CS 210 PC Maintenance and Troubleshooting

Today’s topic

Windows Registry
Scandisk
Disk Defragmenter
Manage Disks
FAT16,FAT32 and NTFS

Manoj Paliwal
GPC Dungarpur
 Windows Registry

The Windows registry is a database of information, settings, options, and other

values for software and hardware installed on all versions of Microsoft
Windows operating systems. When a program is installed, a new sub key is created
in the registry. This sub key contains settings specific to that program, such as its
location, version, and primary executable.

To view and make changes to the Windows registry, the Windows Registry Editor
may be used. The Registry Editor allows you to view all keys and values that are in
the registry, as well as change Windows, program, or driver values you feel are
necessary.
 Scandisk

Scandisk  is a diagnostic utility program included in MS-DOS and Windows 9x. It

checks and repairs file systems errors on a disk drive, while the system starts
The program was first introduced in MS-DOS and succeeded its simpler
predecessor, CHKDSK. It included a more user-friendly interface than CHKDSK, more
configuration options, and the ability to detect and recover from physical errors on
the disk. This replaced and improved upon the limited ability offered by the MS-
DOS recover utility. Unlike CHKDSK, Scandisk would also repair cross linked files
However, Scandisk cannot check NTFS disk drives, and therefore it is unavailable for
computers that may be running NT based (including Windows 2000, Windows XP,
etc.) versions of Windows;
 Disk Defragmenter
Disk fragmentation causes files on your computer to be scattered on different parts
of the disk. This usually happens when you install some application or delete a
large number of files. When the files are stored in a non-contiguous space on the
hard disk, the system must do extra work to retrieve files from the disk. This causes
your computer to slow down. Disks become fragmented over a period of time after
continuous usage. Disk defragmentation helps rearrange the files on the disk to
contiguous spaces and thus improve disk performance.

Open Disk Defragmenter by clicking the Start button . In the search box, type Disk

Defragmenter, and then, in the list of results, click Disk Defragmenter.
Under Current status, select the disk you want to defragment. To determine if the
disk needs to be defragmented or not, click Analyze disk. Once Windows is finished
analyzing the disk, you can check the percentage of fragmentation on the disk in
the Last Run column. If the number is above 10%, you should defragment the disk.
 Disk Management

Disk Management is a system utility in Windows that enables you to perform

advanced storage tasks. Here are some of the things Disk Management is good for

To setup a new drive.

To extend a volume into space that's not already part of a volume on the same drive.

To shrink a partition, usually so that you can extend a neighboring partition.

To change a drive letter or assign a new drive letter, see Change a drive letter
 Disk Management

The easiest way to access Windows 7 Disk Management:

Right click "Computer"→ select "Manage" → Get the new control panel, open
"Storage" and choose "Disk Management" in submenu.
 FAT16

FAT16 is the original file system used in DOS and Windows 3.x, and was originally
only designed for use on relatively small partitions. It's been revised so that it's
possible to make a FAT16 partition up to 4GB in size, but no more than that.

If FAT16 is selected, the hard disk drive will be divided into 512 byte pieces called
sectors. These sectors are grouped into larger pieces called clusters. Due to design
limitations, the maximum number of clusters that the FAT16 system can keep track of
is 65,535. Hard disk drives larger than 1.2GB therefore become very inefficient in
storing data because large amounts of hard disk drive space is unused but occupied
by the file allocation table. FAT16 does provide excellent performance on small hard
disk drives that are less than 1.2GB.
 FAT32
FAT32 is a revised version of FAT16 that can be used to create much larger partitions
and has native support for long filenames, and was introduced with Win98. Both
FAT16 and FAT32 are also backwards and cross-compatible with older versions of
Windows and other Operating systems. However, both FAT16 and FAT32 suffer from
many drawbacks: they have weak error recovery and no built-in file security

Choosing FAT32 as the file allocation system during the formatting of the hard disk
drive will efficiently manage the way the data is stored on the hard disk drive. FAT32
can and should be used for hard disk drives larger than 1.2 GB. Improved hard drive
performance using FAT32 on larger hard disk drives is the key advantage of selecting
FAT 32 over FAT 16.
 NTFS

NTFS, which was introduced with Windows NT, is much more secure and robust than
FAT16 or FAT32, and offers better recovery from errors. NTFS is now offered on
Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows 2003 Server, although all of the above OS's
can also use FAT16 or FAT32. It's generally recommended that NTFS be used except
when backwards compatibility is urgently needed.

In order to select NTFS as the file system on the hard disk drive, Microsoft Windows NT
based must be the operating system. NTFS is not supported by any other operating
system. NTFS works well with large hard disk drives. NTFS is chosen for its enhanced
security features and is therefore used by most companies. Security in NTFS partitions
may be sent down to the file level. This enhanced security provides significantly more
flexibility and granularity than can be achieved in the FAT file system. NTFS is available
in Microsoft Windows NT 3.51, 4.0 or in Windows 2000
Feature FAT16 FAT32 NTFS
Minimum partition size N/A 512MB 20MB
2GB 2TB 15EB
Maximum partition size
4GB with Windows NT . .

Minimum file size 2GB 4GB N/A

MS-DOS Windows 95 Windows NT v3.51

Windows 95
Windows 3.1 Windows NT v4.0
OSR2
Operating system Windows 95 Windows 98 Windows 2000
Windows 98 Windows 2000 .
Windows NT . .
Windows 2000 . .

N/A N/A Windows NT v3.51

Security
. . Windows NT v4.0
. . Windows 2000