6 ms·

I agree to a large extent but I think 80GB is an extreme on the low end. Many modern games (especially MMOs) are 20GB+. Windows 7 alone requires a huge amount o

by pyrocat 11y ago

I agree to a large extent but I think 80GB is an extreme on the low end. Many modern games (especially MMOs) are 20GB+. Windows 7 alone requires a huge amount of storage. I have a 120GB partition at home (just for OS+programs, not data) and I'm constantly uninstalling steam games in order to install others. If you want a modicum of breathing room, I'd say minimum 200GB.

hobarrera 11y ago
I've Eve-Online and StarCraft 2 installed, which use about 30GB in total. Add another 6-8GB for the OS, and you've still got about 50GB left (which I actually fill up with even more games). IMHO, 120GB is way more than enough.
dragontamer 11y ago
IIRC, Assassin Creed Unity required 50GB by itself. If Windows takes up 30GB, you pretty much need to wipe out everything just to play Unity on 80GB. I think 256GB to 512GB is the best bet for the standard consumer.
- timboslice 11y ago
  I just got a 250GB Samsung EVO SSD. Filled it up in a matter of weeks by installing some of my favorite games from Steam. I'm looking to add a 500GB to my build, but I should have STARTED with a 500GB.
  - madez 11y ago
    This seems like a big waste. Why would you put games on a SSD?
    - zaphoyd 11y ago
      Same reason as you'd want an SSD for anything else? Fast loading times of lots of data? Also, some operating systems make having programs installed to volumes other than the boot volume hard.
      - Rapidwire 11y ago
        Which operating systems? Windows? I haven't had that problem on Windows 7 x64, but maybe that's just me.
    - pmalynin 11y ago
      Insane load speeds
    - bjd2385 11y ago
      I used to have roommates that were intense gamers (blew thousands of dollars on new GPUs and other desktop gaming parts per semester) and all they talked about were SSDs. SSDs are pretty big in gaming.
    - zanny 11y ago
      They are literally the most data intensive software you have in terms of UX. Your movies, music, documents, and even non-served databases are all browsable on low bandwidth low IOPS devices just fine with sophisticated algorithms. Your load times for a level of Call of Duty are always reflective of how long it takes to get texture data off the disk and into vram, and that is constantly being hammered. It sometimes even causes texture popping on crappy notebook hard drives. I have 256GB SSDs in my desktop and notebook (with intents to find a nice 1TB drive next year, since we are at the tail end of SATA3) and my Steam library on my desktop is 176GB by itself. My OS on its own (Arch) discounting pacman provided games (0ad, doom3bfg, darkplaces, doom, etc) is around 6GB, and most of that is Qt doc, Python2 site packages, 300MB of wallpapers, and 600MB of locale.
      - belorn 11y ago
        Not only is load time reflected by the time it takes for texture data to be copied into vram, but what constitute reasonable load time is to a degree based on developer platforms and those have a tendency to use above average hardware. If in the past 10s load time was maximum, that number will now be more likely based on SSD speeds rather than HDD.
    - simplexion 11y ago
      Why wouldn't you?
    - paulsutter 11y ago
      Because I ran out of punched cards?
    - onli 11y ago
      You are right, it is a pity that you are downvoted. Right now, you maybe put your favorite game on the SSD, not the whole steam library - and that is what gamers often recommend themselves. FPS don't get influenced by the HDD, only loading times, and those are normally not too high. Many new games have only two loading times: loading the game and then loading the save. Afterwards, everything is streamed, and a proper HDD is fast enough for that. And that is what the people responding to your comment here miss completely. Using a SSD is for many games a waste.
