108 ABSOLUTE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TODIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY
Formatting Flash Media
Every version of Windows since Windows 98 uses the FAT32 filesystem. This is a 32-
bit filesystem in which the File Allocation Table stores cluster addresses as 32 bits,
resulting in smaller cluster sizes (4KB versus FAT16’s 16–32KB).
Here are a few different versions of the FAT family:
■ FAT12 File System—The oldest type of FAT uses a 12-bit binary number to
hold the cluster number. This filesystem can hold a maximum of 4,086 clus-
ters, which is common on flash media smaller than about 16MB and floppy
disks. This filesystem isn’t too common anymore because even flash media
are larger than 16MB.
■ FAT16—The filesystem used for almost all flash media relies on a 16-bit
binary number to hold cluster numbers. A flash media card using FAT16 can
hold a maximum of 65,526 clusters, which is 16MB–2,048MB. Today’s CF
cards are already over 2GB—therefore the need for FAT32.
■ FAT32—Today’s flash media larger than 2GB require formatting using the
FAT32 filesystem. FAT32-formatted media can theoretically handle 268 mil-
lion clusters, and will support drives up to two terabytes in size!Almost no flash media is formatted with the FAT32 filesystem, even with these
advantages (smaller file size, greater capacity, and so on). The reason is that access
times are long with 32-bit addresses. FAT32 tables must be accessed much more
often because they contain so many more clusters. This matters when you are a pro-
fessional photographer and have to shoot dozens of rolls in an hour. The time it
takes to write each image to a FAT32 card is much longer than with FAT16.
Rather, most digital cameras rely on FAT16, or even FAT12. Flash media up to 16MB
use FAT12; media between 16MB and 2GB use FAT16, and some media above 2GB
use FAT32.Formatting in the Camera
You usually should not format a flash media card in a Windows XP machine. Use
the camera to format the card instead. Most cameras and portable devices will not
accept media that has been formatted with the FAT32 filesystem, which is the
default format for Windows XP. If a flash media card is formatted in Windows XP as
FAT32 and you place it in a camera, you might see the following error messages:
■ Error message asking to reformat the flash card.
■ Error message that the flash card is not formatted.
■ Error message indicating that the card is anomalous.