When people talk about the best components of their gaming computers, I’ve always heard them discussing the motherboards, the processors, the RAM, and the Monitor as well. However, many of them forget to mention one important piece – hard drive. No matter how fast processor you have or how large is your display, your overall gaming experience may be spoiled if you don’t have enough storage available to install your game on your computing.
But the problem here is that finding the best HDDs for your gaming PC isn’t an easy task. You are bombarded with a wide range of options available online, especially each of them claiming to be the best. When looking for a hard drive that is suitable for both fast-paced gaming and traditional storage requirements, it is very essential to pay great attention to its features like cache and storage capacity.
As experts in the technical world with loads of knowledge about the computers and other digital products, we’ve spent hundreds of hours on researching and testing HDDs to find the best options for any use and budget. This list will for sure help you reach your final decision of buying the best HDD for your gaming PC, but before you start your journey of buying an HDD, it’s good to know what you must know about the HDD.
How to Choose the Best Hard Drive for Gaming?
While looking for the best HDD for your gaming machine, there are many factors and things that must be kept in mind. Think about what you need, your budget, your expectations and how often you are going to use it, etc. The answers to these queries will help you a lot in reaching the final choice as it gives you a close idea of what you are really looking for and which of the following characteristics of a hard drive you shall pay attention to.
- Storage Capacity
In a layman’s language, an HDD is a storage device where you can store all your required files, data, etc. It also stores all the details about the installed software on your gaming PC. So, this makes sense that the storage capacity of the HDD must be kept in mind while you search for the best HDDs. In fact, it should be at the top of your list. And it’s always good to go with the best possible option because no matter how large your storage space is, eventually it will be full.
- Speed
Many people don’t know about this but the price of HDDs differ because of their data transfer speed capacity. This is why you see such huge difference on two HDDs that are of the same capacity. If you don’t want to spend half of your day waiting for a data to transfer, it is good to go with the HDDs that offer better and faster speed for data transfer.It’s important to know that the HDDs with higher data transfer speed are more expensive, but every cent will pay off.
- Cache
It used to be a very big issue in the past, but the time has changed now. However, now the users need not to be worried as the technology has changed a lot and almost every HDD comes with better Cache capacity.
- Connectivity
In current days, most of the HDDs available offer SATA connectivity. These days, SATA3 has become a standard connectivity method, but you might also bump on slower SATA2 drives. If you can, always go for a faster SATA3 option.
Here is our list of the Best Hard Drives for Gaming To Buy
If you have been customizing gaming desktops for long, you must be familiar of one of the top HDD manufacturing brand – Western Digital. The brand has been offering premium quality external hard drives so you can expect superior products from them.
Its WD Black series is one such example and it’s highly recommended to upgrade your existing HDD from the WD Black. It comes in various capacities starting from 250GB to 6TB. But I’ll suggest using WD Black 1TB. Why? Because you’re going to use your PC for the professional, hardcore gaming experience. And the best part about this is that it excels in performance levels.
This HDD is equipped with a dual-core processor and offers great loading speed with read/write speed of almost 200mbps. Additionally, WD Black also features 32MB of cache which is also crucial in boosting the load and access time.
Apart from being faster and affordable this HDD also comes with the additional benefit of being secure. This comes with various protection mechanisms like No Touch Ramp Load technology and Corruption Protection Technology. The silica gel available on top of the plastic wrapper in your HDD ensures ensure better protection against moisture.
This is another one of our best recommendations for gaming HDDs in 2019 as it is specifically designed for professional gamers. So, all of its features are meant to improve your gaming experience. This is the reason you will get only two versions of this HDD – 1TB and 2TB.
After all, the professional gamers need more space to store their data and to install their games that come in GBs. The FireCuda 3.5″ SSHD is a bigger desktop version of the Seagate FireCuda 2.5“. It features 7200RPM, 64MB of cache and a SATA 6Gb/s connection.
If you are looking for something different, then this is the right pick as it’s the perfect fusion between an SSD and an HDD. FireCuda utilizes adaptive learning technology, which can easily memorize the frequently accessed games and save them in the flash memory.
Its larger size allows this hard disc to produce high performance than the 2.5” FireCuda. Other commendable features available on this HDD include the Instant Secure Erase to safely and easily delete content from the hard drive.
