SSD in Gaming: How does it work?

[aissixtir]

Most people nowdays if not they go exclusively for SSD, others buy SSD and HDD. However I am a bit confused of how someone should improve his gaming speed using his SSD. 

 

My question: Does someone need to boot from his SSD to his game? and boot seperately when working on his HDD. 

Or can he just install OS in HDD and access SSD like a USB through the OS. If its the last, wouldnt that decrease the speed?

 

p.s Sorry if its a noobish question but I am not aware of how people use several SSDs as I have no been using several HDDs in the past. Just one big fat sweaty HDD ;p

[yassarikhan786]

You can install the OS on a HDD and use an SSD for games. If you install the SSD on the correct SATA port you should have no problems with speed. 

[Villain]

You can install the OS on the SSD, or the HDD, it doesn't matter. However, 99.9% of SSD users have it for their operating system or programs that they use frequently. If you have an SSD and you aren't using it for your OS, then you are doing it wrong. The benefit you get with an SSD in terms of games is only load times. You can use both drives at the same time, so no, you don't need to boot separately. If you want to launch a program from your HDD you can still do it while your OS is installed on the SSD.
 

(not sure if I explained that very clearly)

[XiaoPigs]

There are several ways a SSD can improve your load times.

 

First one is simple. Just install your games on the SSD itself. It decreases the load times quite a bit. Most people just install their OS, most used programs and 1 or 2 games on the SSD itself.

 

Second way is to cache you HDD with the SSD. You get more space as well as a performance boost to go along with. Certainly won't be as fast as loading the game from the SSD itself but it will be adequate. It'll also decrease boot times like a SSD will. A 32GB SSD should be enough as a cache

[crazystorm13]

what you could do is partition your ssd and use it for os and games, then use your hard drive for every thing else

[aissixtir]

Thanks a lot people.