NVME or regular SSD?

[Funky Koval]

NVME are listed as higher requirements. Provided that I have 32 gigs of ram, rtx4080 and intel core i9-12900 and regular ssd drive do I really need nvme? I want to max the game with raytracing in 1440p, dont care if level loads 3 seconds faster. Gameplay wise - will I benefit from nvme or can I disregard this?

[Nasder]

I don't think gameplay wise matter much.

Just loading might be a second or two faster, that's it. I haven't done any testing, but I don't think there's much loss or benefit besides loading.

[valium]

The leap from HD to SSD was way more massive than SSD to NVME, so as long as you have a good quality SSD, load times should be perfectly fine.

[Crimsomrider]

There are plenty of video comparisons between SATA SSDs and NVME SSDs, the difference is miniscule between the two. We're talking about one second of a difference, sometimes even less.

NVMEs are naturally better since the first NVME on the motherboard is in direct communication with the CPU, but in terms of actual performance there is currently no meaningful difference. Maybe that will change with better implementation of DirectStorage and future developments of software.

[Fluffy_Llama]

The SSD is never the bottleneck when it comes to gaming so even the slowest SSD you buy will be more than enough. NVME is the fastest but they also suffer from running hot so id recommend a normal SATA SSD since it will likely have a longer life span.

Personally i use Samsung SSDs and they have never let me down.

[Funky Koval]

Thanks guys. Correct me if I am wrong. So the game loads into RAM, hard drive is only to speed up loading times. So why they listed nvme for phantom liberty? Does it mean it will load assets into ram faster?? So potential stuttering with regular ssd?

I cant wrap my head around this

[Crimsomrider]

The drive is not just for faster loading times, it's also for active asset streaming. The reason why they recommend NVMEs is because it's the latest technology since Cyberpunk is a title they're doing their best to future-proof.

Ultimately however NVME or SATA doesn't matter because as long as PC streaming architecture remains as it currently is, you can't fully utilize either so the difference between a quality NVME SSD and quality SATA SSD is negligible in actual in-game gameplay scenario. You will not notice nor feel a difference between the two.

That is why Microsoft developed DirectStorage so that games can fully utilize NVMEs, but unfortunately it is still in its infancy and only a few games implemented it. Once it kicks off truly, NVME will become the absolute gaming necessity for stutter-free smooth gameplay.

Also if you wish to know in more official detail what exactly an SSD does, here's a snipet from Intel's own website[www.intel.com];

• Faster OS boot times.
  Installing an SSD means less time waiting for your operating system to start before you can play games or do anything else. A new PC with an SSD often boots in a fraction of the time when compared to an HDD. SSDs’ superior data transfer speed can save you minutes of waiting.
  
  
• Faster load times.
  The most dramatic difference between SSDs and HDDs is the time you’ll spend waiting for games to load. The benefit is clear: SSDs can save you a few minutes of loading time in every play session and hours of waiting in the long term.
  
  
• Smoother gameplay.
  Many games perform thousands of tiny read and write operations as you play, which can result in hundreds of megabytes of data transfers. Upgrading to an SSD won’t increase your FPS, but it can result in an improvement in some open-world titles with game engines that load in new areas and textures as you play. On HDDs, the seek time of the arm’s read/write head and the rotational latency of the magnetic platter below it create the latency behind these hitches. By comparison, the greater bandwidth and reduced latency of SSDs help them rapidly access the requested data and avoid hitching.

[Obsessive Power]

Originally posted by Magnetic Man:

Thanks guys. Correct me if I am wrong. So the game loads into RAM, hard drive is only to speed up loading times. So why they listed nvme for phantom liberty? Does it mean it will load assets into ram faster?? So potential stuttering with regular ssd?

I cant wrap my head around this

Large open world games are always streaming assets and textures from the storage to RAM and VRAM. They don't load everything in all at once. This is the same with Cyberpunk. If you have a fast enough drive, you shouldn't get any stuttering, textures loading in a low res mode, and then popping in to high resolution.

The world is moving on from HDD's, this is essentially technology from the late 1970's. it's slow and mechanical. SSD's have no moving parts, data can be found instantly rather the drive head having to move around the platters trying to seek the data that's needed.

