Performance tip for users with SSD while Steam games are on HDD

[JayPlayingTV]

If you have Steam installed on the HDD and the game you're playing takes a lot of time to load, or stutters during gameplay because it's caching files from the HDD, the performance can be increased with the SSD you have installed, even when Steam doesn't let you move a certain installed game onto another drive.

If you have space on the SSD for the game you have stuttering issues with, you might not want to move the entire Steam installation on the SSD, because you might have so many games installed that it just wouldn't fit there, but no fear: there is a way to move a Steam game on the SSD and get the performance increase you might need, without moving the entire catalog of installed games!

So, how to do?

Obsolete: Get Junction v1.06 at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896768.aspx
Junction is a Microsoft Sysinternals utility to make symbolic links within the NTFS file system Unzip it somewhere easy to find. I'm going to use D:\ as an example.

Now, let's say your Steam installation is on the HDD which might be the D: drive and your SSD is the C: drive.

Shut Steam down
Create a new folder on the C: drive, such as C:\Games
Go to D:\Steam\steamapps and find the game you have loading issues with, such as D:\Steam\steamapps\skyrim

Move the game folder to the new folder you created, so you'll have C:\Games\skyrim and no skyrim folder on D:\Steam\steamapps anymore.

Once the moving of the files is finished, it's time to make the symbolic link.
Usage:

mklink -D [link] [target]

Open the command prompt (All programs - Accessories - Command Prompt, or winkey+r and type cmd)

As for this example, with the folder structure mentioned above, you'd type:

mklink -D D:\Steam\steamapps\skyrim C:\Games\skyrim

And that's it, you're done. The game is physically on the SSD while Steam is still on the HDD, but without it knowing, it will load everything for that game from the SSD through the symbolic link we created.

Hopefully someone finds this useful! I know I did! :)

[Satoru]

Junctiongin is rudundant as about 95% of steam games now allow you to install to different drives anyway.

Also note that SSD drives provide little if any actual 'performance' benefits. YOu're nto going to get any fps increases in games. At best you may get 'modest' load time benefits. But that's highly dependent on the game, and universally almost never justifises the high ssd cost per GB

[Legendary old man]

You do know that Steam has the ability to install games over different drives built into it now? Also why would anyone use Junction when they could use symlinks? Your advice is bad. It was good about 5 years ago. Symlink does a much better job. Junction is for XP users.

[Ludonaut]

Junctioning is unnecessary. It is far easier to simply move everything to the new location:

Moving a Steam Installation and Games

[JayPlayingTV]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von facedown:

You do know that Steam has the ability to install games over different drives built into it now?

For some games, but not all, such as my Skyrim installation.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von facedown:

Also why would anyone use Junction when they could use symlinks?

I guess you mean mklink, as there is no command named symlink or symlinks, at least not on Win7pro by default, but I just found out that there is mklink.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von facedown:

Your advice is bad. It was good about 5 years ago.

As you pointed out, junction is not needed, but bad advice? I wouldn't judge it that harshly, since it does give an increase to load times over slower HDDs. Thus it's definitely useful for those that can use the boost.

Ursprünglich geschrieben von facedown:

Symlink does a much better job. Junction is for XP users.

As for this, Junction gives the same result as mklink. Anyway, thank you for pointing out that it exists by default now, so there is no need to download junction anymore. Just use mklink. :)

[Komish]

Mhm.

[JayPlayingTV]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Ludonaut:

Junctioning is unnecessary. It is far easier to simply move everything to the new location:

Moving a Steam Installation and Games

That is, if you have the room for it. Many SSD drives don't have.

[Legendary old man]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbolic_link

Junction will not give the same results as symlinks. Symlinks can make a network drive appear as a local drive or it can make a program think it is installed on the c: drive when it is on another drive. You can symlink certain files or folders for a program. Junction is obsolete if you have Vista or newer. Junction would only be needed if you have XP.

[JayPlayingTV]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von facedown:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbolic_link

Hm, you do know that a junction is a symbolic link, right? It's just limited to folders (which is the only thing needed in this tip.) Indeed mklink can also point to certain files and network paths, thus it has more functionality than junction, but it is not needed in this.

Anyway, downloading junction is now useless as the function is built in with mklink. Thanks for pointing that out. :)

[Reinoud]

Great!

[Legendary old man]

Ursprünglich geschrieben von Bennar:

Ursprünglich geschrieben von facedown:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbolic_link

Hm, you do know that a junction is a symbolic link, right? It's just limited to folders (which is the only thing needed in this tip.) Indeed mklink can also point to certain files and network paths, thus it has more functionality than junction, but it is not needed in this.

Anyway, downloading junction is now useless as the function is built in with mklink. Thanks for pointing that out. :)

Symlinks is much more powerful form of Junction. Many Steam games are not fooled by Junction and will not work. Plus like you pointed out I can use symlinks to link to network drives and run games from there, which I do. Multiple computers using the game installed on a network drive all at the same time is possible if you want.

Anyway, Steam can install most games to other drives now without symlink or junction.