Microsoft NTFS for Linux by Paragon Software

The free version of the program works with Linux kernel from 2.6.36 to 5.17.x. The Professional version supports the latest official kernels.
New kernel support implements within 1 month after the official release.
Automatic driver rebuild for newer supported kernels with DKMS library.

Supported HFS+ features (see also “Compatibility”):

• Full support for the native HFS+ journal.
• Full support for macOS High Sierra HFS+.

Implementation of changes into driver and file system utilities to provide a more user-friendly behavior by default, without the need for additional options, when working with very large volumes (16 TB and larger). NTFS&HFS+ for Linux confirmed to work on 20 TB physical and 25 TB virtual volumes in the Paragon lab.

Use the ‘discard’ mount option to enable TRIM support on the SSD storages mounted by Paragon driver to improve performance.

Kernel modules provide support for both NTFS and HFS+ file systems.

Both x86 and x86-64 CPUs are supported.

Support for SMP kernels (multiprocessor systems).

Share volumes mounted by NTFS&HFS+ for Linux via SAMBA.

Reduced CPU load and memory consumption.

Mount any NTFS/HFS+ volumes like native Linux ones automatically.

There are no limitations to maximum file and volume size (but within Linux kernel and NTFS/HFS+ limitations).

File and folder names in native languages, including Asian. Codepage for filename translation is specified via mount options.

Improved driver behavior in case target storage is detached unexpectedly to minimize the possibility of file system issues.

• mkntfs utility ─ format any partition as NTFS under Linux;
• chkntfs utility ─ check NTFS partition integrity and fix errors.

• mkhfs utility ─ format any partition as HFS+ under Linux;
• chkhfs utility ─ check HFS+ partition for integrity and fix errors.

• Reading and writing compressed files is fully supported in both sequential and random orders.
• Encrypted files are read encrypted. During copy operation, file data streams will be copied encrypted with the decryption capability loss.
• When copying from NTFS to Linux FS: all additional streams will not be copied, along with the compression flag and security attributes.
• Any link will be copied as a full file with its body, losing link information.
• NTFS stores filenames in UTF-16 encoding. This may cause confusion when very long filenames containing non-Latin characters are used and UTF-8 is selected as default kernel codepage.

• Both case sensitive and case insensitive types of HFS+ file systems are supported.
• Only the ‘data’ fork is copied during a file copy operation on Linux (using cp command).

• This product supports x86 and x86-64 architectures.
• Paragon Software Group also offers drivers for other architectures where Linux is used. For example:
  • ARM
  • MIPS
  • SuperH (SH4)
  • Ubicom32
  • Power PC

For more information, please send us a request.

• Processor: Intel Pentium 300 MHz and higher, or compatible
• Both 32- and 64-bit CPUs are supported
• RAM: 32 MB
• HDD: 10 MB

(Thanks to its unique technology, our NTFS&HFS+ for Linux driver has low system requirements. For example, the driver only requires 650 KB of free RAM to work with NTFS partitions larger than 250 GB. Kernel driver modules themselves take up around 800 KB of RAM.)

The free version works with Linux kernel versions 2.6.36 up to 5.17.x. The Professional version supports the latest official kernels.
Due to the ever-changing nature of Linux, using newer Linux kernels may require changes to the product. The driver update appears within 1 month after the kernel release.
Both free and paid versions don’t insure compatibility with highly customized kernels.
Users of customized kernels can test the Free edition before purchasing a Professional edition. To keep up with changes in the Linux kernel, our product is updated frequently. As a result, this website may not contain the most up-to-date information. Please contact support for the most up-to-date list of supported Linux kernels.

A development environment is required to compile the Linux drivers. Please make sure that you have installed:

• Kernel source code (recommended) or kernel header files (doesn’t always work)
• GNU C (gcc) compiler
• GNU C++ (g++/gcc-c++) compiler
• GNU Glibc-static libraries
• GNU Make
• GNU ld (binutils)
• Modutils (module-init-tools)
• DKMS library

The Hierarchical File System (HFS) is a file system developed by Apple Inc. for use in computer systems running macOS. Originally designed for use on a floppy and hard disks, it can also be found on read-only media such as CD-ROMs. HFS is also referred to as macOS Standard (or “HFS Standard”), whereas its successor, HFS Plus, is also called macOS Extended (or “HFS Extended”). With the introduction of OS X 10.6, Apple has dropped format and write support for HFS disks and images, which are now supported as read-only volumes.

HFS Plus is an improved version of HFS, supporting much larger files (block addresses are 32-bit length instead of 16-bit), using Unicode (instead of macOS Roman or any of several other character sets) for naming the items (files, folders), and also using a full 32-bit allocation mapping table so that the disk could support more than 65,536 allocation blocks.

Linux kernel has HFS read support in Linux kernel 2.6.18 and beyond or additional utilities like hfsplus and hfsutils from the repositories to be installed.

