AVG Antivirus test

The program's dark-hued main window features five large panels representing five security areas: Computer, Web, Identity, Email, and Firewall. Each panel includes a colored circle that's proportionally colored to reflect how complete your protection is, and each circle changes from green to red if there's a problem.

AVG really does want you to try the pro edition. During installation, you get a choice of proceeding to install AVG free or starting a 30-day trial of pro. It's a bit tricky; the only way to proceed with the free edition is to back up a step and select Custom Install. And of course the ad panel across the bottom exhorts you to upgrade.

Privacy Brouhaha
AVG made the news recently with reports that its new privacy policy allowed the company to sell your browsing and search history. An article in Wired made some strong statements, among them that this policy placed AVG squarely in the category of spyware.

I perused the actual privacy policy, along with privacy policies of a number of other sites, and concluded that AVG's policy is completely normal for the industry. Publishers of free antivirus software must have some way to make money, but it totally can't involve selling personal data. That would be corporate suicide. The scariest privacy policy I read belonged to Wired itself.

Good Lab Results 
AVG participates in testing with all of the most-innovative labs that I follow, and does well. It has also appeared in all of the last 12 tests by Virus Bulletin, and received VB100 certification in 11 of those tests.

Of the three testing criteria used by AV-Test Institute, protection against malware is the most important. AVG defeated 100 percent of the malware samples used in this test, earning 6 of 6 possible points. It also took 6 points for usability, meaning it exhibited almost no false positives. The only thing keeping it from achieving a perfect 18 points the way Bitdefender Antivirus Plus 2016 did was a poor showing in the performance test.

 In a different performance test by AV-Comparatives, AVG rated Advanced+, the top rating. It also earned Advanced+ in the dynamic real-world protection test, and in a test specifically measuring how thoroughly products remove malware they detect. It would have managed Advanced in both static file detection tests by this lab, but false positives knocked one score down to Standard.

The months-long real-world test performed by Dennis Technology Labs is labor-intensive enough that this lab only includes about 10 products. Like Kaspersky Anti-Virus (2016) and Trend Micro Antivirus+ Security 2016, AVG earned AAA certification, the best rating.

While AVG doesn't have the across-the-board top scores that Bitdefender and Kaspersky boast, it's definitely up there with the best free products.

Speedy ScanWhen you click the Scan now button on the main window, you get several choices. You can manage scheduled scans, run a scan of the whole computer, scan a specific folder, or run a rootkit scan. That last one had me worried the first time I saw it. Would users have to run a rootkit scan and a full scan? Don't worry; the full scan includes rootkits.

I timed a full scan on my standard clean test system and found it took 27 minutes. That's pretty good, given that the current average is 34 minutes. During the initial scan, AVG notes files that are known to be safe and hence don't require scanning as long as they don't change. A repeat scan with AVG completed in barely a minute.

Effective Malware BlockingAVG put on a good show in my hands-on malware-blocking test. When I opened the folder containing my malware samples, it leapt in to the fray, knocking out one sample after another. Within a few minutes, 86 percent of the samples were gone.

My malicious URL blocking test, on the other hand, is always current. Using a data feed supplied by MRG-Effitas, I challenge each antivirus with the very newest malware-hosting URLs. For each URL that doesn't result in an error message, I note whether the antivirus prevented the browser from even visiting the URL, eliminated the payload during or immediately after download, or ignored the threat.

What’s New in the Latest Windows 10 Insider Preview

Arguably the biggest update is Cortana. Microsoft continues to expand on what Cortana can do, clearly trying to make it the most powerful assistant in an increasingly growing pool of competition (Siri, Google Now, Alexa, and the whole gang). This time around, Cortana comes to the Windows 10 lock screen, so you can invoke her at any time. And, she can push stuff to and from your mobile device, including notifications and text messages. (And remember, sinceCortana is available on Android too, that doesn’t mean you need a Windows Phone to take advantage.)

More interestingly, though, Cortana can parse even more information about stuff it thinks you might need. For example, the on-stage demo showed us that Cortana can respond to things like “Send Chuck the PowerPoint I worked on last night”, or “What toy store did I visit at Build last year?” That’s pretty crazy. Of course, if you’re more privacy-conscious, that’s crazy in all the wrong ways–but it’s a pretty tempting set of features.

Cortana can also make proactive suggestions for you. If you receive email confirmation of flight details, it’ll add them to your calendar. If you promised Chuck you’d send him that PowerPoint in an email, Cortana will know, and remind you to fulfill that commitment later on.

