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Installing Steam games on additional SSD

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  • Armoured_Bear 26 Dec 2012 20:51:46 4,102 posts
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    I've ordered a second SSD to cope with my Steam Library so I'll have 2x256GB.
    What's the best way of handling this, spanning using W7 to create one volume?
    RAID?
    Any other suggestions?
  • Whizzo 26 Dec 2012 20:56:47 41,155 posts
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    Steam allows you to install on different drives in another SteamLibrary folder now so you don't have to do anything too clever.

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  • superdelphinus 26 Dec 2012 21:05:27 6,177 posts
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    On some games.....
  • dsmx 26 Dec 2012 21:08:39 6,867 posts
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    So long as the game supports it, not all games support installing on different hard drives at the moment.

    "If we hit that bullseye the rest of the dominoes will fall like a a house of cards, checkmate." Zapp Brannigan

  • superdelphinus 26 Dec 2012 21:10:26 6,177 posts
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    And very annoying it is
  • Whizzo 26 Dec 2012 21:13:39 41,155 posts
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    Hmm doesn't seem to be an issue with too many of the games I checked on, nearly everything in my library would allow it.

    Anyhow if it doesn't I'd use Steammover rather than RAIDing drives or anything.

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  • MrTomFTW Moderator 26 Dec 2012 21:16:22 31,315 posts
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    I use this:

    http://www.stefanjones.ca/steam/

    Follow me on Twitter: @MrTom
    Voted by the community "Best mod" 2011 and 2012.

  • THFourteen 26 Dec 2012 21:18:58 29,070 posts
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    theres a tool that lets you drop symbolic links

    so you copy folders to another drive and then just have a link on the existing drive that points to it

    easy as
  • THFourteen 26 Dec 2012 21:19:32 29,070 posts
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    http://schinagl.priv.at/nt/hardlinkshellext/hardlinkshellext.html
  • superdelphinus 26 Dec 2012 21:21:32 6,177 posts
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    @Whizzo yeah to be fair, I think most of mine have supported it
  • JoeBlade 27 Dec 2012 16:00:24 2,216 posts
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    @Armoured_Bear I'm not sure what you'd want to use RAID for as it basically serves either or both of two purposes: increasing performance or having redundancy in case a HDD fails.
    The latter seems a bit pointless if your Steam library is the primary purpose, that in itself is its own backup.

    The former is useful and there are no real downsides if your hardware supports it. Be aware though that striping - the technique used to improve performance - typically means you'll lose all your data if one drive fails in a two-drive RAID setup.
    But again: if it's for a Steam library that's less of a consideration, esp. now that cloud saving is supported by many games.

    Alternatively I'd indeed just create one big volume if you're starting afresh.
    With more than one partition/drive I've always run into the practical situation where I really wished I had more space on one partition while there was still plenty of room on another.
    With tools like PartitionMagic you may be able to remedy that but there's no guarantee; I find it easier to not use partitions anymore if at all possible.
  • JoeBlade 27 Dec 2012 16:09:07 2,216 posts
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    @Armoured_Bear Addendum since I missed the word "additional" in the thread title: creating a striped RAID with a drive that has data on it already is not possible to my knowledge, or rather said data will be lost.

    You can obviously copy your data files somewhere else and copy them back after the procedure but programs and the OS will need to be reinstalled.

    Extending an existing partition across an additional drive is possible but I don't remember whether you'll need extra tools or whether W7 can do it for you.
  • THFourteen 27 Dec 2012 16:13:51 29,070 posts
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    jesus just use the symbolic link dropper i linked to, its a piece of piss to understand.
  • mattgonzales 28 Dec 2012 01:16:56 1 posts
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    @MrTomFTW I use one similar to this called Steam Mover. Works great, too.
  • Armoured_Bear 28 Dec 2012 06:10:08 4,102 posts
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    MrTomFTW wrote:
    I use this:

    http://www.stefanjones.ca/steam/
    Thanks, that looks ideal.
    I can just bung the drive in, format and shift loads of stuff over. Easy peasy.
  • urban 16 Mar 2013 14:17:26 10,410 posts
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    Figured I'd update this...