      - _khau 11y ago
        Why is it a waste? If you have the monty and the means why wouldn't you do it? You're comment is very 'matter if fact' and baseless. Improved loading times and better texture loading in games where it is heavy (think Fallout 3 or Skyrim) is a great reason to wack an SSD in your system.
        onli 11y ago
        Skyrim and Fallout 3 are in my eyes counter-examples for using an SSD, since you basically have only the two loading times and afterwards it's streaming. Maybe if the Quicktravel takes too long on the HDD. > If you have the monty and the means why wouldn't you do it? Oh, sure then :) It is only a waste in the relation of price per gigabyte vs. the possible performance improvement ingame. > You're comment is very 'matter if fact' and baseless. See http://www.hardocp.com/article/2013/12/10/hdd_vs_ssd_real_world_gaming_performance/3 http://www.hardocp.com/article/2013/12/10/hdd_vs_ssd_real_wo... if you want another source.
        _khau 11y ago
        Are you serious? That HardOCP article (and HarcOCP are not really known for their quality articles anyway) is testing for framerate imrpovements. An SSD will not improve your framerate much at all (That's not what you use an SSD for). You cited main loading times like loading a game and loading a save, which are enough reason themselves to want an SSD in there. Some games are painfully long in these areas (take any Total War game as an example) and an SSD will help. I gave Fallout 3 and Skyrim as an example of texture loading where an SSD would matter. You claimed it didn't, as this is contrary to all avaialble information. These games (like many open world games) stutter when new cells/areas are loaded (I'm not talking about regular texture streaming). Again, this is where SSD's will make a difference. An SSD becomes even more useful when you start installing high-resolution texture mods to games like these. My own Skyrim installation uses nearly 4Gb of video memory when wandering around the wilderness. That would cause some pretty heavy thrashing on an HDD. There is nothing about SSD's being used to store games that is a 'waste' if those things are important to you. I have two SSD's in my personal machine, one 128Gb for the OS and one 500Gb for Steam and some games. They didn't cost me much, so why wouldn't I do it? There is literally no reason for me to not do this in a high-end system meant for playing games. Other games will go on my regular HDD's because you are right at least in saying that not all games will benefit from it, but some will.
  - signal11 11y ago
    A friend of mine is looking to upgrade from a 256GB MBA to a 512GB or 1TB MBP because he needs to view medical imagery offline (the Retina display also helps). <= 128GB storage is not really adequate for people who work with photos or music. 256GB is better but many people do need more.
- kijin 11y ago
  256GB is indeed the sweet spot for typical users. 512GB if you play large games. Windows on its own is quite capable of filling up a 128GB drive with restore points, update backups, and all sort of other junk when left in the hands of a typical user for a couple of years. I recently wiped nearly 60GB of pure OS-level junk (i.e. not caused by applications) from a family member's Windows 8.1 PC.
- ascagnel_ 11y ago
  Expect this to be increasingly common, now that new consoles ship their games on Blu-Rays.
- toxican 11y ago
  I'm curious to see what kind of space Win10 takes up. I believe one of their focuses was stripping it down to take up less space for applications such as tablet, netbooks, et.c
runamok 11y ago
I recently discovered a large portion of my windows 7 partition was due to space set aside for system restore. Then there is the swap space and hibernation image which if you have a lot of ram is enormous.
segmondy 11y ago
I use a chromebook with 16gb, I also have linux on it. I do fine and have had it for 2 years. :)