Furthermore, if you add an appointment to your calendar, it’ll know if that appointment overlaps with another, and ask you if you want to re-schedule one of the overlapping events. Or, if you have a meeting during lunch it’ll ask if you want to book a table, or make a to-go order, based on the apps you have available. In short, Cortana is getting more proactive, so you don’t have to be on top of your own stuff–and isn’t that what having an assistant is all about?

Windows 10 Interacts with Your Android Phone (or Windows Phone)

This isn’t finished in the Insider Preview yet, but after the Build keynote, Microsoft also announced that Cortana will now integrate with the Cortana application on your Android or Windows smartphone. You’ll just need to install the Cortana Android app and sign in with the same Microsoft account on both devices. iPhone users are out of luck, as iOS is too locked down for Microsoft to integrate with it as deeply. As of build 14328, this should be working between Windows 10 PCs and Windows Mobile 10 phones running the latest builds. It now works between Android phones and Windows 10 PCs, too–just be sure you have the latest Cortana app installed from Google Play.

How to Turn Off the Character Popups on the iOS 9 Keyboard

When you tap a key on the iOS keyboard, it will “pop up” so you know what key you’re pressing. This preview has long been a feature that you had to live with whether you liked it or not, but in iOS 9, you can disable it.

To begin, tap “Settings” on the Home screen.

Tap “General” on the Settings screen.

On the “General” screen, tap “Keyboard”.

In the “All Keyboards” section, tap the “Character Preview” slider button so it turns white instead of green.

Now you won’t see the character popups when you tap keys on the keyboard. The ability to turn off the character popups is also a security enhancement. With the “Character Preview” setting on, anyone who can see your screen while you’re typing can more easily see which keys your tapping. Turning off the setting will better mask your keystrokes.

Don’t Waste Time Optimizing Your SSD

SSDs Aren’t as Small or Fragile as They Used to Be

There are a lot of guides out there about optimizing your SSD, but we don’t recommend following most of them. Some of the advice is outdated, and some of it was never necessary.

Much of the advice on “optimizing” Windows for an SSD involves reducing the amount of writes to the SSD. That’s because each cell of flash memory on the drive only has a limited number of writes before it can’t be written to anymore. Guides assert that you should try to avoid unnecessary wear on the SSD by minimizing the amount of writes.

But worries about SSD wear are overblown. Tech Report ran an 18-month-long stress test where they wrote as much data to SSDs as possible to see when they failed. Here’s what they found:

“Over the past 18 months, we’ve watched modern SSDs easily write far more data than most consumers will ever need. Errors didn’t strike the Samsung 840 Series until after 300TB of writes, and it took over 700TB to induce the first failures. The fact that the 840 Pro exceeded 2.4PB is nothing short of amazing, even if that achievement is also kind of academic.”

Even at 700TB, the lowest failure threshold, you could write 100 GB a day to the drive every single day for over 19 years before the drive failed. At 2 PB, you could write 100 GB a day to the drive every single day for over 54 years before the drive failed. It’s unlikely you’ll write that much data to the drive every single day. You’ll probably be done with the drive well before then. In fact, there’s a good chance you’ll die before your SSD dies of wear. Everything wears down, and SSDs are no exception–but they don’t wear down so quickly that we need to worry about it.

You still need to perform regular backups of your important files, as SSDs could fail for other reasons aside from wear. And for extremely heavy use–for example, database servers–an SSD might not be up to snuff. But tweaking Windows to write a bit less to the drive won’t make an appreciable difference.

Other guides advise you to reduce the amount of files you store on the SSD to save space. That’s because SSDs may slow down as you fill them up, just like any other drive–but this was more helpful when SSDs were tiny. Modern SSDs are larger and less expensive, so you shouldn’t have to disable important system functions (like hibernation) to stay within these limits.

Windows Already Performs the Necessary Optimizations For You

There are some important optimizations, but Windows performs them all automatically. If you used an SSD with Windows XP or Vista, you needed to manually enable TRIM, which ensures your SSD can clean up deleted files and stay speedy. However, ever since Windows 7, Windows has automatically enabled TRIM for any drive it detects as solid-state.

