Friday, November 1, 2013

How do I install and mount an exFAT partition?

Microsoft introduced the new exFAT file system with Vista SP1. Extended File Allocation Table (exFAT) is the successor to the old FAT32 file system [1].

As the very first step you may need to add the following URL to your repository base. To add the correct repository to Ubuntu 13.04 and lower:
$sudo apt-add-repository ppa:relan/exfat

To add the correct repository to Ubuntu 13.10:
$sudo add-apt-repository ppa:relan/exfat

To update your package list:
$sudo apt-get update

To search packages pertaining to exfat, following command can be used.
$apt-cache search exfat

Then it will display the following packages.
fuse-exfat - This driver is the first free exFAT file
exfat-utils - A set of utilities for creating, checking, dumping and labelling

To install these packages, following command can be used.
$apt-get install exfat-utils fuse-exfat

During this process, the following extra packages will be installed:
  fuse-utils
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  exfat-utils fuse-exfat fuse-utils

Easiest way to mount the exfat disk is, once the above installation is over, plug the storage device. It will be auto mounted.

Reference:
[1] http://www.tech-recipes.com/rx/2801/exfat_versus_fat32_versus_ntfs/#sthash.Dqeow04Z.dpuf