PS4 Hard drive question

I play on a PS4, and I am thinking of upgrading my hard drive to either an SSD or a SSHD. I am not a tech savvy person, those are just the options that I saw when I looked up what to upgrade my hard drive to online.
But I'd like to get feedback of some people who actually play 14 with either of them. What is your thoughts on them? Do you notice any sort of improvement using them? Which would you suggest?

For all you people who are going to say, "Get a PC." I'm working on it. I have a friend building one, but it's taking time to get all the parts.

The ps4 hard disk from factory has a speed of 5400rpm vs a SSD w is about 57000rpm could be more or could be less depending on brand, I guess you wanna upgrade the hard disk because of the loading screen, so yes upgrading to an SSD will improve the load speed a bit,you need to know that a loading screen is more affected by RAM an CPU that an actual hard disk upgrade an the ps4 is limited on that so you will not see a big difference, my advice is to leave it as it is,the most you will get will be about 15-20% from an upgrade about the 150.00 or more but then again is your decision.

Just to add up ps4 use 8gb ddr5 but it reserves 3.5gb for os operation.

Get a PC :p (sorry had to be done)

Now im talking from a PC perspective, but the tech will reap the same benefits..

But seriously an SSD and/or an SSHD should be a vast improvement over a regular HDD. I have to wait what feels like forever for my PS4 friends to load after a teleport for example, I've never timed it but i load within 3 seconds and they take what i estimate to be anywhere from 15-20. This is due to the PS4's low grade HDD rated at like 5400RPM, the standard minimum nowadays is 7200RPM.

What is your thoughts on them?
Get one and never look back ^^ they are like a gift from heaven. In a nutshell

Do you notice any sort of improvement using them?
As i said above, dramatically faster load times. The system can pull data off an SSD faster so transitions will be smoother and less jittery as you won't be waiting for files. You will still notice dips in framerate though.

Which would you suggest?
This depends on your needs... a standard SSD fully utilizes flash memory so is always faster, but lacks storage space compared to a similarly priced HDD, where as an SSHD is basically a HDD with a small SSD tacked on. It provides mass storage and increased speed but there are some cons. Namely only your most regularly accessed data will be saved onto the SSD component, which means you will have to regularly play FF14 alot to keep it on the SSD section to benefit from the increased speed. The PS4 OS will also count to this limit too so im not sure how viable an SSHD really is on console, hopefully someone with more experience can help here, as im more for a pure drive kind of guy rather than a hybrid drive.

In short:
SSD if you don't have many games as EVERYTHING will load faster
SSHD if you have lots of games or plan to have lots, but play FF14 most of the time so you can still benefit from better performance.

If you want my personal opinion, I'd say just get a regular SSD, its far more reliable than a hybrid when it comes to performance, but it will cost more.

BUT, if you are getting a PC soon i would just save up to get a large SSD for that instead of upgrading the PS4 and then getting a cheaper SSD for your PC. This is what i would do in your situation if im honest...


Also congratz on soon joining the PC mater race (sorry also had to be done :p )

What ever you do don't get a hybrid i have heard from countless people that they are not reliable. And honestly i would only go with an ssd if it would be on sale, otherwise i do not think it warrants the money that they are currently at.
Myself i upgraded to a 2tb drive about a month ago and am very happy so far and i got it on sale :)

PS stick to PS4 granted yes it does use older tech but is still very good, way better then xbot 1 and we have better exclusives then even PC :P
And no i will not debate, lol

I have a SSHDD for my PS4 and have had zero issues with loading from XIV and other PS4 games.

I have a SSHD in my PS4 and it improved the boot and loading times, I'm planing on getting a SSD but for now my 1TB SSHD work fine

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Originally Posted by vigioX-Sun

The ps4 hard disk from factory has a speed of 5400rpm vs a SSD w is about 57000rpm

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SSD's don't have a RPM speed as they don't have a spinning disc like regular hard drives. To answer the OP's question, you will see much, much quicker load times if you upgrade to an SSD. Have you ever tried to teleport into a zone when there is an S rank hunt up? It takes about 20-30 seconds with a standard HDD. With an SSD it will take about 5 seconds or less.

only issue with SSD's even still that makes me steer clear of them is simply this. they have a tendancy to just start to die without little to no warnings and if you don't have software to tell you it has started one day you could end up with an unusable system. if this risk sounds ok to you I suggest you do a lot of research and find the drive that is the most reliable of the bunch.

SSHD's are becoming more the norm but you want to research those too. the wrong drive might not even work in your PS4. ofcourse this is the same with regular mechanical hard drives as well.