The same goes for disk defragmentation. Performing a typical defragmentation operation on an SSD isn’t a good idea–even if wear isn’t a concern, attempting to move all that data around won’t speed up file access times like it will on a mechanical drive. But Windows already knows this, too: modern versions of Windows will detect that SSD and will turn off defragging. In fact, modern versions of Windows won’t even let you attempt to defragment an SSD.

On Windows 8 and 10, the “Optimize Drives” application will attempt to optimize your SSDs even further. Windows will send the “retrim” command on the schedule you configure. This forces the SSD to actually delete data that should have been deleted when TRIM commands were originally sent. Windows 8 and 10 will also perform an SSD-optimized type of defragmentation about once a month. Microsoft employee Scott Hanselman offers more details on his blog.

Windows 8 and 10 also automatically disable the SuperFetch service for speedy solid-state drives. Leave SuperFetch “on” in Windows 10 and it will automatically enable itself for slower mechanical drives and disable itself for fast SSDs. You don’t need to tweak this by hand–Windows 10 just does the right thing. Windows 7 will disable SuperFetch system-wide if you have a fast enough SSD. Either way, SuperFetch is disabled automatically.

Windows Update automatically updates your hardware drivers–whether or not you want it to–so you shouldn’t need to dig up new driver versions from your motherboard manufacturer’s website to go looking for performance improvements.

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Prevent Windows From Restarting Your PC After Windows Updates

Have you seen that message in Windows 8 that tells you your computer is going to reboot and there is not a thing you can do about it except save your work? Here’s how to make sure that never happens again. This tip works for Windows 7 as well.

Note that we have covered this method before for preventing Windows 7 from automatically rebooting. This article has two methods for doing the same thing.

Prevent Windows 8 From Restarting Your PC After Windows Updates

Press the Win + R keyboard combination to bring up the run dialog then type gpedit.msc and press enter.

When the Local Group Policy Editor opens, navigate to:

Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Windows Update

On the right hand side you will see a setting titled:

No auto-restart with logged on users for scheduled automatic updates installations

Double click on it.

From here you will need to enable the setting by changing the radio button from “Not Configured” to “Enabled”, then clicking apply.

As always, we recommend you force a Group Policy update so that the changes will reflect immediately.

That’s all there is to it.

Using the Registry

If your version of Windows 8 doesn’t ship with the Group Policy editor, you can always use the registry to disable these reboots. Again press the Windows + R keyboard combination to bring up a run box – type regedit then hit enter.

Now navigate to:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate\AU

Note: If you don’t see the Windows Update or AU keys you may have to create them.

Then create a new 32-bit DWORD called NoAutoRebootWithLoggedOnUsers.

Then double click on it and give it a hex value of 1.

Reboot your machine and you’re good to go!

How to Enable System Restore (Repair System Problems) on Windows 10

With Windows 10, Microsoft seems to have disabled System Restore by default — at least on some PCs. System Restore has been around since Windows ME, creating snapshots of system files you can restore if a problem occurs.

Windows 10 still does contain System Restore, so you can re-enable it if you feel more comfortable with System Restore as a safety net. Windows 10 also offers other system-recovery features, helping lessen the need for System Restore.

Why Did Microsoft Disable System Restore?

Microsoft hasn’t really explained why it’s not enabling System Restore by default. However, we do have some idea. System Restore can use quite a bit of disk space when it creates those snapshots, and Microsoft is trying to get Windows 10’s disk space requirements down. Microsoft wants Windows 10 to run on devices with as little as 16 GB of internal storage — all the better to compete with Chromebooks and cheap Android tablets.

System Restore is also less necessary thanks to other features in Windows 10 that can quickly get your Windows system back to a fresh state without a full reinstallation of Windows. Windows 10’s PC reset feature that will give you a fresh Windows system without necessarily wiping your files is one big help here.

How to Re-Enable System Restore

You can re-enable System Restore from the Control Panel. It will use some system storage space for its snapshots, so you probably won’t want to do this on inexpensive laptops and tablets with only a small amount of storage space. If you have a big hard drive in your PC, however, it won’t be a big deal.

Bear in mind that it’s disabled by default, so it hasn’t been creating snapshots. If you’re experiencing a system problem, re-enabling System Restore won’t help because you won’t have any old snapshots to restore. When you re-enable it, it will create a new snapshot — of your current system in its damaged state, if it’s damaged. If you want to enable and rely on System Restore, this must be done preemptively, before you have a problem.

