NTFS and FAT : the difference internally

Question

I've been searching about this on google, but I get a lot of external information like: it is self healing and more stable etc etc.. Can someone explain the internal workings of the two systems, in terms of how they store data, retrieve them and any other differences between them. I gather FAT stores in clusters of bytes and has a "FAT" table to store entries. Also they mention that each cluster has a link to the next. How is FAT working exactly when I poll for a particular file. What happens in NTFS?

Answer 1

Your question is extremely general - so just some links with information about NTFS:

• http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms995846.aspx
• http://www.ntfs.com/ntfs_vs_fat.htm
• http://www.ntfs.com/ntfs_basics.htm