UFSD (Universal File System Drivers) is a unique technology specially developed by Paragon Software Group to provide full access (read/write, format, etc.) to volumes of the popular file systems such as NTFS, HFS+, FAT, Ext2, etc. under various platforms: Windows, Linux, etc. in case where these file systems are not natively supported.

The Universal File System Driver Software Development Kit (UFSD SDK) is designed for developing applications and provides the following main features:

• Access to unmounted (drive letter is not assigned) partitions
• Access to file systems including ones not supported by DOS and Windows OS family
• Platform-independent UFSD API

It is well known that NTFS was originally very close to the HPFS file system developed by IBM. HPFS was much more OPEN in terms of documentation support, data structure, and so on. It helped us gain a better understanding of its nature, architecture, and ideology. The knowledge we have gained about NTFS has already been used for years in our best-selling products: Paragon Hard Disk Manager and Partition Manager. We have sold millions and millions of copies worldwide. The stability of the products as far as NTFS-related operations are concerned speaks for itself and for the stability of NTFS technology in general. Thus, having a good understanding of the HPFS file system, we understand how NTFS works.
Applying our knowledge to the other sources of information like Linux drivers for NTFS (read-only drivers) and debugging Windows applications, we’ve documented NTFS structures from within and created the Universal File System Driver. While developing Paragon NTFS for Linux driver, we always stuck to the following rules:

• We never referred to any confidential Microsoft NTFS stuff (docs, codes, etc.) and never applied a reverse engineering approach for Microsoft’s binary code.
• Open sources are the only thing we used, so we gained the majority of our NTFS knowledge and understanding from www.ntfs.com.
• NTFS, as a file system, as well as on-disk layout, is not patented and not documented.

UFSD technology provides access to the following file systems:

• NTFS/HFS+/exFAT/FAT32/ReFS/APFS under Linux;
• NTFS/HFS+/exFAT/ FAT32/ReFS under ThreadX;
• NTFS/HFS+ under Windows CE;
• ExtFS/HFS+/APFS under Windows;
• ExtFS/NTFS FS under macOS.

UFSD provides direct access to physical devices, which is why it can process partitions regardless of their support by the current OS. With UFSD, it is possible to mount NTFS partitions under Linux, getting access to its contents. Partitions are recognized the same way as with the NTFS for Linux driver. It also allows direct access via physical device addressing, as realized in the UFSD SDK.

Microsoft NTFS for Linux by Paragon Software

NTFS & HFS+ for Android

File System Link Business/OEM solutions

ExtFS for macOS

NTFS for macOS

HFS+ for Windows

ExtFS for Windows

APFS for Windows

APFS SDK Community Edition

Paragon NTFS&HFS+ for Linux software provides access to NTFS and HFS+ volumes under Linux. Now everyone can access NTFS and HFS+ partitions under Linux in a usual manner. The driver allows mounting NTFS or HFS+ partitions so that programs can work transparently with these mounted partitions – browse contents, open documents, run applications, work with existing files, and create new ones. The NTFS&HFS+ for Linux driver is a commercial Linux kernel driver for local access to NTFS or HFS+ volumes. It supports full read/write access. Kernel driver means you will have rapid and transparent access to native file systems. Just mount manually or use the automounting feature of the Professional version, and NTFS or HFS+ volumes will be available like any other tree directory.

• UFSD modules – NTFS&HFS+ for Linux Driver
• Installation/Uninstallation scripts
• Additional NTFS utilities:
  • CHKNTFS – Check utility
  • MKNTFS – Format utility
• Additional HFS utilities:
  • MKHFS – Format utility
  • CHKHFS – Check utility

• TGZ archive providing the libraries and source code required to compile for the customer’s environment (NTFS & HFS+ for Linux Desktop products)
• Binary UFSD modules (NTFS & HFS+ for Linux Embedded products)

The free version works with Linux kernel versions 2.6.36 up to 5.17.x. The Professional version supports the latest official kernels. To keep up with the changes in the Linux kernel, our product is also updated frequently. Please contact our OEM licensing team to get the most up-to-date list of supported Linux kernels. Additional porting activities may be required before the driver can be used on platforms with highly customized kernels.

The NTFS&HFS+ for Linux performance is similar to native NTFS performance and, in some cases, even better than the performance of native Linux file system Ext2. Data throughput depends on the CPU performance, cache performance (RAM availability), the actual data writing scenario (size of chunks and order of write operations), number of files written simultaneously, etc. However, the major factor is the fragmentation of volumes and files. In the case of substantial fragmentation, performance could drop significantly in comparison with the performance on non-fragmented files. Performance for several simultaneous copy processes is four to five times slower, regardless of the summary data flow. The same behavior is seen on any other file system and/or operating system.

