Running SC4 off an SD card. Any quicker than a conventional Hard Drive?

[Lazarou Monkey Terror 1,838]

Hello all, loading times on my 7gb plugin folder can be a pain after a while. Sometimes the landmarks menu can take a few minutes to load even though I'm running a 8gb ram quad core (although only using one core for SC4 for stability) laptop.

 

 I've heard ssd drive make this so much quicker but that isn't an option right now, would a good SD card do just as well?

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

If you want to use a thumb drive, remember that they can't stand the write traffic that an SSD can, so what you put on there should be read-mostly.  Put your plugins on there, and create a shortcut in your regular structure to them.  The name of the shortcut must be Plugins.  Be sure you also have an HDD backup for that.

 

Now, the in-game disk activity except for saves should be on the thumb drive at essentially core speeds.

[Lazarou Monkey Terror 1,838]

Thank you Mr Moose!

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

How did it work?

[PBGV103 729]

USB 2.0 caps out at 60MB/s which is slower than any 7200rpm HDD. You would need to use USB 3.0 to see any benefit, and like Nonny said, if you save a lot you will likely wear out the car within 6 months to a year.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

USB 2.0 caps out at 60MB/s which is slower than any 7200rpm HDD. You would need to use USB 3.0 to see any benefit, and like Nonny said, if you save a lot you will likely wear out the car within 6 months to a year.

The speed argument is cogent provided the subject file is a single extent on the disk.  If it has several extents, you'd have to actually bench it to see.  The multiple extent problem is easily avoided.

[APSMS 1,893]

A number of SD cards have read speeds that may measure around 60 mb/s, but the vast majority of inexpensive ones read at between 10 and 30 mb/s, which is very slow. The speed of the lapto's core processor may also be a bottleneck, though this is less likely with newer intel CPUs (they have other SC4 related problems, but this isn't one of them).

 

Generally if you can avoid going through the FSB (front side bus) that most peripherals are routed through then you will do okay. An SSD even on SATA II (3 Gbps) is orders of magnitude faster than an SD card, which is already slower than on a spinning platter hard disk. A SATA III (6Gbps) is even faster, and you can find some cheap 60 GB ones for as much money as a "high-speed" SD card that may approach half-SSD speeds under completely ideal conditions (usually hard to come by). SATA, on the other hand, is standardized.

 

If you have SC4 as a digital copy and can replace your CD drive with a HDD bay, I'd recommend it. I have the HDD caddy for my laptop (cost around $15-20) but lack the funds and justification for the SSD. It's still a plan, though, and will last much longer than an SD card, and have a much lower chance of misplacement. (Imagine forgetting where you stowed your plugins!)

[Lazarou Monkey Terror 1,838]

Hello all. Creating a shortcut to the plugins files on the SD card didn't work sadly. Should I put all relevant SC4 files on the disc and run it off that?

[Cyclone Boom 17,031]

Hello all. Creating a shortcut to the plugins files on the SD card didn't work sadly. Should I put all relevant SC4 files on the disc and run it off that?

 

An alternative way to set a new location for your user files (regions, plugins, screenshots, etc.) is by using the -UserDir shortcut parameter.

 

To achieve this, copy or move your entire SimCity 4 folder (in Documents) to the new desired location on the SD card.

Then in your game's desktop shortcut, right click >> Properties and enter the following command in the "Target" box, adding a space after the game's path:

 

-UserDir:"x:\<path>\"  (Change x to your drive letter, and <path> to the location of your SimCity 4 folder).

 

For example:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Maxis\SimCity 4 Deluxe\Apps\SimCity 4.exe" -UserDir:"G:\Games\SimCity 4\"

 

A quick way to find the path of the new location is to hold down SHIFT, right click the folder, and select Copy as path.