It remains a solid choice to keep an SSD as the boot drive while using an HDD for regular storage.
It remains a solid choice to keep an SSD as the boot drive while using an HDD for regular storage.
The main advantage of HDDs lies in larger storage sizes and durability. You can access drives with capacities reaching 8TB or more, whereas SSDs generally cap around 2TB. SSDs require consistent power to maintain data over time, while HDDs can be safely stored away for years without losing information. If your storage needs are under 2TB and you don’t need long-term cold storage, SSD offers better performance and value despite its higher price per gigabyte. Edit: 4TB SSDs exist but tend to be slower QLC models and often very costly.
Over the years, I've noticed game performance on solid-state drives isn't keeping up with newer titles. Older games usually handle better, while fresh releases often experience lag and stutter when loaded from a hard drive. For my new games, I'm switching to SSDs. Media and large storage are fine with the old drive, but I still use it for some older games.