I have been looking all over for a way to format an external drive so that I can use it under Linux, Windows and OS X. The reason for this is simple, I currently use Windows and Linux all the time, and I am planning on upgrading my rig to a MacBook Pro just as soon as I can. Since I expect to be running OS X, Windows and Linux I needed to find a format for my 300GB external drive that would work with all of them.
While FAT32 is an option, it has some serious limitations. Like a maximum file size of 1 byte less than 4 GB. That and the way that FAT32 partitions over 32 GB (while supported under Windows) tend to get a little, shall we say, flaky.
Before today what I had found was as follows:
| OS |
File System |
Read |
Write |
| Windows XP |
Ext2 / Ext3 |
application |
no |
| HFS+ |
application |
no |
| NTFS |
native |
native |
| Linux |
Ext2 / Ext3 |
native |
native |
| HFS+ |
in kernel |
in kernel |
| NTFS |
in kernel |
no |
| OS X |
Ext2 / Ext3 |
no |
no |
| HFS+ |
native |
native |
| NTFS |
in kernel |
no |
Note: native = default or standard in a “vanilla” install | in kernel = modules available for kernel insertion, although not default.
Well, that was before I found these today: kernel modules for both OS X and Windows for full read and write support of Ext2 / Ext3 file systems. I have installed Ext2 IFS for Windows and pounded on it already. It works (so far) like a charm. I don’t yet have a Mac to test the Mac OS X Ext2 Filesystem but I will do so as soon as I can. Assuming they are building this as a loadable module for the Darwin kernel (does the OS X Darwin kernel allow insmodding?) then it should be a snap. What surprised me is that the Ext2 IFS for Windows is an actual NT Kernel module, not an app or service. It’s actually kind of cool to see my Linux partitions show up under XP as lettered drives!
