I'm helping a friend set up a Linux box which he can use as a file server for storing his data either for access from multiple computers or as storage whenever he needs to reformat. The main "client" computer will be a Win XP Home running on an NTFS partition. I know that Linux has "experimental" support for writing to NTFS, so how will this affect the effectiveness of a file server?? One thing I am unsure of is whether or not this applies if the XP box initiates the copying instead of the Linux box. Any suggestions/tips on what to do is greatly appreciated if the current proposed setup will cause some problems.

It'll work without a hitch.

When you mount a Samba share on Linux from a Windows computer, it doesn't mount it as NTFS or VFAT, it mounts it as a special filesystem called smbfs (this is what you'll use if you make an entry in your fstab btw) and I think you can guess what it stands for.

But, in short, you won't have a problem

Great, thanks for the answer

Yes, thanks for the help *the friend*