This option is only available in the Control Panel, not the new Settings app. The quickest way to access System Restore settings will be to open the Start menu or Start screen, type “Restore” to search for it, and click the “Create a restore point” shortcut. You can also open the Control Panel, navigate to “System”, and click the “System Protection” link in the sidebar.

Open this window and you’ll see that system protection is “Off” for your Windows 10 system drive and the other drives in your computer. Select your system drive and click the “Configure” button if you want to enable it.

Click the “Turn on system protection” option and choose how much disk space you want to reserve for your restore points. The less space you provide, the fewer restore points System Restore will be able to kepe at once. Click “OK” and System Restore will be enabled.

To use System Restore in the future, just go back to the same “System Protection” panel you used above. Click the “System Restore” button — now no longer grayed out, assuming you enabled System Restore — and you can use System Restore to go back to a previous restore point.

If Windows isn’t normally bootable, you can also boot into Safe Mode and run System Restore, or launch System Restore from the “advanced startup options” recovery environment.

Other Ways to Fix System Problems

If you wanted to use System Restore to fix a problem but found out it’s been disabled all along, you’ll have to fix whatever system problem you’re encountering in another way.

If the problem was caused by a recent update, you can look at uninstalling that Windows Update or reverting to a previous “build” of Windows 10. This should fix problems that might occur due to Windows Update and issues with your specific hardware and software.

If your system files are corrupted, you can try using the SFC — system file check — command to scan your system files for problems and automatically repair them.

If you installed a program or hardware driver and the problem started after that, you can visit the Control Panel and uninstall that program or hardware driver.

If Windows isn’t booting properly so you can’t do any of this, you can boot into Safe Mode. You can also visit the “advanced startup options” screen — these will automatically appear if Windows 10 can’t boot normally — and use the options there.

There are many other ways to troubleshoot and fix a Windows 10 system. However, the one surefire solution will be to use the “Reset this PC” tool in the Settings app. This will wipe your Windows 10 system and restore it to factory-default settings. You’ll have to reinstall your software and reconfigure Windows afterwards. However, your personal files will be kept and won’t be erased. Whatever system problem you’re having, this will restore all your Windows 10 system files to their default state.

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System Restore has always been a bit of a shotgun approach, just rolling back an entire system rather than fixing whatever that individual problem was. It used a bit of disk space, too.

Having it disabled by default is certainly a loss that makes tech support harder to perform. It used to be enabled by default and was a quick thing to try whenever a Windows PC isn’t working properly. Now, you just might have to use the “reset” feature instead.

What to Do If You Forget Your Mac’s Password

Can’t remember your Mac’s password? Don’t worry. With the default settings, you can simply try logging into your Mac. Fail enough times and you’ll be able to reset your password with your Apple ID. But this won’t always work.

If you haven’t enabled FileVault disk encryption, there’s an easy password-reset tool you can access. If you have enabled FileVault disk encryption and are willing to abandon your encrypted files, you can just reinstall Mac OS X and start over again.

Reset Your Password Using Your Apple ID

This trick only works if you’ve associated your Mac account with an Apple ID. It will work if you haven’t set up FileVault disk encryption, or if you set up FileVault disk encryption and had Mac OS X store your recovery key in your iCloud account. This is the default option. If you enabled FileVault and didn’t store your recovery key with your iCloud account, it won’t work.

If you’ve forgotten your password, just try entering the wrong password three times at the sign-in screen. After three wrong answers, you’ll see a “If you forgot your password, you can reset it using your Apple ID” message. Click the button and enter your Apple ID details to reset your passwordl.

Enter Your FileVault Recovery Key

If you’ve enabled FileVault disk encryption and didn’t store your recovery key in your iCloud account, the FileVault setup tool gave you a recovery key and told you to print it out or write it down and store it somewhere safe. This — aside from the password — is the only thing that can decrypt the files stored on your Mac and give you access to them.

Assuming you have this recovery key, you can type the recovery key into the password field on the login screen. This will decrypt your Mac’s storage and sign in you in. Once you’re signed in, you can change the password from the usual Users & Groups tool in the System Settings window.

Reset the Password From OS X Recovery (If You’re Not Using FileVault Encryption)

If you haven’t enabled FileVault encryption, there’s an easy way to reset any user account’s password. You just need to restart your Mac and hold Command + R while it’s booting. This will boot your Mac into a special recovery mode, also known as OS X Recovery.

From OS X Recovery, you can access a hidden a password reset tool and use it to change any user account’s password on the Mac. This is another good reason why you should enable FileVault encryption on your Mac — it’ll prevent people from entering the password and gaining access.

