partition question.

[shamoo]

Hello all, i have 2 HDD, one has win xp on it, the other has just movies on it. the one with movies on has 131gb of movies on it and 100gb of free space. I want to allocate 50gb of it to a FAT32 partition. can i reallocate 50gb without wiping the movies? if so, how do i do it?

thanks in advance :helpful:

[LoRd_MuldeR]

Yes, partitions can be shrinked without loosing the data - if they have enough free space. But I think Windows XP itself cannot do it. Windows 7's Disk Manager can ;)

Under Windows XP you will need to use third party software. Needless to say that you should backup your data before messing with partitions.

After you have shrinked the existing partition, it should be no problem to create a new partition in the unpartitioned area. Then create a FAT32 filesystem in the new partition.

[shamoo]

any suggestions on programs that can do it, easily?

[LoRd_MuldeR]

http://www.soft32.com/download_151.html

[RunningSkittle]

http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php
;)

[shamoo]

thanks for the reply guys, just another quick question before i dive into it.

If the whole HDD (external) is formatted to FAT32, and i put my Blu-ray movies in it which are M2Ts files, will a PS3 recognize both the M2Ts files that are VC-1 and H264?

basically the reason i'm looking at doing this is, i want to store all my blu-rays and DVD's onto a HDD (pref 2tb) but a lot of blu-ray's are in the code of VC-1 which the ps3 cant read unless it's written onto a disc. Unless you convert it to H264 which i can do but takes time, or as i read partiton the HDD to FAT32 and then it can work, with the help of AVCHD

[LoRd_MuldeR]

thanks for the reply guys, just another quick question before i dive into it.

If the whole HDD (external) is formatted to FAT32, and i put my Blu-ray movies in it which are M2Ts files, will a PS3 recognize both the M2Ts files that are VC-1 and H264?

The file system has absolutely nothing to do with the file format. So if the PS3 does support M2TS files and if it does support VC-1 and/or H.264 video streams, then it should be able to play those files from any media it can access. Well, unless there is some synthetic restriction, added by Sony for political/commercial reasons. Anyway, you may run into the problem that the maximum fiile size on FAT32 formated discs is 2GB. If your M2TS file exceeds that size, it cannot be stored on a FAT32 file system. You'd have to use a different file system or split the file...

[nurbs]

Anyway, you may run into the problem that the maximum fiile size on FAT32 formated discs is 2GB.
Small correction: It's 4 GB.

[Ghitulescu]

I strongly recommend a backup before - it seems to me that you don't have much experience with such things and you can easily ruin everything. An external HDD is not that expensive now.

[shamoo]

I've spent the last week! trying to find the best solution/set-up for me, like i said before i want to go discless without loss of any quality to picture or audio. All my testing was done on a empty internal HDD and a external HDD and i think i had 3 breakdowns trying to find this answer, yet i'm still not 100% sure what i want lol.

I still have a few questions that i'm searching for but can assume the answers. Like is the internal PS3 hdd NTSF or FAT32? i think it works the same as the computer does, so if you can transfer wireless or wired from a NTSF hdd to the PS3 i assume the PS3 hdd is NTSF?

The reason i was looking at this is that you can install a bigger hdd upto 1td in the ps3 or connect a internal hdd (2tb) but externally as the ps3 only houses hdd's that are 2.5" and 1tb is the largest they come. The idea being no streaming or needing the computer on to watch a movie, it would all be on the PS3. But then having hdd's hanging out the ps3 would look a bit shite really, lol. :eek:

This still doesn't solve the problem of having blu-ray movies that are in VC-1, does converting it to H264 loose any quality? and VC-1 apparently can only run of a FAT32 hdd which i still cant the ps3 to play:mad:
http://forums.afterdawn.com/thread_view.cfm/686998
this is the tut i'm trying but doesn't seem to work for me, and if i could get it to work, would it be a no go for the bigger internal ps3 hdd as i would need some of it in the form of FAT32 and NTSF which would involve a lot of messing around all the time. Plus i'm not 100% sure but i think the PS3 can only have 1 internal HDD? 2tb=100ish blu-ray movies, which isn't a lot.

in the end if anyone is looking to do the same as i am, then you have a choice of methods to use.

1, Wait for Sony to update the ps3 to be able to play VC-1
2, Play the movies wireless or wired from the pc, that way you can have multiply hdd in both FAT32 and NTSF.
3, Convert the VC-1 to H264 and forget FAT32.

I'm not sure is this will help anyone and i've probably gone off topic, but there you go, you look into 1 thing and before you know it turns out there is a lot obstacles in they way.
HURRY UP SONY AND MAKE THE PS3 ABLE TO PLAY VC-1. sorry for the long post. :thanks:

[Inspector.Gadget]

This still doesn't solve the problem of having blu-ray movies that are in VC-1, does converting it to H264 loose any quality?

You will lose mathematical quality unless you use x264's lossless mode (warning: HUGE files). You can minimize visual quality loss, however, by using appropriately low CRF values or appropriately high 2-pass bitrates. Start with CRF 18 and see how it goes; you can easily mux the video in place of the original VC-1 using TSMuxer (but be aware that the PS3 may not support all frame sizes, so to be safe don't crop). You can always retain the original VC-1 material and then delete the transcoded copy if and when Sony issues the relevant firmware update.

[nurbs]

Harddrives don't have to use the same file system in order for you to be able to transfer files between them. There are only problems when you hit the limitations of a file system, i.e. the 4GB filesize limit in fat32. The PS3s internal drive uses fat32 and that's the only filesystem (apart from UDF for DVD and Blu-Ray) the PS3 can directly read. Also the PS3 is already able to play VC-1 (in m2ts at least). The forum post you linked even says so.

[shamoo]

. Also the PS3 is already able to play VC-1 (in m2ts at least). The forum post you linked even says so.

When your streaming either by wired or wireless form a NTSF internal hdd the ps3 wont read the m2ts file which is vc-1, it comes up with data corrupt, it will work (although i haven't got it to work yet) if it is being read of a external fat32 hdd via usb, as the tutorial states. For some reason i cant get it to work.