What to do if USB Flash Drive does not let you transfer files larger than 4GB?

If your brand new USB drive does not allow you to copy big files, the problem might not be in faulty unit, but in the preset formatting. Your flash drive might have the FAT-32 format, which is known by imposed file size limitations, not permitting you to transfer files larger than 4GB.

In order to remove such limitation, you will have to format your flash drive into the NTFS format.

Note that formatting will essentially erase all the existing files, located on your drive, so it is recommended to copy all the useful information before approaching the following procedure.

In order to format your USB thumb drive to NTFS, please follow the simple steps:

* Right click on “My Computer” and select “Manage”.

* Open the “Device Manager” and find the “USB drive” under the tab “Disk Drives”

* Right click the drive and select Properties.

* Choose “Policies” tab and select “Optimize for performance" option. Click OK.

* Open “My Computer”, Select “Format” on the flash drive.

* Choose “NTFS” in the “File System” dropdown menu.

* Wait for the format completion.

Note, that in some cases, you may need to perform the same operation - format the USB drive - for compatibility issues. All 64GB flash drive/removable drives use an exFAT file system, successor to FAT32 in the FAT family of file systems. However, some cameras and other electronic devices may NOT be compatible with the exFAT file system. Also, devices formatted using exFAT can NOT be read by any version of Windows prior to Windows XP.