In the unlikely event that you’ve enabled a UEFI firmware password on your Mac, you won’t be able to gain access to OS X Recovery unless you remember that password. You can’t remove that UEFI firmware password without visiting an Apple Store — at least in theory. This helps prevent thieves from just erasing the UEFI password of a MacBook after they steal it.

Sign In As Another User (If You Are Using FileVault Encryption)

If you have more than one user account on your Mac and are using FileVault encryption, try logging in as the other user account. If you gave that other user account permission to decrypt your Mac with its password, you’ll be able to sign in and access a desktop. You can then create a new user account or regain access to your old user account.

Reinstall Mac OS X (If You Are Using FileVault Encryption)

If there’s a UEFI password on your Mac, you won’t be able to gain access to OS X Recovery to reset the password or reinstall Mac OS X without that password. You’ll just see a big lock icon appear on your screen and a box to type your password when you try to boot into recovery mode or boot from an external device.

This is a separate password from your user account’s password, so hopefully you remember this one. If you can’t, the only way to potentially remove that UEFI password is to take your Mac to an Apple Store.

There may be some sort of attack that allows an attacker to bypass a UEFI password, but, in theory, only Apple can remove an unknown UEFI password.

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If you can’t remember your Apple ID (iCloud) password, Apple’s website offers an Apple ID password reset tool that might be able to help.

How to Setup Your New Chromecast

When we first reviewed the Chromecast back in 2013 we showed you how to set it up, but the Chromecast now comes in a sleeker, more powerful, and better designed package so we’re back with updated instructions.

What’s New With The Chromecast?

The most obvious change with the Chromecast is the form factor. The rigid HDMI-stick form factor is gone now and has been replaced with a flexible cable attached to a disk-shaped device. This is a great change as it makes it easier to position the Chromecast behind your HDTV and it better protects the Chromecast from damage. The original Chromecast had a seldom used extender (that we received more than a few emails about over the years) designed specifically to both improve the Wi-Fi signal and protect the HDMI jack. The new design builds a flexible extender right into the unit and ensures people use the feature (whether they need it or not).

Speaking of signal strength the new Chromecast features an updated Wi-Fi radio that finally supports 5GHz networks via 802.11ac wireless. For those who have had headaches with the 2.4GHz band it’s a welcome relief to both get a faster connection and the ability to move to a less congested band.

In addition to other small hardware changes under the hood the biggest change is brand new control software that radically extends the usefulness of the Chromecast. The old Chromecast app was pretty elementary and, while it got the job done, it existed pretty much to set up the Chromecast for the first time and find apps to use with it. The new Chromecast app will actually keep you coming back with features like the “Fast Play” prediction algorithm that pre-caches content it predicts you will want to watch across the services you use like Netflix and YouTube so you always get a snappy and ready to go playback experience.

Better yet, the Chromecast app now serves as a unified search platform for the video services you use; it’s never been easier to find exactly what you want to watch on the Chromecast than it is now with the new and updated software.

Finally, although it has yet to prove as popular as the traditional Chromecast, the new Chromecast update rolls out an audio-only Chromecast designed to link your streaming music services to your stereo.

If you already have a Chromecast you’re likely curious if it’s worth upgrading to the new model. Just like the old Chromecast the new Chromecast costs $35 (with an occasional sale here or there). If it’s in your budget to replace your Chromecast with the new one, we’d certainly recommend doing so: it really is a faster and smoother experience. If it’s not in your budget, don’t worry. The old Chromecast is compatible with the new software and will keep working just as well as it always has.

Setting Up The Chromecast

The setup process hasn’t changed much since the original Chromecast but it’s way more polished now. Unpack your Chromecast, plug it in, and you’re treated to clear step-by-step instructions.

If you don’t already have the Chromecast app installed on your smartphone or tablet, now is a great time to do so.

With the app installed, launch the app and select the “Devices” tab at the top of the screen. There you’ll find your new Chromecast ready for set up. Unless you live in a population-dense area like a college dorm or apartment complex you really don’t need to double check the identity of your Chromecast, but if you desire to do so you can look at the screen of your HDTV and the name of the Chromecast on the setup screen in the app to confirm they’re the same unit (you can see in the two screenshots above that both read Chromecast5108). Select “Set Up”.

