HDD causing stuttering?

Monarch · March 20, 2015

I've noticed microstuttering in games, as well as in Valley Benhcmark. Specs in sig.

Here's what happens in Valley:

This is in BF4:

Given that HDDs have much higher response time than SSDs, could the cause of this be HDD? I've noticed my HDD being active during these tests so obviously BF4 and Valley do require additional assets from the hard drive, aside from the initial load. Since SSDs have lower access time, I reckon I'd need an SSD to have a smooth gameplay. What do you guys think?

babadoctor · March 20, 2015

I agree. I switched from a HDD to SSD and it was much much faster.

Monarch · March 20, 2015

I agree. I switched from a HDD to SSD and it was much much faster.

Most people say SSDs only improve initial level loading time. I'm not sure how hard drive response time affects frame times and fps when data is being streamed during gameplay, but it must have some sort of impact on them, right?

At the rate of 60 fps single frame is rendered in 16.7 ms, so access time of HDDs of up to around 15 ms (according to Wikipedia) sounds like a lot of time, which could cause stuttering.