Why is there a 4gb limit on FAT32 file systems?

Question

My guess is that there is no fix for this. I run Ubuntu/Linux and whenever backup my DVD's on to my ex-HDD(fat32) so that I can watch them on PS3. I have to always split the .vob files at 4gb. Can anyone explain why?

Regards

Answer 1

Because it uses 32-bit pointers to indicate file size. Most modern file systems use 64-bit pointers. The maximum addressable size for 32-bit is 4 GB.