Why replacing the hard drive of the PS4 Pro with an SSD is a winning bet

You have no plans to fall for la PlayStation 5 at its launch because your PS4 Pro will still be valiant for a while? Good. And why not improve it, by replacing the hard drive with an SSD of the same capacity, or higher? It will cost you as much as a new game or two and, I promise, you’ll win on the exchange. This is in any case what the latest tests of the British site show Digital Foundry, well versed in technical and technological mysteries.

To put it simply, at the end of their tests, our colleagues from across the Channel have shown that loading times in games are really shorter, that we gain in display fluidity and … even in graphic quality. And all this on a current generation console. What justifies that this type of storage, on the next gen, will clearly bring big changes.

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The Foundry has selected the most impressive SSD of the moment. But many other models could also do the trick, much less expensive. The goal is not to ruin you but to make the gaming experience more enjoyable.

An SSD perfectly suited to the operation of consoles

A guinea pig worthy of the name was needed to clearly show the test results. This is WHICH 870 en le Samsung To 8, sold the trifle of about 1050 euros, that used Digital Foundry. Yes it is a monster as we described in the article above.

Obviously, the QVO series is available in several capacities: the 1 and 2 TB models are offered at 140 and 299 euros respectively. And it’s not uncommon for the two to do the object of promotions and good plans.

The particularity of the QVO series is that it uses QLC (Quad Level Cell) type SSD modules which can store up to four data bits per cell, which is more than significant. However, QLC SSDs have a downside: the lifespan of their modules. They deteriorate faster with use. However, as recalled Digital Foundry, this is only true if there is a heavy and incessant write and rewrite work on the SSD modules, such as on a computer or a server. In the case of the PS4 Pro, and consoles in general, this is not the case.

The operating system of the PS4 Pro does not need “Constantly change your place of business”, or even the games that are installed. Once everyone has put their things in a corner, they hardly move. And then, let’s be realistic, before you manage to exhaust a QLC SSD, you will undoubtedly have bought a PS5!

The SSD, a real makeover for the PS4 Pro

Are you comfortable with the language of Shakespeare? We can only encourage you to read the full article of our colleagues because we will only make a big summary here.

In order to get a good idea of ​​the contribution of the SSD in the console or as external storage for games, Digital Foundry carried out three loading measurements:

• one with the on-board hard disk as a standard meter,
• one with the SSD externally connected to USB,
• one with the SSD connected in SATA 3 to the console motherboard.

The site has also selected a large panel of games: from Battlefield 5 at Witcher 3 Passing by Gran Tourismo, Final Fantasy VII Remake or Fallout 4. Each time the titles have been tested in different situations, with game saves leading to places more or less loaded with 3D textures and other graphic effects in order to have an exhaustive panel of results.

In the vast majority of cases, loading times are reduced by 25 to 50% when the internal hard drive is replaced directly with an SSD. A little less if you use the SSD externally, but the gains are still appreciable.

For example, in The Witcher 3, the console puts 91 seconds to load a backup in a very dense urban environment with the hard disk, 67 seconds with the SSD externally and 62 seconds with the SSD internally.
In Day’s Gone, it’s quite spectacular: the first mission of the campaign takes care of 87 seconds with the disc, in 50 seconds with the SSD placed externally and … 47 seconds with the SSD internally.

SSD is also good for display

Improved load times are good but what about the graphics? It’s also much better especially in open-world games or where there are a lot of scenery elements that are generated on the fly. Why ? Quite simply because the bottleneck of an SSD is much less than that of a conventional hard drive. Fact, the APU processor of the PlayStation 4 Pro, RAM and console storage converse with each other faster.

Information relating to 3D textures, light effects and graphic elements navigate faster within the platform. All these small people can therefore be processed faster, which – on the one hand – limits the effects of slowing down the display of sets at times. On the other hand, some graphics engines even seem to take advantage of the SSD to improve and refine the textures they have to calculate and then generate through the GPU.

Again, we refer you to the article of Digital Foundry where you will find some comparisons in the form of Full HD screenshots. Here is one that shows results visible at first glance.

As you can see, between the left and right image, the house wall is much more detailed when the Samsung SSD is in the console. Likewise, some more distant elements are better defined and the shadows are less jagged.

What about non-gaming performance?

The console interface and menu navigation are a bit more responsive. As for the so-called cold start (which does not result from waking up from standby), it is also a few seconds faster. The same is true when launching several games in succession, without turning off the console between two sessions.
Our English colleagues point out, however, that many interface elements of the PS4 / PS4 Pro are dependent on the speed and quality of your Internet connection. So switching from a hard drive to an SSD and hoping that the social details of the games show up faster in the main interface is not a good math if your connection is not good.

Read also – PlayStation 5: to avoid any shortage at launch, Sony would produce at full speed

Put in perspective with Sony’s announcements regarding the SSD but also the platform of the future PS5, the results obtained during the above tests have enough to leave us dreaming about the likely performance of the next gen console from Sony. During Mark Cerny’s highly technical presentation last March, the creator of the PS5’s system architecture seemed very confident about the multiple benefits the SSD would bring to both game makers and gamers. We therefore look forward to seeing all of this at work.

Source : Eurogamer/DF

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