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Karl-WE's avatar
Karl-WE
MVP
Oct 15, 2022

SUGGESTION: change the UX when trying to access a volume with a newer ReFS version than supported

If you are trying to access to disk which is formatted with 3.9 (WS vNext + W11 22H2 RP / beta / insider) and you attach it to an earlier version of Windows Server (or client OS), File Explorer will ...
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storage
Karl-WE's avatar
Karl-WE
MVP
Oct 15, 2022
technically, fsinfo is unable to read the ReFS version used, so I am not sure if we can improve the error dlg. but I hope we can change the order.
  • Alban1998's avatar
    Alban1998
    Iron Contributor
    Nov 04, 2022
    Well considering the amount of documentation and support/tooling for ReFS is close to non-existant since years, I highly doubt it. I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft plainly drop the support of this filesystem in a near future.
    • Karl-WE's avatar
      Karl-WE
      MVP
      Dec 13, 2022
      Hi Alban, this isn't true.
      ReFS is still under active development and Windows Server 2022 and vnext have new versions and features, this is why I raised my suggestion.


      In addition there are many day to day scenarios that benefit from storing data on (the lastest) ReFS.

      - FSlogix containers
      - Hyper-V S2D / Azure Stack HCI (by default)
      - Citrix PVS
      - Hyper-V on logical local drives or on Storage Spaces
      - Exchange Server Databases + Logs
      - SQL Server Databases + File Backups + Logs
      Just to name some common scenarios
      • Alban1998's avatar
        Alban1998
        Iron Contributor
        Dec 26, 2022
        Hello,
        Sorry I missed your reply.
        I'm not denying ReFS is useful. It's certainly a good product. But you simply can't have "active development" without tooling and documentation. ReFS does not have those - in fact, never had.
        We don't even have an official Microsoft article for version history, only an unofficial GitHub post about it !
        Nothing struck me on new and exciting features neither. In fact, what was the last time ReFS got a breaking new feature ? I can't remember.
        To sum it up : I believe the product is dead and buried, Microsoft unplugged since several years ago for multiple reasons. Same for NTFS btw. At least NTFS got tools and docs.
        I wish Microsoft would continue to invest in on-premise technologies, but that's not the case, and we have to accept it.

        I still hope your suggestion will be implemented tho. I really do.

        Cheers and happy new year !

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