TL ; DR>>research research research

you might also note depending on the location of the drive and how you keep your PS4 a 7200rpm hdd will improve performance even if only by a little

I put a 2TB hard drive in my PS4 and called it a day. A SSD is not that much faster and if you want to pay more for less storage by all means buy a SSD.

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Originally Posted by Wildsprite

only issue with SSD's even still that makes me steer clear of them is simply this. they have a tendancy to just start to die without little to no warnings and if you don't have software to tell you it has started one day you could end up with an unusable system. if this risk sounds ok to you I suggest you do a lot of research and find the drive that is the most reliable of the bunch.

SSHD's are becoming more the norm but you want to research those too. the wrong drive might not even work in your PS4. ofcourse this is the same with regular mechanical hard drives as well.

TL ; DR>>research research research

you might also note depending on the location of the drive and how you keep your PS4 a 7200rpm hdd will improve performance even if only by a little

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By the next generation SSDs will be fine, there are new memory technologies that perform better and don't have the aging issue that the memory currently used in SSDs does.

AFAIK the HDD in a PS4 is a standard 2.5 inch SATA device such as the laptop drives. I believe that the only physical restriction is that the drive can't be one of the 'fat' drives that are thicker to accommodate an additional platter like some of the really big 2.5 inch HDDs do.

Specifically the 2.5 inch SATA drive must be no thicker than 9.5mm. Sony's official page contains a disclaimer that not all drives operate and you should check their list of supported drives. IIRC this is down to limitations of the FAT32 standard format, and the ways that different manufacturers overcome it in their drive BIOS and formatting, resulting in some drives not acting the way systems expect. So either the system firmware has to be modified to accommodate, or the drive does, or you get a different drive. So it is wise to check the reviews to ensure that the drive you select works.

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Originally Posted by Blissa

I put a 2TB hard drive in my PS4 and called it a day. A SSD is not that much faster and if you want to pay more for less storage by all means buy a SSD.

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When buying an HDD pay attention to the on-board cache the drive itself has, the larger the cache the better. A 5400rpm drive with a 64MB cache (WD used to make one) works great, as fast as most 7200rpm drives. If you have a choice of 7200rpm drives and one has a larger cache than the other, it's worth a few extra $ to get the larger cache.

I actually had purchased what is considered an external hd as it was in a case, however once removed from the case it fit perfectly in my PS4. Now i have the original hd that i could use for other stuff :)
I sort of wanted to laugh when the Best Buy guy said "you realize" you need an adaptor", i did not say anything but that statement was false, lol

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Originally Posted by Kosmos992k

By the next generation SSDs will be fine, there are new memory technologies that perform better and don't have the aging issue that the memory currently used in SSDs does.

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if that proves to be true the only thing holding me back at that point will be price.

Whats more important to you, speed or storage? If your building a PC later down the line I'd say save your money and get an SSD for the OS, I would recommend SanDisk or Crucial (just not a Kingston brand.)

However, if you play a lot more games I would just recommend getting a 1 or 2 TB HDD or just sticking to the one you have now since an SSD with a lot of storage isn't really that cheap yet.

From prices I randomly chose from Amazon you can see how much more you get for a 2 TB HDD at the same price than an SSD with less storage.
SSD 250GB = $96.18
SSD 2TB = $716.45
HDD 2TB = $95.88

Anyway, for something that you game on frequently and you play more than just FFXIV, I would recommend getting on HDD thats capable of 7200 RPM for faster loading times. If you just play this game and maybe a couple of others/ don't mind reinstalling some games then I would recommend an SSD.

Personally, I game on a PC I have 1 SSD for the OS, and two HDD's for my games and other storage, I played on both the SSD and HDD and didn't notice much of a difference. The only biggest advantage I think an SSD has is booting the OS and other applications at high speeds, but for gaming I recommend an HDD for the storage.

I have a 2TB SSHD and it is noticeably faster with load times as well as recovery from being in rest mode. Its about a 2-3s difference from the stock harddrive they give you. I paid 140$ for mine but that was at the time the PS4 was launched. They are probably much cheaper by now.

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Originally Posted by Wildsprite

if that proves to be true the only thing holding me back at that point will be price.

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Indeed.

Actually, in long term testing, the current non volatile memory used in SSDs is not as prone as expected to failure due to the number of read & write cycles as they were once thought to be. Also, 'good' SSDs have sophisticated algorithms to manage the reads and writes to reduce the aging of the memory cells in the drive itself, prolonging life and making things a whole lot more reliable over time. That said, unless you are a heavy user it's normally not a problem with a good SSD.

Saw this post and wondered why I had never though about upgrading my PS3 HDD before..? I've been doing a little bit of research today and came across this video showing loading time differences between standard PS4 hdd and an SSHD.

