HDD Gaming in 2025?

[Chudimir Lenin]

I got a couple of older games that I'd like to put on my HDD. I'm just wondering if it's even worth it in 2025? They're single player games, and from what I've tested out it works great with games like Zomboid. Curious about the pros and cons, thanks.

[BJWyler]

What does 2025 have to do with anything? Either games will run or they won't - year don't mean squat.

[rawWwRrr]

I guess I don't understand the question. What is the concern?

An SSD will provide faster load times. Depending on the game, it might benefit from those kinds of speeds. But plenty of users are still using HDD vs SSD. You're not going to kill a HDD by using it in the way it was designed.

[Chudimir Lenin]

Originally posted by BJWyler:

What does 2025 have to do with anything? Either games will run or they won't - year don't mean squat.

I worded it wrong, apologies. I guess I meant if there were any downsides to using it in 2025, but my post didn't really follow up on it.

[Chudimir Lenin]

Originally posted by rawWwRrr:

I guess I don't understand the question. What is the concern?

An SSD will provide faster load times. Depending on the game, it might benefit from those kinds of speeds. But plenty of users are still using HDD vs SSD. You're not going to kill a HDD by using it in the way it was designed.

Ok great, thank you so much!

[Lystent]

I'd imagine that games that use less storage space would work much better on HDD than ones that don't. Things do get convoluted with games that load a tinier portion of their assets at a time, though, among with other factors.

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Gaming with an HDD make so little difference versus an SSD that it is almost completely irrelevant. It is only relevant when you purchase games which are made for consoles and are built to stagger loading. And even then... If saving 10-20 seconds in your whole day make or break it then we're not made of the same cloth.

What is actually important is that you have a gaming HDD. HDDs come in different speed sets and you obviously want the faster ones which can load faster. The most common are 5400rpm and 7200rpm although there apparently is a whole set of options in between and it could go as high as 10000rpm.

[Chudimir Lenin]

Originally posted by Eagle_of_Fire:

Gaming with an HDD make so little difference versus an SSD that it is almost completely irrelevant. It is only relevant when you purchase games which are made for consoles and are built to stagger loading. And even then... If saving 10-20 seconds in your whole day make or break it then we're not made of the same cloth.

What is actually important is that you have a gaming HDD. HDDs come in different speed sets and you obviously want the faster ones which can load faster. The most common are 5400rpm and 7200rpm although there apparently is a whole set of options in between and it could go as high as 10000rpm.

Would you say multiplayer games are a no go for HDDs?

[wesnef]

Originally posted by Chudimir Lenin:

Would you say multiplayer games are a no go for HDDs?

It's more an issue of games that stream in lots of data (or have huge loading times) vs games that don't. Not single player vs multi player.


(I have an SSD and an HDD. I put old and/or low-data games on my HDD, and big/modern games that do lots of loading on the SSD.)

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Originally posted by Chudimir Lenin:

Originally posted by Eagle_of_Fire:

Gaming with an HDD make so little difference versus an SSD that it is almost completely irrelevant. It is only relevant when you purchase games which are made for consoles and are built to stagger loading. And even then... If saving 10-20 seconds in your whole day make or break it then we're not made of the same cloth.

What is actually important is that you have a gaming HDD. HDDs come in different speed sets and you obviously want the faster ones which can load faster. The most common are 5400rpm and 7200rpm although there apparently is a whole set of options in between and it could go as high as 10000rpm.

Would you say multiplayer games are a no go for HDDs?

I would say that I don't understand why you're even asking the question.

Is HellDivers II considered multiplayer? Because I have a very old PC here with a 7200rpm HDD and I've never had any problems.

You literally simply load the game in memory before launching it. Have you ever played League of Legends once in your life, for example, and wondered why it was taking so long for the game to launch while looking at the team screen? That's because someone took slightly longer and we were all waiting for the guy. Once that screen is passed he would be playing exactly the same game in the same way. What is 10 seconds more, really?

[Chudimir Lenin]

Originally posted by Eagle_of_Fire:

Originally posted by Chudimir Lenin:

Would you say multiplayer games are a no go for HDDs?

I would say that I don't understand why you're even asking the question.

Is HellDivers II considered multiplayer? Because I have a very old PC here with a 7200rpm HDD and I've never had any problems.

You literally simply load the game in memory before launching it. Have you ever played League of Legends once in your life, for example, and wondered why it was taking so long for the game to launch while looking at the team screen? That's because someone took slightly longer and we were all waiting for the guy. Once that screen is passed he would be playing exactly the same game in the same way. What is 10 seconds more, really?

I'm new to PC buddy lol chill

[Eagle_of_Fire]

Originally posted by Chudimir Lenin:

Originally posted by Eagle_of_Fire:

I would say that I don't understand why you're even asking the question.

Is HellDivers II considered multiplayer? Because I have a very old PC here with a 7200rpm HDD and I've never had any problems.

You literally simply load the game in memory before launching it. Have you ever played League of Legends once in your life, for example, and wondered why it was taking so long for the game to launch while looking at the team screen? That's because someone took slightly longer and we were all waiting for the guy. Once that screen is passed he would be playing exactly the same game in the same way. What is 10 seconds more, really?

I'm new to PC buddy lol chill

... What do you mean? I'm simply literally explaining to you how it work.

[ezwip]

SSD just makes your games load a lot faster. On some you probably wouldn't even notice but if you wanted to play GTA V or something like that you'd definitely notice the difference.

[󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡⁧⁧Kei]

HDDs are only useful for storage

[Lystent]

Originally posted by wesnef:

...I put old and/or low-data games on my HDD, and big/modern games that do lots of loading on the SSD.)

I can help but to think about that bit where HDDs presented bulkier storage than SSDs, leaving one with a very disproportionate capacities for small and large games.

[Overseer]

Especially indie games that just load maybe 150 MB before you get to play a level will not see significant improvement from a SSD. It can even be that a more powerful CPU improves loading times more than faster storage, simply because logic is managing data before the game shows a playable area.
You can always experiment yourself and learn what all of that really means, by simply having libraries on HDD and SSD and then test the games on both. Chances are you find games that show no difference at all or cut down loading from 30 seconds to 3.