Which file system offers better data verification error correction and scalability?

Microsoft is switching to the Resilient File System for Windows 8, but only the server edition will support the new and more robust file system.

ReFS is built on the foundation of the current and almost 20-year-old NTFS file system. But it's been designed from the ground floor to offer several advantages, particularly for servers.

As described in the latest Building Windows 8 blog by Surendra Verma, a development manager on Microsoft's Storage and File System team, ReFS will be unveiled and phased in as part of Windows Server 8, so IT administrators will be able to give it a spin by the end of the year.

Since ReFS uses a subset of features from NTFS, it's designed to maintain backward compatibility with its older counterpart. So Windows 8 clients will be able to read and write to ReFS hard-drive partitions and shares on a server, just as they can now do with those running NTFS. But as implied in its name, the new file system offers greater resiliency, meaning better data verification, error correction, and scalability.

Beyond its greater resiliency, ReFS will also surpass NTFS by offering larger maximum sizes for individual files, directories, disk volumes, and other items, as seen in the table below:

Trying to address concerns among server administrators, Verma said Microsoft has conducted tens of thousands of tests of the new file system to ensure that it's reliable and that it performs as expected. However, the company is still cautioning IT departments to tread slowly and carefully in deploying ReFS and to adopt their own internal testing before deployment.

Microsoft is also ramping up ReFS in a step-by-step manner.

"We will implement ReFS in a staged evolution of the feature: first as a storage system for Windows Server, then as storage for clients, and then ultimately as a boot volume," Verma explained. "This is the same approach we have used with new file systems in the past. Initially, our primary test focus will be running ReFS as a file server. We expect customers to benefit from using it as a file server, especially on a mirrored Storage Space. We also plan to work with our storage partners to integrate it with their storage solutions."

Summary

In this article we will see some benefits and properties of implementing ReFS file system. We will also see why Microsoft implemented this file system, to meet the requirements for larger volumes increase due to the current trend in virtualization technologies and the issues that prevent NTFS file systems from managing very large volumes when the file system does not provide sufficient error-tracking and self-repairing mechanisms, especially for multi-terabyte (TB) volumes.

ReFS has Number of Advantages Over NTFS

There are some advantages in ReFS as compare to NFTS as below:-

• Metadata integrity with checksums
• Expanded protection against data corruption
• Maximizes reliability Large volume, file and directory sizes
• Storage pooling and virtualization
• Redundancy for fault tolerance
• Disk scrubbing for protection against disk errors
• Resiliency to corruptions
• Shared storage pools across machines

ReFS is a file system that is based on the NTFS

• It provides the following advantages over NTFS: ·        
• Metadata integrity with checksums ·        
• Expanded protection against data corruption ·        
• Maximizes reliability, especially during a loss of power (while NTFS has been known to experience corruption in similar circumstances) ·        
• Large volume, file, and directory sizes ·        
• Storage pooling and virtualization, which makes creating and managing file systems easier ·        
• Redundancy for fault tolerance ·        
• Disk scrubbing for protection against latent disk errors ·        
• Resiliency to corruptions with recovery for maximum volume availability ·        
• Shared storage pools across machines for additional failure tolerance and load balancing

ReFS inherits some features from NTFS 

Following are the featured inherited by NTFS

• BitLocker Drive Encryption ·        
• ACLs for security ·        
• Update sequence number (USN) journal ·        
• Change notifications ·        
• Symbolic links, junction points, mount points and reparse points ·        
• Volume snapshots ·        
• File IDs

Conclusions

ReFS uses a subset of NTFS features, so it maintains backward compatibility with NTFS. Programs that run on Windows Server 2016 can access files on ReFS just as they would on NTFS. However, an ReFS-formatted drive is not recognized when placed in computers that are running Windows Server operating systems that were released before Windows Server 2012. You can use ReFS drives with Windows 10 and Windows 8.1, but not with Windows 8. NTFS enables you to change a volume’s allocation unit size, but with ReFS, each volume has a fixed size of 64 KB, which you cannot change. ReFS does not support Encrypted File System (EFS) for files. As its name implies, the new file system offers greater resiliency, meaning better data verification, error correction, and scalability.

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