If you arr getting a PC anyway, I'd spend the cash there and just live with the PS4 one for now, unless it i some time away until it will be finished.

I play on PS4 all the time and am not really a PC gamer, probably because I don't have a PC lol :). I am now seriously considering this purely based on load times (I love my hunts!)

I got a 1TB SSHD when I bought the PS4 works like a charm, helps with the load times and at the same time allows me to have a large collection of games around.

I haven't really used my ps4 since it came out but i did buy a SSHD for it.

http://www.ign.com/wikis/playstation...est_Comparison

The Seagate 1TB SSHD is quite common and cheap to boot.

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Originally Posted by vigioX-Sun

The ps4 hard disk from factory has a speed of 5400rpm vs a SSD w is about 57000rpm

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SSD's have no moving parts, so there are no RPMs.

Anyway. I bought a 500GB Samsung EVO SSD for my PS4. It's VERY easy to swap the disk drive out in the system. Sony's got simple directions on how to back up your stuff beforehand. As far as the performance boost, the load times between zones is noticeably shorter. Even compared to my desktop, which is a beast (and is also equipped with an SSD). so yeah, if you can afford it I highly recommend getting a SSD.

How are you having trouble loading? I have never been the last person into a dungeon and I am always waiting on one or two people...

If you have the money and it doesn't hurt you to get it, I would say get it. I have a Samsung PRO 850 in my system, and I'm usually the first in a dungeon, S ranks load all the players and the boss quickly from the draw distance, and when someone goes somewhere for a tele, and I use their tele, I can beat them on the other side, if not arrive at the same time.

To me it seems to make the game a lot smoother, not to mention I even enjoyed faster load times on Bloodborne, which I heard many people complain that the load screen was to long. Was ok and quick to me.

in my opinion, an SSD is totally worth it. i tried upgrading to an HDD with higher cache... the gain was nominal. i have tried an SSHD... again, the gain was very nominal. i put an SSD in the PS4 and FFXIV was loading super fast. warp times went from like 30~45seconds all the way down to like 10~12seconds. i would consider this a huge gain.

there are other areas of improvement besides load times. but they don't seem to as pronounced on the PS4 as they were on the PS3. probably due to better hardware.

i don't think this was mentioned, but you need to have at least a 240GB drive for the PS4 to utilize it. also, when shopping for an SSD... you don't need to get the best one on the shelf. the PS4 isn't able to utilize the full potential of an SSD, but it can utilize enough to make a significant difference.

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Originally Posted by BLaCKnBLu3B3RRY

in my opinion, an SSD is totally worth it. i tried upgrading to an HDD with higher cache... the gain was nominal.

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Interesting, I put a 500GB 5400rm drive with a 64MB cache in my PS3 and it was quite successful, not as good as an SSD by any means, but on par with 7200 rpm drives. PS4 uses more up to date SATA than PS3 did, perhaps that, and a greater ability to cache HDD in main memory, offset the performance increase from the larger drive cahe.

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Originally Posted by Maero

What ever you do don't get a hybrid i have heard from countless people that they are not reliable. And honestly i would only go with an ssd if it would be on sale, otherwise i do not think it warrants the money that they are currently at.
Myself i upgraded to a 2tb drive about a month ago and am very happy so far and i got it on sale :)

PS stick to PS4 granted yes it does use older tech but is still very good, way better then xbot 1 and we have better exclusives then even PC :P
And no i will not debate, lol

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Better exclusives is relative.

I only play RPGs, and very very rarely do I play JRPGs.

Most of the best ones are available on PC. And I hate controllers. *especially* Xbox controllers. Blech.

Thank you all so very much for your helpful information. Looks like I'm going to be looking into getting a SSD! The video that Viuiji posted kinda made up my mind. I did laugh when I saw all the people in Revnant's Toll. Oh the days of pre-3.0. I remember selecting to teleport to Mor Dhona and then my DF popped and loosing the que because it took that long to zone in.

Bought a Samsung EVO 850 500GB SSD a couple of months before Heavensward hit and the loading times for all of my games, including this one are ultra fast. I absolutely love it and was so glad I made the decision to do it. For XIV especially if you find yourself teleporting a lot, which to get around in this game you'll find yourself doing often, it allows you to get things done so much quicker.

On average, loading into a zone on the HDD probably took 15-20 seconds on average with some taking 30 secs or so in a crowded area. With the SSD, it has been reduced to 5 or 10 seconds and maybe 15 seconds in crowded area but rarely does it ever take more than 10 secs... it's mostly 5 seconds max and you're in.

I'm certain someone much smarter than I am could determine, on average, how many times the active player teleports in a day/week/month etc. and just how much more playtime you actually get versus waiting to load in.

TLDR: The SSD is worth every penny.