SSD or HDD for Gaming Quick Answer
An SSD is much faster and will offer significantly better performance when it comes to gaming, especially in terms of loading times. In contrast, HDDs have a longer lifespan and are much more cost-effective as a high-volume storage solution.
SSDs have been all the rage in recent years, thanks to unprecedented read/write speeds that have destroyed traditional hard drives.
It was not without good reason that gamers around the world proclaimed that SSDs were undoubtedly the best choice for gaming because of the sheer performance they offer.
But are they that much better?
In this article, we’ll compare SSDs and HDDs on all fronts, discussing the pros and cons of each, and deciding which one is ultimately the better gaming solution.
SSD or HDD transfer speed
As we’ve said before, SSDs are superior to HDDs when it comes to speed, and there’s no doubt about it. The data transfer speed of an SSD can several times surpass that of a hard drive, although, in practice, an SSD hard drive is about 2 to 3 times faster than an HDD hard drive.
Longevity
When it comes to overall lifespan, HDDs tend to last longer than SSDs. Although there is a lack of longevity, it is barely noticeable. Even with heavy use, an SSD can last up to 5 years. However, HDD hard drives can easily last more than 10 years, although their performance degrades over time.
Sustainability
There’s no denying that SSDs are more durable due to a lack of moving parts. HDD hard drives, on the other hand, are prone to malfunction and physical damage simply due to the mechanisms that underpin their operation.
SSD vs HDD storage capacity
In terms of maximum capacity, SSDs and HDDs of up to 8 TB, or even more, can be found on the market. However, a more important thing to consider is the price-to-capacity ratio.
Namely, HDD hard drives are around 4 times cheaper than SSD hard drives when it comes to storage. For example, a hard drive costing around $50 will have 1TB of storage space, while an SSD of the same price will only have around 250GB. The situation is similar at the other end of the spectrum: an 8TB hard drive will cost you around $280, while a 4TB SSD will cost thousands.
Noise
As we’ve already stated, an SSD has no moving parts. As such, it operates completely silently. Conversely, an HDD hard drive is bound to produce a certain amount of noise, but not all hard drives are as loud as others.
Ultimately, the loudness of an HDD comes down to the following factors:
- RPM – Today, low-end hard drives start at 5400 rotations per minute while the more performance-oriented variants can exceed 10000. Naturally, the faster a hard drive spins, the louder it will be.
- Age/Degradation – Considering that moving parts are essential to their operation, an HDD hard drive can become noisier over time due to wear of its mechanisms or physical damage.
Install games on SSD or HDD?
The most common way to use your drives is to use an SSD drive for your operating system, heavy intensive applications such as PhotoShop, your web browser, and a few favorite games (depending on the size of the SSD you can allow you), then a separate hard drive for storage.
SSDs have limited longevity in terms of the number of times you can write/read data to them. Therefore, it is not recommended to keep installing and then removing video games frequently when you are done with them. Instead, you should only keep your favorite games on the SSD and thus preserve its lifespan.
Nowadays, there are 4TB and above SSDs in the market, but due to the high price, very few can afford them even though the prices of SSDs have decreased significantly over the years. Fortunately, they will probably continue to get cheaper and bigger as time goes on.
Conclusion Which hard drive to choose for video games?
All things considered, there can be no doubt about who is the winner in the SSD vs HDD showdown.
An SSD is much better for gaming than an HDD. The latter simply can’t compete with the performance offered by SSDs, so for those who value performance above all else, it’s a no-brainer.
However,
an SSD is not faultless. Indeed, they are not as good as HDDs in terms of long-term storage, both because of their inherently shorter lifespan and because the prices of high-capacity SSDs border on the ridiculous.
Our advice? Take both.
Many players take this approach. Just use a 500GB SSD as your operating system drive and keep all your games in a much more affordable 1TB or larger HDD. This is, ultimately, the most cost-effective solution.