Hybrid Hard Drives And Whether They Are Worth The Additional Cost

Games are swallowing up storage space like nobody’s business at the moment, with titles such as The Elder Scrolls Online and Titanfall tipping the scales at 60GB plus. With that in mind Solid State Drive (SSD) space is more precious than ever. Despite rapidly falling costs, a 1TB SSD still costs around $500, nearly 10x more than a $55 internal hard drive…



Without scouting out the deals, SSDs can still be expensive business. For many, a substantial SSD is off limits for now, despite the high-speed access and vast performance gains available. We thought it best then to investigate hybrid hard drives, which marry traits from both SSD and HDD components, to see what they offer and whether they’re worthwhile.

The thinking behind a hybrid hard drive is that it combines the high-speed we’ve come to expect from an SSD with the larger capacity and lower price point seen in a traditional hard drive.

What a hybrid HD essentially is is a standard hard drive with a discrete additional SSD capable of housing the OS and the most frequently used data. Most files will be stored on the conventional and more spacious hard drive, while Windows etc will benefit from lightning quick access times of an SSD.

One thing worth bearing in mind for organisational enthusiasts - the hybrid drive is a single unit, both physically and technically when viewed by the PC. A 1TB hybrid hard drive with 10GB SSD will appear as a single 1TB hard drive, with complex algorithms deciding what content is best suited to the limited SSD space.

The caching algorithms take a bit of time to sort itself out as your system calculates what your most frequently used files and programs are, meaning that there will be no performance increase at first. The speed of the hard drive will increase over time as the most accessed files ingratiate themselves into the SSD.

What this means for you, the gamer, is perhaps negligible. Using a hybrid hard drive will mean noticeably faster boot times, as well as faster in-game loading if SSD portion is large enough to house games. It’s worth bearing in mind though that it will pale in comparison to a dedicated SSD, with which you can expect to see ~25% boosts in overall system level performance, compared to ~10-15% with a hybrid drive.

If you’ve got the money to spare then a dedicated SSD is undoubtedly the way to go, particularly when combined with a seperate spacious HDD to hide the legions of files taking up on valuable space on your rig. For those on a tighter budget though, who aren’t particularly bothered by the performance gains seen with a dedicated SSD, then a hybrid hard drive is a great choice above and beyond a traditional HDD.

So what do you think is the best choice for a gamer on a budget?Do you think SSD above all else, are the performance gains too great to ignore?Let me know on the discussion area below