The app will indicate the setup process is starting, prompt you to select “Next” and then you’ll see the screen above, on your mobile device, with a 4 character alpha-numeric confirmation code.

Confirm that the same code, as seen above, appears on the screen of your HDTV. Again, unless you live in a high-density area the chances of you setting up somebody else’s Chromecast is slim. Where this is handy, however, is if you’ve bought lots of Chromecasts. We’re huge fans of the Chromecast and with at least one Chromecast on every floor it’s definitely possible to mix them up.

Next, on your mobile device, select your region (e.g. The United States), then you’ll be prompted to name your Chromecast for easy identification and to toggle options like enabling guest mode and crash reporting.

The crash reporting bit is self explanatory, but if you’d like to read more about guest mode (which allows guests to use your Chromecast without logging into your Wi-Fi) you can read our full guide to enabling and using Chromecast’s guest mode here. In short: don’t worry about random people connecting to your Chromecast from the apartment down the hall; you need to see the actual screen and use the PIN on the screen in order to connect.

Finally, plug in the credentials for the Wi-Fi network you wish to connect the Chromecast too. If you have multiple Wi-Fi networks in your home and/or distinct SSIDs on your main router be sure to put the Chromecast on the Wi-Fi network/SSID you normally use with the device you intend to cast from (e.g. your iPhone) because it must be on the same Wi-Fi node.

Using Your Chromecast

There are two ways to use the Chromecast. You can cast from a mobile device and you can cast from your computer via Chrome browser plugin. If you want the full run down on the desktop casting option, check out our guide Mirror Anything from your Computer to Your TV Using Google Chromecast here.

Although the desktop casting function has its uses the mobile casting experience is far more polished and certainly the source of the Chromecast’s popularity.

Finding Apps

The easiest way to get started actually using the Chromecast is to use the Chromecast app to see what apps you already have on your phone that support casting. After completing the setup open up the Chromecast app.

In the screenshot above you can see that the Chromecast app has already populated the “What’s On” tab, the default view, with potential YouTube videos and Netflix content because we have both apps on our iPhone.

If you don’t have any apps yet or want to explore what else is out there, you can either select the “Get Apps” tab as seen above or you can scroll to the bottom of the “What’s On” tab where you’ll both see other apps on your device that can cast to the Chromecast (like Plex or other streaming apps) and you can click “Get More” beside those apps to search for more related apps.

Searching for Content

While we’re still in the Chromecast app let’s take a look at the new unified search function that really makes it easy to search across services like YouTube, Netflix, and Google Play to find the content you’re looking for. Let’s say, for example, want to get started with the popular TV show The Walking Dead.

Simply enter the key words for the content you’re looking for in the search box, found at the top of the Chromecast app, and you’ll be treated to a page of search results right inside the application.

Select the result you want, in this case the entry for the original series as seen above to the right.

There you’ll find a summary of the show and, most importantly, a “Watch” button linking you right to the Netflix app. If you tap the “Watch” button Netflix will launch just as if you had searched for the show within the app. Let’s take a look at how to cast the show to your TV in the next section.

Playing Content

Once you’ve loaded an app with Chromecast compatibility, like the Netflix app we just launched courtesy of our search query in the Chromecast app’s unified search dashboard, playback is as easy as can be (and this ease of use is definitely why the Chromecast is so wildly popular).

Any time you’re in an application that can cast to the Chromecast the Chromecast logo, seen above in the upper right-hand side of the screenshot, will appear. Tap the icon and the mobile app you’re using will automatically kick the stream over to the Chromecast and the stream will begin playback.

The extra nice thing about the Chromecast is that all the unpacking/decompression of the video stream is handled by the Chromecast itself (not the casting device) so even if your device is old, battered, and sporting a slow processor you can still use the Chromecast with ease. A such old Android and iOS devices make for great Chromecast “remote controls” you can leave plugged in next to the couch in the living room.

What’s the Difference Between FAT32, exFAT, and NTFS?

Whether you’re formatting an internal drive, external drive, USB flash drive, or SD card, Windows will give you the choice of NTFS, FAT32, and exFAT. The Format dialog in Windows doesn’t explain the difference, so we will.

FAT32 is an older file system that’s largely relegated to USB flash drives and other external drives. Windows uses NTFS for its system drive, and it’s also ideal for other internal drives. exFAT is a modern replacement for FAT32, and more devices support it than do NTFS — although it’s not as widespread as FAT32.