by pyrocat 11y ago

hobarrera 11y ago

I've Eve-Online and StarCraft 2 installed, which use about 30GB in total. Add another 6-8GB for the OS, and you've still got about 50GB left (which I actually fill up with even more games). IMHO, 120GB is way more than enough.

dragontamer 11y ago

IIRC, Assassin Creed Unity required 50GB by itself. If Windows takes up 30GB, you pretty much need to wipe out everything just to play Unity on 80GB. I think 256GB to 512GB is the best bet for the standard consumer.

timboslice 11y ago
I just got a 250GB Samsung EVO SSD. Filled it up in a matter of weeks by installing some of my favorite games from Steam. I'm looking to add a 500GB to my build, but I should have STARTED with a 500GB.
- madez 11y ago
  This seems like a big waste. Why would you put games on a SSD?
  - zaphoyd 11y ago
    Same reason as you'd want an SSD for anything else? Fast loading times of lots of data? Also, some operating systems make having programs installed to volumes other than the boot volume hard.
    - Rapidwire 11y ago
      Which operating systems? Windows? I haven't had that problem on Windows 7 x64, but maybe that's just me.
  - pmalynin 11y ago
    Insane load speeds
  - bjd2385 11y ago
    I used to have roommates that were intense gamers (blew thousands of dollars on new GPUs and other desktop gaming parts per semester) and all they talked about were SSDs. SSDs are pretty big in gaming.
  - zanny 11y ago
    They are literally the most data intensive software you have in terms of UX. Your movies, music, documents, and even non-served databases are all browsable on low bandwidth low IOPS devices just fine with sophisticated algorithms. Your load times for a level of Call of Duty are always reflective of how long it takes to get texture data off the disk and into vram, and that is constantly being hammered. It sometimes even causes texture popping on crappy notebook hard drives. I have 256GB SSDs in my desktop and notebook (with intents to find a nice 1TB drive next year, since we are at the tail end of SATA3) and my Steam library on my desktop is 176GB by itself. My OS on its own (Arch) discounting pacman provided games (0ad, doom3bfg, darkplaces, doom, etc) is around 6GB, and most of that is Qt doc, Python2 site packages, 300MB of wallpapers, and 600MB of locale.
    - belorn 11y ago
      Not only is load time reflected by the time it takes for texture data to be copied into vram, but what constitute reasonable load time is to a degree based on developer platforms and those have a tendency to use above average hardware. If in the past 10s load time was maximum, that number will now be more likely based on SSD speeds rather than HDD.
  - simplexion 11y ago
    Why wouldn't you?
  - paulsutter 11y ago
    Because I ran out of punched cards?
  - onli 11y ago
    You are right, it is a pity that you are downvoted. Right now, you maybe put your favorite game on the SSD, not the whole steam library - and that is what gamers often recommend themselves. FPS don't get influenced by the HDD, only loading times, and those are normally not too high. Many new games have only two loading times: loading the game and then loading the save. Afterwards, everything is streamed, and a proper HDD is fast enough for that. And that is what the people responding to your comment here miss completely. Using a SSD is for many games a waste.
    - _khau 11y ago
      Why is it a waste? If you have the monty and the means why wouldn't you do it? You're comment is very 'matter if fact' and baseless. Improved loading times and better texture loading in games where it is heavy (think Fallout 3 or Skyrim) is a great reason to wack an SSD in your system.
      - onli 11y ago
        Skyrim and Fallout 3 are in my eyes counter-examples for using an SSD, since you basically have only the two loading times and afterwards it's streaming. Maybe if the Quicktravel takes too long on the HDD. > If you have the monty and the means why wouldn't you do it? Oh, sure then :) It is only a waste in the relation of price per gigabyte vs. the possible performance improvement ingame. > You're comment is very 'matter if fact' and baseless. See http://www.hardocp.com/article/2013/12/10/hdd_vs_ssd_real_world_gaming_performance/3 http://www.hardocp.com/article/2013/12/10/hdd_vs_ssd_real_wo... if you want another source.
        _khau 11y ago
        Are you serious? That HardOCP article (and HarcOCP are not really known for their quality articles anyway) is testing for framerate imrpovements. An SSD will not improve your framerate much at all (That's not what you use an SSD for). You cited main loading times like loading a game and loading a save, which are enough reason themselves to want an SSD in there. Some games are painfully long in these areas (take any Total War game as an example) and an SSD will help. I gave Fallout 3 and Skyrim as an example of texture loading where an SSD would matter. You claimed it didn't, as this is contrary to all avaialble information. These games (like many open world games) stutter when new cells/areas are loaded (I'm not talking about regular texture streaming). Again, this is where SSD's will make a difference. An SSD becomes even more useful when you start installing high-resolution texture mods to games like these. My own Skyrim installation uses nearly 4Gb of video memory when wandering around the wilderness. That would cause some pretty heavy thrashing on an HDD. There is nothing about SSD's being used to store games that is a 'waste' if those things are important to you. I have two SSD's in my personal machine, one 128Gb for the OS and one 500Gb for Steam and some games. They didn't cost me much, so why wouldn't I do it? There is literally no reason for me to not do this in a high-end system meant for playing games. Other games will go on my regular HDD's because you are right at least in saying that not all games will benefit from it, but some will.
- signal11 11y ago
  A friend of mine is looking to upgrade from a 256GB MBA to a 512GB or 1TB MBP because he needs to view medical imagery offline (the Retina display also helps). <= 128GB storage is not really adequate for people who work with photos or music. 256GB is better but many people do need more.
kijin 11y ago
256GB is indeed the sweet spot for typical users. 512GB if you play large games. Windows on its own is quite capable of filling up a 128GB drive with restore points, update backups, and all sort of other junk when left in the hands of a typical user for a couple of years. I recently wiped nearly 60GB of pure OS-level junk (i.e. not caused by applications) from a family member's Windows 8.1 PC.
ascagnel_ 11y ago
Expect this to be increasingly common, now that new consoles ship their games on Blu-Rays.
toxican 11y ago
I'm curious to see what kind of space Win10 takes up. I believe one of their focuses was stripping it down to take up less space for applications such as tablet, netbooks, et.c

runamok 11y ago

I recently discovered a large portion of my windows 7 partition was due to space set aside for system restore. Then there is the swap space and hibernation image which if you have a lot of ram is enormous.

segmondy 11y ago

I use a chromebook with 16gb, I also have linux on it. I do fine and have had it for 2 years. :)