    Simple to do and it's built-in

    Tadah!
  • Rusty_M 16 Mar 2013 15:28:48 3,633 posts
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    Only on some games though I think

    The world is going mad. Me? I'm doing fine.

  • Dirtbox 16 Mar 2013 17:03:49 73,745 posts
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    Buy more SSDs and put all your games on them, it'll make loads of difference, seriously. Loads.

    Edited by Dirtbox at 17:04:00 16-03-2013

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  • DFawkes 16 Mar 2013 17:07:58 19,309 posts
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    See, when you say seriously I'm never sure if you actually mean seriously or you're being sarcastic, despite specifying your seriousness level. I've been burned by one of your "seriously" posts before. Are you being super-duper extra serious right now?

    Kirby is the man! Even if he wasn't, he'd just ingest and become one.

  • Frogofdoom 16 Mar 2013 17:18:13 132 posts
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    ssd's arent worth it for games so he is taking the piss :)
  • warlockuk 16 Mar 2013 17:24:45 18,618 posts
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    urban wrote:
    Figured I'd update this...

    Simple to do and it's built-in

    Tadah!
    Yeah, it's been there for a while

    I'm a grumpy bastard.

  • Dirtbox 16 Mar 2013 17:25:37 73,745 posts
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    Yeah, it's the biggest load of bollocks and a plain waste of money to put all but a few games that have a lot of loading onto an ssd.

    I forget who it was, but they were saying it increases loading time by 10 - 12 seconds in some cases, but I haven't known of a single game in the last 10 years that takes anything like that to load up.

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  • Sharzam 16 Mar 2013 17:34:21 1,329 posts
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    Only games i put on SSD are MMOs and some specific games. For example Rage benefits quite alot and reduces the annoying texture pop a bit.

    I put MMOs on SSD as they tend to benefit alot due to loading in alot of data in the open world and reduces pop in of NPCs and the like. Not to mention helps with load times when entering dungeons and the like. I guess other open world games would benefit but alot of them are not taxing enourgh to care about.

    Edited by Sharzam at 17:35:25 16-03-2013

    Known as 'Sharzam' in 98.5% of games

  • Dirtbox 16 Mar 2013 17:35:55 73,745 posts
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    Many MMOs are limited by server speed and bandwidth more than hardware related loading times.

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  • Sharzam 16 Mar 2013 17:43:25 1,329 posts
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    Of course this is a factor.

    However with everything else being ok then the SSD makes a difference. Also i guess although very minor you tend to play MMOs for large amounts of time, dont normally log on just for an hour so the reduced energy and noise is a good thing.

    But that is such a minor point. I would never consider installing MMOs to SSD if pushed for space or buying a SSD just for an MMO but in my case i have the space avalible for a few games on SSD so i may as well.

    Known as 'Sharzam' in 98.5% of games

  • Dirtbox 16 Mar 2013 18:41:09 73,745 posts
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    Just how big id the WoW install these days anyway? Last time I had a go at it, it was over 40gb.

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  • Frogofdoom 16 Mar 2013 18:47:48 132 posts
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    26.4 gb but i dont have the latest patch
  • Dirtbox 16 Mar 2013 18:53:40 73,745 posts
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    They probably did away with keeping a backup of the patches in the install directory then. Insane space eater.

    Edited by Dirtbox at 18:53:52 16-03-2013

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  • Fake_Blood 16 Mar 2013 18:56:49 2,993 posts
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    I'd wait for vizzini to post and then do the exact opposite of whatever he said.
  • Dirtbox 16 Mar 2013 18:59:56 73,745 posts
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    If you had any understanding whatsoever of quantum entanglement and string theory you'd know that ObiWan predicted that.

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