Which HDD/SDD to install on?

[SpinDoc1]

Hello all,

I just installed a new SDD hard drive with my Windows 10 installation on it. Previously, I had been running Steam from my main (let's call is C:) drive SDD, with a large Steamapps folder on another SDD. However, I have read comments that HiTech recommends running AH III from an HDD (spinning) drive, based on the way the game is constantly interfacing with it. Is this true? Should I use Steam from my main SDD with Windows, and then put AH III in some separate HDD? What if I want to run all my other Steam apps from the main SDD, will it benefit me to have them all in different locations? Thanks.

[TequilaChaser]

I. Personally don't run AH3 on my Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB software

But have been running AH2/to AHIII on a Crucial SSD basically non stop 24/7 that PC has been on since early 2014

With not 1 single issue on Windows 8.1 pro


Hope this helps

TC

[The Fugitive]

I think Skuzzy use to say that in the old days back when they were much smaller. If you used up the space for an operating system and the game it didnt leave much room for file swapping. Todays SSD drive are much bigger so I dont think it would be an issue these days.

[Bizman]

IIRC it was not about the swapping space, it was because there is so much rewriting (guess you can call it swapping) happening that the read/write cycles of an SSD would run out too soon. Furthermore on an SSD rewriting doesn't happen over existing data like on an HDD which triplicates the number of disk operations on an SSD for any single rewritten file.

Of course on a small SSD the same cells would be used more frequently than on the current ones so size really matters, then again some 10 GB free space on a 120 GB disk is exactly as much or little as 10 GB on a 1 TB disk.

The prices for SSD's has dropped so much that even if the life span of an SSD is shorter with programs like AH running on one, the cost is very much tolerable.

[Eagler]

I have found SSD better than spinning drives for every app you want faster/quicker response...which to me is all of them.
I have used them since they came out.
Spinning drives are set as array in my NAS backup.

Eagler

[Wiley]

I was paying pretty close attention to this, as my system was marginal at the time and I was wondering if moving to an SSD would help.  Skuzzy did indeed recommend running it from an HDD because it writes small bits of info to storage a lot.

He is technically correct, because SSDs have a finite number of writes.  However, IMO it's academic at this point as the tech and algorithms the drives use to spread out the write cycles means it would take a ridiculous amount of usage (hundreds of gigs being written per day iirc) to have an effect on a modern drive's lifespan.

The one other thing I will say, AH probably gains the least from being on an SSD out of any game I play.  It affects time loading into the arena, and that's it.  So instead of it taking 2-3 seconds when you click on the arena, it takes 10.  I would lose very little sleep over that.  Once it's loaded up, that I can see there's no noticeable improvement running on an SSD vs HDD.  YMMV.

With that said, I run it on an SSD because I am no longer using any HDDs in my rig.

Wiley.

[Pudgie]

Here is the data from my D: SSD (where I set up the pagefile, this is all this SSD is used for) to show the amount of total bytes written over (provisioned) over the last 6+ yrs of me using my box (which includes playing a LOT of AHIII) provided below. This is displaying the amount of single cell bytes written over.

As you can see, w\ 16Gb of system mem in use she ain't getting tagged very much.

So if you have enough system mem onboard along w\ Win 7 OS or up (Win 10 is the best Windows OS for SSD usage) you should be OK....depending on what else you're using your computer for outside of running AHIII.

 

[Pudgie]

Here is data of my main C: drive (the 1 w\ the OS, drivers & programs other than AHIII, I have AHIII on a separate SSD but not the D: drive I posted earlier) over the same time frame of 6+ yrs usage provided below.

You'll do far more writebacks to your main SSD from shutting down\starting up your computer, installing\deleting drivers & programs & installing Windows OS updates, etc but as you can also see, the amount is still pretty minimal..................

Hope this helps.

 

PS---BBS won't let me send it all in 1 post....exceeds the KB posting limit......FYI. Also I should add that I am using multiple SSD's configured specifically to protect the 2 SSD's that I want to protect from any excessive writebacks from paging while playing AHIII so you know. The issue w\ using SSD's is the amount of cell provisioning occurring from writebacks to them as Bizman posted. Data also shows that a page file can get fairly large unless you dump em once in a while....or use a large enough capacity SSD so's to not run out of room for everything else.

Thought I'd mention that.

 

[TequilaChaser]

Tried looking at the first pic you attached Pudgie

I am going to assume that it is 1.5 TB total over time

That picture want show but. 1.50........

TC

[Bizman]

Just to make things more complicated, I recall Skuzzy mentioning micro updating the game data. So it's not about the amount of data, it's about the number of file transfers that can cause issues combined with the difference in how a files is replaced on an SSD compared to an HDD.

If memory serves me right, the procedure of updating a file on an HDD is a simple overwriting whereas on an SSD the new file is stored to a temporary location, the original file will be moved to another temporary location and the new file will be put into the now empty location and the plus potentially some recalculating to verify that the new file really is where it should before the original file is finally deleted. That may not be an exact explanation but close enough for a layman. Lots of bouncing in no time, that is.

[TequilaChaser]

That sounds about right, although my memory is going....

I recall very long thread(s) regarding the discussion seems like 2010 thru 2012....with out doing any searches


Ok, back  to trying to remember how to play Foggy Mountain break down,  wild wood flower and other golden oldies on my acoustic guitar and my banjo..... dueling banjos is child's play heh...

