Windows File System Comparison - Essay Example The two main categories of file systems used by different Microsoft Windows operating systems are the File Allocation Table (FAT) and the New Technology File System (NTFS). There are different versions of FAT, which are FAT 12, FAT 16, and FAT 32; while for NTFS, there are NTFS or NTFS 4 and NTFS 5. These file systems have many characteristics in common which will be pointed out in the discussion below. The FAT file system is the one being used by Microsoft DOS and older versions of Microsoft Windows. In fact, any version of Windows can have FAT as its file system. When a volume is formatted and the FAT file system is used, a data structure is created by Windows which is used to record the data blocks on the hard drive that are allocated to each file in order for the files to be retrieved at a latter time. FAT is considered to be a simple file system which makes it an ideal file system format for most memory cards and floppy disks. FAT file system is suggested if the computer has two operating systems installed.