FAT32

FAT32 is the oldest file system here. It was introduced all the way back in Windows 95 to replace the older FAT16 file system.

This file system’s age has advantages and disadvantages. Because it’s so old, it’s the de-facto standard. Flash drives you purchase will often come formatted with FAT32 for maximum compatibility across not just modern computers, but other devices like game consoles and anything with a USB port.

Limitations come with that age, however. Individual files on a FAT32 drive can’t be over 4 GB in size — that’s the maximum. A FAT32 partition must also be less than 8 TB, which is less of a limitations — but still a noticeable one if you have a new, high-capacity mechanical drive.

While this file system is okay for USB flash drives and other external media, you won’t want to use this for an internal drive. It lacks the permissions and other security features built into the more modern NTFS file system. Modern versions of Windows can no longer be installed to FAT32, and must be installed onto drives formatted with NTFS.

Compatibility: Works with all versions of Windows, Mac, Linux, game consoles, and practically anything with a USB port.

Limits: 4 GB maximum file size, 8 TB maximum partition size.

Ideal Use: Use it on removable drives for maximum compatibility with the widest range of devices, assuming you don’t have any files 4 GB or larger in size.

NTFS

NTFS is the modern file system Windows likes to use. When you install Windows, it formats your system drive with the NTFS file system. NTFS has file size and partition size limits that are so theoretically huge you won’t run up against them. NTFS first appeared in consumer versions of Windows with Windows XP.

Aside from these limitations, NTFS is packed with other modern features. It supports file permissions for security, a change journal that can help quickly recover errors if your computer crashes, shadow copies for backups, encryption, disk quota limits, hard links, and other various features. Many of these are crucial for an operating system drive — especially file permissions.

Your Windows system partition must be NTFS. If you have a secondary drive alongside Windows and you plan on installing programs to it, you should probably go ahead and make it NTFS, too.

However, NTFS just isn’t as compatible with other operating systems. It’ll work with all recent versions of Windows — all the way back to Windows XP — but it has limited compatibility with other operating systems. By default, Mac OS X can only read NTFS drives, not write to them. Some Linux distributions may enable NTFS-writing support, but some may be read-only. None of Sony’s PlayStation consoles support NTFS. Even Microsoft’s own Xbox 360 can’t read NTFS drives, although the new Xbox One can. Other devices are even less likely to support NTFS.

Compatibility: Works with all versions of Windows, but read-only with Mac by default, and may be read-only by default with some Linux distributions. Other devices — with the exception of Microsoft’s Xbox One — probably won’t support NTFS.

Limits: No realistic file-size or partition size limits.

Ideal Use: Use it for your Windows system drive and other internal drives that will just be used with Windows.

exFAT

exFAT was introduced in 2006, and was added to older versions of Windows with updates to Windows XP and Windows Vista.

It’s a file system optimized for flash drives. It’s designed to be a lightweight file system like FAT32 without all NTFS’s extra features and overhead, but without FAT32’s limitations.

Like NTFS, exFAT has very large file size and partition size limits. This means you can store files that are larger than 4 GB apiece on a flash drive or SD card if it’s formatted with exFAT. exFAT is a strict upgrade over FAT32, and should be the best choice for external drives where you want a lightweight file system without FAT32’s file size limits.

exFAT is also more compatible than NTFS. While Mac OS X includes only read-only support for NTFS, Macs offer full read-write support for exFAT. exFAT drives can be accessed on Linux by installing the appropriate software.

While exFAT is compatible with Macs — and will be compatible with some devices that don’t support NTFS, like digital cameras — it still isn’t quite as compatible. Microsoft’s own Xbox 360 doesn’t support it, although the Xbox One does. The PlayStation 3 doesn’t support exFAT drives, although the PlayStation 4 reportedly does. Various other older devices may only support FAT32 instead of exFAT.

Compatibility: Works with all versions of Windows and modern versions of Mac OS X, but requires additional software on Linux. More devices support exFAT than support NTFS, but some — particularly older ones — may only support FAT32.

Limits: No realistic file-size or partition-size limits.

Ideal Use: Use it for USB flash drives and other external drives, especially if you need files of over 4 GB in size. Assuming every device you want to use the drive with supports exFAT, you should format your device with exFAT instead of FAT32.

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NTFS is ideal for internal drives, while exFAT is generally ideal for flash drives. However, you may sometimes need to format an external drive with FAT32 if exFAT isn’t supported on a device you need to use it with.