chess. That's right Chess. And I taught him in the third grade, I beat the nails out of him day after day, for about a week or two, then suddenly he started beating the hell out of me -- FOREVER. I practiced with my Dad, and I studied a big thick chess book (this was back in the 70's no computers) but even with all that, this kid, my pal, my best friend, always took me to the cleaners. Needless to say we did a lot of Science projects after that. Today sadly my friend I found out is a cripple, He had got into a bad car accident in the 80's, It breaks my heart looking back at my life again, please be careful how you treat your fellow man, especially ones who give you gifts and lessons in life. If you are going to treat someone based on their Deeds, you tread in dangerous waters around me, and better have your facts straight.

You should be glad I don't run this website, I would have deleted your comment.

For this SOFTWARE TODAY... works great on XP here with a 16 GB sandisk DTSE9, I was using in my TP-Link TL-WR1043ND set as a openwrt/PirateBox (the wireless project go look it up and fully understand before anyone screams piracy, it's more like local neighborhood alternative communications in case the web goes down)

Can this GAOTD software be installed on a Flash drive so it can be used portable?

It gets a bit confusing because there's a pop-up that says the Free Edition is limited to 8GB, but this is the Home Edition which doesn't have that limitation.

It didn't detect my main hard drive. It did find an small secondary drive. I don't have a drive I want to convert so I didn't test it.

Bitdefender Cloud Protection blocked their page....so be careful dudes!!

Besides that, I can't see why one nowadays should convert NTF to FAT 32 and pay 40 bucks for doing that (are you crazy, dudes??LOL!!), since FAT32 is a very old file system compared to NTFS and has many disadvantages.

Not to mention that you can do that and even more for FREE using "AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition":

http://www.disk-partition.com/features/new-features.html

2 THUMBS DOWN for today's giveaway!

#11,

Yes, you're right. I love Chinese women. Here I just want to talk about Chinese software companies but not Chinese people, because it's unpolite to do that.

#3, perhaps THIS is why

http://www.zdnet.com/us-warns-china-software-risk-to-public-infrastructure-2062300799/

http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/feature/The-Huawei-security-risk-Factors-to-consider-before-buying-Chinese-IT

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/2013/0130/Tale-of-Bob-Does-outsourcing-new-software-pose-cyber-security-risk-video

Inviting Chinese software onto your system is a little like inviting the associates of convicted burglars into your home when you aren't there. Some of us are kinda concerned about the prospects of returning to an empty house.

Understand?

Bitdefender cloud protection block website page (http://ntfstofat32wizard.com/) of this SW !

-Is it possible to convert a partition larger than 32GB to FAT32?

Yes. The windows built-in disk management and other utility don’t allow that, it is not a problem for NTFS to FAT32 Converter, the maximum supportable size of partition up to 2TB.

see http://ntfstofat32wizard.com/support/

# 15
The limit of GB is for the free version.
The registered version here, has no such limit.

# 13
just do a backup first, if you are so concerned!

Dear users, please note that:

1) The GOTD offer today is a Home Edition so there will be NO DATA SIZE LIMIT.

2) The Free edition offered on our website can be downloaded freely at any time but it only supports 8GB data.

3) Please download the offer from GOTD and follow the instructions to get the Home Edition for free.

--
Kevin Zhou,
SharpNight

My understanding for GOTD is that the user receives the benefit of the use of free software while the company supplying the software receives the benefit of feedback from the GOTD users of their technical issues with the software offered so that the manufacturer can fix their problems. The manufacturer also receives feedback as to the competitiveness in the market. A third benefit for the manufacturer is that they would potentially receive positive word-of-mouth from GOTD users to friends and colleagues should the software test well. That is a substantial reward for both parties with substantial weight for the manufacturer should their product test favorably.

However, as in this software, as I read through the comments, it is my understanding this piece of software is offered in its most limited form being limited to only 8GB conversion. I figure most users today would not have an <8GB hard drive for testing, and the only other media possible would be a flash drive. So, I don't understand why the manufacturer would offer such a limited version for analysis, especially given that would be the free version offered on their website.

Can the manufacturer please clarify?

Thank you

Whilst what is essentially a one trick pony product can be very useful, where there are other products that can do the same job for free then it lessens the chance of it being purchased, especially when it is anything other than just a few dollars/pounds etc

AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition does the same job in an equally non destructive way and in the case of this particular product also offers additional functionality such as Partition Alignment, Convert GPT and MBR disk, Bootable CD based on Win8 PE, Migrate OS to SSD/HDD etc.

I carried out a small test to see how AOMI worked as the only potential advantage that I could see with today's offering was perhaps the speed of conversion.

I took a 4Gb SD card, formatted to NTFS and filled it with files of varying sizes. There were 14000 files in all to ensure that there were many to be processed should their numbers have any impact on the process (I don't know whether it does).

The process took 1 minute 28 seconds without any data loss.

So there may well be one advantage to today's software with it's advantage of time, assuming that the cited less than 10 second processing time to be true.

This then is likely a decision based upon time against money in terms of whether you are happy to wait longer but have it done for free, or pay money now to save time later.

As with any product of this nature, it is still advisable to backup important data first to avoid any possibility of loss, regardless of claims as you will never find a vendor compensating you for any loss.

"Data safety guaranteed"
If data gets lost during the conversion process then what? Do I get my money back? The website isn't very helpful.

Why does this software after installation tell me that I have NO Harddisk in my Notebook???

@No1+No6: About Awsomegotduser: Maybe he loves Chinese women to much? My opinion is quite simple in fact: "Good and bad software, and, good and bad people (including developers), also, smart and dumb people, have no nationality. These are "international" qualities."

Thank you GOTD and SharpNight LLC for this giveaway. For me it worked OK on a Win7 x32 SP1-U.

@Uppereast, :P It's simply you cannot convert the partition where the OS is installed. Please try with an external device. Thank you.

"It works with all storage device" ...
Does it mean that a C disk ( main HDD with Win XP installed ) is not a storage device but an OS device ?
Why this question: My fat 32 HDD has 2 partitions C (with win XO sp3 as OS)and D.
-installed the soft on D
- tested Fat32 to Ntfs: only D is displayed
- unstalled the soft from D and installed it on C
- tested Fat32 to Ntfs: only D is displayed too.

@Tech, please follow GTOD's guide to download the full version.

@Dadams, the home edition is offered here.

@Awsomegotduser, I have no idea why you bring this up??

There are four versions of this program. check out this link to see the differences.....

http://ntfstofat32wizard.com/purchase/

What version is being offered here?