If you are looking for the best HDD in your budget for your gaming machine, then a look at the WD Caviar Blue is a must as this is a compact yet faster competitor to the others available on this list. Of course, I mentioned that the HDDs shall be of larger size for better performance, but that does not automatically rule out the smaller drives.
And this is an even better option when you are on a tight budget or if your game library is not insanely big. For such instances, WD Caviar Blue is one of the best budget hard drives you can buy for gaming. This may be a small HDD, but it’s certainly not any less than the others in its competition. With a rotation speed of 7200RPM and a cache size of 8MB, WD Caviar Blue is able to provide a decent load and access time. However, its small size is, of course, going to reduce the number and size of the games you play. But if we think about its overall ranking, then it’s a great choice as it’s affordable and it’s smaller than the others available online.
On top of getting a 1-year warranty, you also have the option to return the product for a full refund.
We all know Toshiba as one of the most recommended and leading brands on the global market for electronics goods. Here it comes again as a leading name with its Toshiba P300 HDD, specially designed for the gaming lovers. The Toshiba P300 features 64 MB cache size and 7200RPM, which means that you will definitely notice faster load time. Additionally, it also offers 2TB of storage space so loading and storing your games on your PC won’t be an issue ever.
Toshiba has done a great job by integrating a caching technology in the HDD that efficiently allocates the cache space during read and write cycles. This all results in better and faster access to your games. With the P300, Toshiba has also taken the necessary measures to protect your data which makes it the right choice for your Gaming PC. It also comes with No-Touch Ramp-load technology, which helps reduce the wearing down of the recording head. It comes with multiple sizes ranging from 500GB-3TB and comes with a 2-year manufacturer Warranty.
With the very first look of WD10S21X, you are sure to fall in love with this beautiful HDD that is specifically designed for the gaming lovers. This comes with a -State Hybrid design that has been pushed just a little bit further it is Western Digital model. It does not just have small footprints, but also it gives all the benefits of an SSHD. Whether you have a gaming desktop or a laptop that you love gaming for, this slim HDD will fit all of your gadgets.
When talking about its performance, the manufacturer has done a really good job as this tiny device will net you speeds up to five times faster than a traditional HDD. Imagine booting up in seconds rather than minutes. This is what the WD10S21X will turn reality to you. Everything is fast with this slim HDD whether it’s loading up photos without waiting forever, editing video, etc. It comes with super impressive 1TB storage capacity, 16MB Cache plus an 8GB NAND Flash Memory Buffer and 2-year warranty.
WD Blue 1TB PC Hard Drive is another great development by the Western Digital company. This is a classic model by the company, offering top of the line HDD specs like 7,200rpm, as big a cache as you need, etc.
The company offers several versions of the HDD, ranging from 500GB to even 6TB and the Intelliseek technology helps it from being a super loud HDD.
When talking about the safety, then you can be sure about buying this one as it comes with a No Touch Ramp Load Technology, which means your HDD works for longer and doesn’t get damaged with minor bumps and hits. Additionally, this HDD comes with many other benefits like 64MB cache, 2-year limited warranty, several sizes (500GB, 1TB, 2TB, 3TB, 4TB, 6TB) and more, making it the right choice for next-gen gaming lovers.
And you get a complete 2-year warranty that is a great reason to grab this tiny device.
Seagate BarraCuda is another addition to our list of the top HDDs for gaming PCs from the house of Seagate. The brand, much like Western Digital is renowned for manufacturing some of the most well-known 7200rpm, 64MB cache, traditional HDDs. But, there is something special about BarraCuda, its features. If you are not like a normal gamer, then this is going to be the right pick for you as it comes with whopping 12TB capacity to store almost everything and anything you want.
Practically speaking, you will probably never fill a 12TB hard drive, even with loads of gaming. To ensure the safety of your data and the investments, the manufacturer offers a 3-year warranty which is pretty generous for a traditional HDD.
In addition to this, BarraCuda comes with many other features like7,200rpm, 64MBcache, SATA 6Gbps, 3.5-inch size, instant secure Erase technology and it’s available in various sizes ranging from 1TB to 12TB.
Final Words
While you are hunting for the best HDD for your gaming machine, it’s important to understand what you need and what you expect from the HDD. Make sure to consider the above mentioned points to identify the best suitable option for your needs so you are able to locate what suits you the best.
We’ve mentioned the top models available on the market, depending upon their features and their pricing factors. Check their features closely before you make your final decision about buying one.