TC

[guncrasher]

I have done everything possible to make my ssd fail, it's a Samsung 250 something.  I left it sitting outside of my case for years, had ah and wot on it.  it hasn't failed, still write at same speed as when new. last year I bought another 1.5 tb ssd.it cost 1/2 the price of the 250. ah is installed on the new one. not a problem.


semp

[Pudgie]

Tried looking at the first pic you attached Pudgie

I am going to assume that it is 1.5 TB total over time

That picture want show but. 1.50........

TC

Yes that's what the Samsung Magician SSD management software is showing as total bytes (TB) written over (or provisioned if you prefer).....out of 128Gb only 1.5 total bytes have been written over (provisioned) over the 6+ yrs usage time to date. This D: drive is the SSD that has my pagefile set up on it along w\ my Windows Libraries files & nothing else. I chose to use a 128Gb SSD to make sure that I had plenty of room to prevent Windows from setting up another pagefile on any other SSD's as I do know from past experience that a pagefile left to Windows to manage can get fairly large in size over time. I was gonna use a 60Gb SSD at 1st but after some thinking I went the 128Gb route........

From the Samsung Magician software results it appears that I chose well.

Yep I was a participant in a lot of those old threads back in the 2011-2013 time frame & is why I chose to setup my box at that time in the all SSD configuration that I'm currently running & in the sequence that I have them all setup (C: NVMe 512Gb drive for OS, programs, drivers, Windows Updates, etc; D: SATAIII 128Gb drive for pagefile & Windows Libraries files only, then moved AHIII onto this drive from the E: drive bout 2 yrs ago-never had AHIII installed on the C: drive; E: SATAIII 512Gb drive for storage, OS set to write all Internet downloads to) and I chose to use Samsung SSD's as at that time they showed to be the best SSD's thru independent lab torture testing results for longevity. The sequencing of these SSD's is also me setting up in Windows OS what I deemed as the best SSD usage scenario to ensure safe keeping of the SSD's that hold the data I want to protect by intentionally setting up a separate "sacrificial" SSD to take all the abuse a SSD can go thru from system mem writeouts to virtual mem.

All this being monitored w\ Samsung Magician SSD management software to keep track of the wear\tear on them over time to see for myself how all would fair in a real life usage scenario over time also knowing that if sufficient amount of system mem is installed\used this alone will reduce the number\amount of writebacks from system mem to virtual mem (a SSD or a HDD) thus I had tested for that also (I've had 16Gb of system mem installed in my boxes for the last 8 yrs) back then using Windows Resource monitor set up to detect\record any data transfers from system mem to virtual mem (monitor running in the background) while playing AHIII over several hrs....which the results showed 0% transfers in which I had explained what this meant in the previous postings in this thread to try to ensure understanding that this result doesn't say exactly what some may imply (saying 0 physical writeouts occurred) but from how the monitor is programmed to reflect. What I didn't mention is that by using MSI AF I also had the pagefile monitored as well during these same tests & those results showed that the pagefile never grew in size over the initial size either while playing AHIII over the same test time frame....also indicating that no data\not enough data to register was being transferred into it.
So in closing, either way you look at it, the 2 monitor results demonstrated that very few if any writeouts did actually occur into my pagefile SSD while playing AHIII w\ 16Gb of system mem onboard so I stopped worrying about this a long time ago concerning SSD usage w\ AHIII....irrespective of what was reported back then because the DATA I had gathered from my testing, regardless of how primitive\inconclusive it may seem to some, says that in my current configuration this is a non issue......that seems to line up w\ other's reported observed SSD usage findings.

Not my intention to try to prove anyone right or wrong as that is not the way I roll......is why you've never seen me post any of this info in those threads or in any other threads until now. My responses come from data results I've tracked & recorded over time using methodologies that were available to me to employ.

I only posted what I did in this thread along w\ some viewable, concrete SSD data from a source that I can't manipulate as that data comes directly from the Samsung SSD's physical data storage (where any SSD cell bytes that get provisioned over is kept in record on the SSD's for Windows OS operational purposes) to attempt to help the OP to make an informed decision concerning using a SSD in conjunction w\ AHIII along w\ everybody else's input concerning this topic.....which is what the OP was asking for.

If needed I can pull up the NewEgg records as to when I ordered these SSD's to use w\ the Intel X99 box that I was building at that time (upgrading from the Intel X79 rig I was running prior....in June 2012 then I picked up these Samsung SSD's in October of same year to use in this current configuration....I used an AngelWings M.2 to PCI-E x4 adapter to use the M.2 NVMe SSD on the Intel X99 mobo in order to get the full NVMe read\write speeds of the 950 Pro NVMe SSD. On the AMD Ryzen mobo platforms the M.2 slot under the 1st PCI-E x16 slot is a full speed M.2 for NVMe....direct to the CPU & system mem so no need of the PCI-E adapter & Win 10 started up\ran on the AMD Ryzen setups off the Samsung 950 Pro NVMe SSD w\o an OS reinstall or call in to MS.......until I did the 3 OS reinstalls recently due to what was later found to be an ADSL modem\router issue).

Dang I now realize that I was off on my time frame.......not 6+ yrs but 8+ yrs.....even longer than I initially remembered..........
I'm gonna have to start checking my notes more often.................my mem is starting to slip as well.

Hope this helps.