Products for home use support x86 and x86-64 architectures.
Paragon Software Group also offers drivers for other architectures where Linux is used. For example:

• ARM
• MIPS
• SuperH (SH4)
• Ubicom32
• PowerPC

The following Linux distributions have been tested in the Paragon test lab:

• Ubuntu 22.04 (Linux kernel 5.15)
• Manjaro 21.2.6 (Linux kernel 5.15.32)
• Debian 11 (Linux kernel 5.10)
• Fedora 35 (Linux kernel 5.17.4)
• OpenSuse leap 15.3 (Linux kernel 5.3)
• CentOS 9 (Linux kernel 5.14)
• Linux Mint 20.3 (Linux kernel 5.4)

There is no limitation on the maximum volume size (Linux kernel and NTFS/HFS+ limitations still apply). The workability of the NTFS&HFS+ for Linux was verified on 20 TB physical and 25 TB virtual volumes in the Paragon lab.

There is no limitation on the maximum file size (Linux kernel and NTFS/HFS+ limitations still apply).

Yes, that is possible if the host OS can understand GPT partitioning tables correctly.

Yes, 4KB sector size is fully supported.

A development environment is required to compile Linux drivers and utilities. Please verify that these tools are functional. The easiest way is to choose the developer toolkit when installing Linux.
What must be installed:

• kernel source code (recommended) or header files (doesn’t always work) for the kernel
• GNU C (gcc) compiler (version 3.3 or higher is required)
• GNU C++ (g++) compiler
• GNU glibc-static library
• GNU Make
• GNU ld (binutils)
• Modutils (module-init-tools)
• DKMS library

Yes, you can. To install the software, you should have the kernel sources for the Knoppix on which you want to install the drivers and utilities. Usually, you can find the kernel sources for the Knoppix on its DVD version (not CD).

GNU C compiler (gcc) must have the version 3.3 or higher.
The user should log in as root to install the drivers and utilities.
Correct operation is not guaranteed for customized Linux kernels.

The user can create a partition with a standard Linux fdisk/parted utilities and then format it using the mkntfs or mkhfs utilities.
For example:

• To create a partition write # parted/dev/sdb and follow the instructions
• To format in an NTFS partition: # mkntfs –v:Mylabel /dev/sdb1 to format the /dev/sdb1 volume.
• To format in an HFS+ partition: # mkhfs -v:MyLabel /dev/sdb1 to format the /dev/sdb1 volume.

If a partition to be mounted contains files or directories whose names have non-English characters, please use the “nls” option: nls=utf8.
For example, mount -t ufsd -o nls=utf8 /dev/sda2 /mnt/ntfs (run in a Linux console as root or place it into the /etc/fstab file).

The NTFS&HFS+ for Linux driver enables the shared work with NTFS partitions and folders. It is not prohibited to process an unlimited number of connections simultaneously.
Note: Parameters of the mount command must allow Samba, FTP, etc. servers to get access to the mounted NTFS partition.

Yes, it is possible to mount and access several (up to 12 were tested) NTFS partitions simultaneously.

Since there is no way to map Windows accounts into Linux users, permissions for files and directories are set when an NTFS partition is mounted (similar to the FAT file system, which does not store any information about access rights at all). These permissions are controlled by the following mount options:

• uid
• gid
• umask
• dmask
• fmask

This behavior is different in Embedded and Desktop Products – see Implementation Guide or User manual, respectively.

Just mount the NTFS partition using the following command:
# mount -t ufsd -o umask=000,fmask=000,dmask=000 /dev/hdb1 /mnt/ntfs

You can enable automatic mounting of NTFS/HFS+ volumes by adding lines to /etc/fstab (filesystem table) file or by using the Paragon NTFS&HFS+ for Linux Professional version, which will add settings for automounting of NTFS/HFS+ volumes with the UFSD driver into your Linux system during installation.

The architecture of the NTFS for Linux driver allows porting it to any hardware platform available on the present-day market. Paragon Software Group has a unique experience in customizing the NTFS for Linux drivers for various platforms.

To get access to NTFS partitions from an application, you should use a Paragon NTFS driver for the host operating system that the application runs on, or Paragon UFSD SDK.

We need the following package to port our driver into your specific device (NAS, media device, etc.):

• A HW sample with access to root console (either COM port, Telnet or SSH)
• Kernel Source for which we need to compile the driver, so we can build the same kernel image you use into your device
• Kernel_config and makefile file for your customized kernel
• C and C++ cross-compilers (GNU gcc) to be able to compile our driver from our sources
• C and C++ cross-compilers (GNU gcc) to be able to compile user-space applications (mkfs, chkfs utilities) from our sources
• Toolchain (if it exists)

We need the following package to build our driver for your specific environment:

• Your Linux distribution (nice to have)
• Kernel Source for which we need to compile the driver
• Kernel_ config file and makefile file for your customized kernel
• The compiler you used to compile your customized kernel