Before I had my current system with two NVME's, I played on an internal SATA Crucial MX500 SSD and had no loading, stuttering or other issues.

[Titan Awaken]

Originally posted by Magnetic Man:

Thanks guys. Correct me if I am wrong. So the game loads into RAM, hard drive is only to speed up loading times. So why they listed nvme for phantom liberty? Does it mean it will load assets into ram faster?? So potential stuttering with regular ssd?

I cant wrap my head around this

Even if NVMes will load you faster into the game than a regular SATA SSD, realistically the difference is marginal between the two. Gaming is still one of the use cases where the true potential of NVMes remains largely untapped.

To be honest I don’t even know why CDPR would recommend an NVMe for the expansion unless if they’re planning to implement Direct Storage somewhere down the line. If they’re not planning to add Direct Storage then recommending an NVMe would be largely superfluous.

[joridiculous]

Like Crimsonrider writes above. active asset streaming is the main benefit for NVME vs (Sata)SSD, it got a "shorter route" being mounted directly on the motherboard, close to where the data is going.
But will, you as the player notice it? Maybe, but not likely. If it would help loading shaders.. oh boy one can dream

[Graf Erik]

As has been said, in any open world game the engine will constantly load (and unload) new assets into ram and vram. Especially vram is limited. The faster the game can load these assets, the smoother the game runs.
Will you have a benefit from using a nvme over a sata ssd? Impossible to say, strongly depends on your whole setup (but also your settings. RT need lots of vram, so the engine has to load in new assets more often). Somewhere there is always a bottleneck, and it might be the mass storage in some instances.

I use a nvme and I'm very satisfied. The game always ran very smooth and reliable for me, even at release.
In the week after the release (when a lot of people especially on last gen consoles had problems) there was a vid statement from the devs where they said that a lot of seemingly random issues appear when the engine cant stream assets fast enough and runs out of data.

[Bogmore]

Given the choice it's NVME every time, on the right motherboard ofc.

Most SATA SSDs are 600 MB/s NVMEs are up to 3,000MB/s

[Jamie]

Originally posted by Fluffy_Llama:

The SSD is never the bottleneck when it comes to gaming so even the slowest SSD you buy will be more than enough. NVME is the fastest but they also suffer from running hot so id recommend a normal SATA SSD since it will likely have a longer life span.

Personally i use Samsung SSDs and they have never let me down.

Mine has never gone above 42 C

[Bogmore]

NVMEs are quite a bit cheaper than Sata SSDs and don't need their own power lead.

I'm not sure but I think they may also use less power.

[Gelfan_Dothea]

Just want to throw this out there for GP, and to clarify some possible misinformation that I've seen here. My new NVMe drives are waaaay faster at loading games than my old SATA SSDs. And that's an important thing to remember. NVMe is a protocol, not hardware. You can still have the newest M.2 drives using the SATA protocol, which will be a lot slower in games (I'm assuming). But my NVMe drives are 15-20 seconds faster in loading some games. Gameplay wise there's no difference. I don't think I even notice a difference from my old HDDs, but games with a lot of loading, like Cyberpunk, makes a difference.

That being said, I don't think having an old SATA SSD is going to affect the gameplay in any way, just the load times. Now if you were playing something like the new Ratchet and Clank game, NVMe would make a HUGE difference. Maybe Liberty City will too depending on how much stuff they try to load in at one time. But unless they suddenly cranked the graphics up to 10, which I seriously doubt, it shouldn't make a difference.

[Graf Erik]

Originally posted by Fluffy_Llama:

NVME is the fastest but they also suffer from running hot...

Eh, you know you can get a nvme cooler?

I've got one of these (and its total overkill)
https://www.alternate.de/ICY-BOX/IB-M2HSF-702-K%C3%BChlk%C3%B6rper/html/product/1668541
25 bucks and I can assure you that my m.2 is much cooler then any of my sata ssds. I don't even think I ever used the fan, its supposed to run up at 40°C. I actually thought about building a cooler for the sata ssds as well, but at least there doesn't seem to be a standard 2.5'' ssd cooler on the market.