Ext2Fsd is a file system driver that allows accessing (both reading and writing) EXT2, EXT3 or EXT4 partitions from Windows. It works with Windows 2000, XP, Vista and Windows 7.





Ext2Fsd has limited EXT4 support and by default it will load the filesystems in read-only mode, but you can force this if you really have to write on EXT4 partitions from Windows (this is not recommended). Using it, your EXT partitions will be displayed just like native NTFS or FAT partitions, being accessible from Windows Explorer.

Please note that mounted EXT4 partitions will be displayed as EXT3 (I've actually used EXT4 partitions for the tests but they show up as EXT3 in the screenshots throughout this post).

flexible inode size: > 128 bytes, up to block size

dir_index: htree directory index

filetype: extra file mode in dentry

large_file: > 4G files supported

sparse_super: super block backup in group descriptor

uninit_bg: fast fsck and group checksum

extent: reading, writing with no extending.

journal: only support replay for internal journal

flex_bg: first flexible metadata group

journal: log-based operations, external journal

extent: size truncating & expanding, file deletion

EA (extended attributes), ACL support

Using Ext2Fsd

In my test, an error was displayed after installing Ext2Fsd but the application still works. After installation, restart your computer (this is probably not required if there's no error when installing Ext2Fsd) and open Ext2 Volume Manager from the menu:

Here, you can assign / change the drive letters for your EXT4/3/2, partitions mount / unmount them or perform other operations. If you want to enable write support for an EXT4 filesystem, select "Ext2 Management", uncheck the "Mount volume in readonly mode" box and then click Apply:

You can also select if / which partitions to be automatically mounted on startup (don't use this for USB drives and such).









Ext2Fsd is a great way to access EXT4, EXT3 or EXT2 partitions from Windows, but it's not perfect and data corruption may occur (though it worked just fine in my test) so use it at your own risk! But of course, this can be avoided if you're not writing on the EXT2/3/4 partitions.





Supported Ext3/4 features in the latest Ext2Fsd version (0.51):Unsupported Ext3/4 features: