What's the difference between games on disk to those on cards?

[Okjoek]

I'm curious what the advantages are to each. For example most of my Nintendo handhelds use little cards that resemble an SD card a bit whereas most other consoles or systems use disks.

[handymanshandle]

The cards were harder to break/damage, discs were a little more universal.

I'm not sure about speeds. 

[Moonzy]

cards = scratch resistant (to a degree), less seek time, good for consoles that doesnt put the entire game onto the RAM since it can just access the data almost instantly

CD = cheaper to produce

[FullTank1337]

15 hours ago, Moonzy said:

cards = scratch resistant (to a degree), less seek time, good for consoles that doesnt put the entire game onto the RAM since it can just access the data almost instantly

CD = cheaper to produce

Cartridges 4lyfe

[1988fido]

1-

CD can be easier to read if u want to rip it to a PC ( emulator purposes ) 

While cartigaes nearly impossible to find adapter that allows u to connect them to a PC :3 so for us PC gamers CD better horray

 

2- technically the read and write of cartridges can still improve and not bottlenecked by the spinning speed of a disk , so it can be like ssd vs hardrive ( so they load the game data on ram to not rely on CD speed which result on the need of more ram I guess ) so can increase the cost of a console  but have to do more research into it coz maybe cartridge system interface might be more costly cox it might need more parts to allow fast reading from that cartridge (chips )

 

3- I believe battery wise the CD rom motor use queit the amount of power compared to SD card or a cartridge system so better battery life for the handheld will be with cartridges

 

4- compatibility wise the CD will be better coz its more wide spread these days so if the manufacturer want the game to run on multiple systems ( like PlayStation :3 let's dream that they made the games run on psp/PS Vita and ps4/ps3  by just plutting the CD in ) it will be easier to achieve that goal with CD than cartidges like maybe add in PC compatibility which ofc will never happen :3 but let's say Sony become an angel company and u can just take ur ps4 disk put it into ur bluray ROM and done , now u can play ps4 games on ur PC 

 

 

Excuse my English , I know level over 10,000

[minibois]

Cartridge vs. disc based:

 

Catridge:

Pros: faster load times, can store them without cases

Cons: more expensive to make, can hold less data for the same money compared to a disc

 

Disc:

Pros: can hold more data than cartridges, very very cheap, better audio quality

Cons: longer loading times, can scratch

 

Of course these are very generalized terms. Some of the cartridge cons are probably not relevant to the 3DS cartridges too.

[doeskydoes]

its really all dependent on how long your gonna be playing for play for 20 minutes yeah slap a cartridge in and get playing. gonna binge fallout all day then yeah sit through the loading screens