The following are a few limitations of the NTFS file system.
Reserved File Names
Though the file system supports paths up to ca. 32,000 Unicode characters with each path component (directory or filename) up to 255 characters long, certain names are unusable, since NTFS stores its metadata in regular (albeit hidden and for the most part inaccessible) files; accordingly, user files cannot use these names. These files are all in the root directory of a volume (and are reserved only for that directory). The names are: $Mft, $MftMirr, $LogFile, $Volume, $AttrDef, . (dot), $Bitmap, $Boot, $BadClus, $Secure, $Upcase, and $Extend ; . and $Extend are both directories, the others are files.
Maximum Volume Size
In theory, the maximum NTFS volume size is 264-1 clusters. However, the maximum NTFS volume size as implemented in Windows XP Professional is 232-1 clusters. For example, using 64 KiB clusters, the maximum NTFS volume size is 256 TiB minus 64 KiB. Using the default cluster size of 4 KiB, the maximum NTFS volume size is 16 TiB minus 4 KiB. Because partition tables on master boot record (MBR) disks only support partition sizes up to 2 TiB, you must use dynamic volumes to create NTFS volumes over 2 TiB.
Maximum File Size
Theory: 16 EiB minus 1 KiB (264 bytes minus 1 KiB). Implementation: 16 TiB minus 64 KiB (244 bytes minus 64 KiB)
Alternate Data Streams
Care must be exercised when copying or moving files from NTFS to other filesystem types. Windows system calls and programs can have varying behavior with regard to alternate data streams and might silently strip those which could not be stored on the destination filesystem. A safe way of copying or moving files is to use the BackupRead and BackupWrite system calls, which allow to enumerate streams, to verify whether each stream could be written to the destination volume and to knowingly skip offending streams.
