File System Conversion Behavior During Windows 2000 Setup

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This article was previously published under Q197056

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SUMMARY

When you install Windows 2000 using Winnt32.exe, you may receive the option to upgrade the existing file system on the volume on which Windows 2000 is being installed to the NTFS file system. If you choose to do so, the file systems on other volumes are left unchanged. Note that this dialog box does not have any effect on the upgrade of existing NTFS volumes to the newer version of NTFS.

MORE INFORMATION

The following rules apply to this conversion process:

During a system upgrade, the existing file system (FAT/FAT32) is kept intact.
In the case of an unattended installation or upgrade, the file system conversion behavior is driven by the value of the FileSystem = key in the [Unattended] section of the Unattend.txt file:
[Unattended]
FileSystem = ConvertNTFS | LeaveAlone

Specifies whether the primary partition should be converted to NTFS or left alone
In the case of a Windows 95/98 migration, the default behavior is to leave the file system intact. This can be overridden in the Unattend.txt file if one is being used.