I'm moving from Windows to CachyOS and have some concerns about file management during the transition. My current setup involves an HDD for personal files that I want to format to ext4, and I need to temporarily move these files to an external drive which is NTFS formatted. This drive is crucial since it contains backups from family members who only use Windows, and I can't get a new drive right now. I'm worried about potential risks involved in moving files back and forth between NTFS and ext4. Specifically, can I safely use my NTFS external drive for backup, format my HDD to ext4, and transfer everything back without causing file corruption? Also, is it advisable to occasionally copy files from ext4 to NTFS for backups every few months? What are the risks of file corruption during these transfers?
2 Answers
It seems like you're a bit misinformed about Linux and NTFS. Linux can read and write NTFS without breaking it. The real problem with NTFS lies in its proprietary nature. If it gets corrupted, recovery is easier on Windows. If you're only using Linux, relying on NTFS could become risky, especially if something goes wrong. You might think about eventually switching to ext4 or similar for reliability.
You'll be okay! Though NTFS drivers on Linux aren't as robust as ext4, for occasional use with an external drive, you shouldn't run into major issues. Just remember that no storage solution is completely foolproof, so it's smart to have backups. If your external 'backup' is your only copy, it's not really a backup!
Can you share some sources that explain why NTFS is considered less reliable? I've found it to be quite stable in my experience, but I'm interested in the arguments on both sides.