Solid state hard drives offer little gain in PS3
One of the great things about PS3 is the ability throw your own hard drive into the system, without voiding the warranty. Many PS3 hardcore have already put faster, bigger hard drives into their consoles. But what about the latest tech, solid state hard drives? Do they offer any benefit to PS3 owners?
Solid state hard drives have been around for a while, but only recently have they dropped in price to something far more reasonable. Without any moving parts, they consume less energy and can be found in an increasing number of mobile devices, like the MacBook Air. However, putting the drive in a PS3 offers interesting results.
Gamespot did a thorough PC-like evaluation of the drives, and showed that writing to the disc is significantly slower. For example, the infamous Devil May Cry 4 installation goes from 21.2 minutes to a whopping 32.5 minutes -- better buy another sandwich! However, load times do decrease due to the speediness of read times off a solid state drive. Grand Theft Auto IV, for example, loads 4 seconds faster on a system equipped with a solid state drive.
Considering how these drives are upwards of $400, there is very little incentive to get a solid state drive. As important it is for things to load quickly, it's just as important to make sure data is written efficiently. For those trying to upgrade their hard drives, a standard high-rpm drive looks to be in order.
[Via Digg]
