Originally Posted by monkeyz Yes I did, and refer to these two threads for why there was such a large update. http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/...l-preparation& http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/...tion-Articles& IF I read it correctly, aside from the minor changes there is going to be a new version of war of the roses released as Kingmaker edition, a free upgrade for all those that own the game that includes new maps and Assault and Assault Gate modes. There will be a free trial of the game and in preperation of that this patch puts that in place. The edition should release at the end of March. And there will be a Brian Blessed voice over premium DLC for $4.99 sometime this month. That is all paraphrasing and off memory but if you read those you will get more detailed information. Hope that helps and I'm pretty excited the new stuff looks like it will help the longevity of the game. EDIT refer to this article. http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/gaming/n...roses-dlc.html

Awesome! Thanks for the info. Glad I bought and redeemed it before this whole Kingmaker upgrade/trial has been set in order.

Nice that they reduced pole arm thrust damage too (or maybe a lot more than just that...). I only played the game for 30 minutes or so, and too many times did I get instakilled by a pole arm thrust.

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Originally Posted by bshirk Do you think you can actually install games to it? Not sure if it'd be too slow since I've never used an external drive for gaming. My SSD is too small for games like Guild Wars 2.

NO, don't do that !

External HDDs are not reliable for the continuous access games require when playing. I've got 2x 2.0TB HDDs gone bad for that reason, one WD and one Seagate.
External HDDs are only good for backups or data that would not require heavy access. For games, internal HDDs are the best.

Originally Posted by r9800pro NO, don't do that ! External HDDs are not reliable for the continuous access games require when playing. I've got 2x 2.0TB HDDs gone bad for that reason, one WD and one Seagate. External HDDs are only good for backups or data that would not require heavy access. For games, internal HDDs are the best.

Would there honestly be a notable performance loss with an external installed game running through a 3.0 port though?

Originally Posted by Idiotekque Would there honestly be a notable performance loss with an external installed game running through a 3.0 port though?

Yeah. USB 3.0 still has a lot of overhead. http://images.techtree.com/ttimages/...fer-speeds.jpg

Originally Posted by darkling23 Yeah. USB 3.0 still has a lot of overhead. http://images.techtree.com/ttimages/...fer-speeds.jpg

But would that equate to noticeably slow loading times and performance in games? It doesn't look like it from that chart, but I'm not a whiz about this stuff.

Originally Posted by Idiotekque Would there honestly be a notable performance loss with an external installed game running through a 3.0 port though?

No, games would run fine and loading times are the same as with any internal SATA drive. The problem as I said is not performance, but external drives's life span.

Originally Posted by r9800pro No, games would run fine and loading times are the same as with any internal SATA drive. The problem as I said is not performance, but external drives's life span.

There isn't any difference between an internal and external drive of the same kind. When a local Best Buy and Frys were having a price war, then had a pricing mistake, I bought and popped open several WD green mybooks and installed them internally. They were identical to the WD-green drive I was already using for storage. All of them have been running great for just over 2 years *knock on wood.*

However, most external drives are meant to be low-use storage drives, so using them as a primary or high-use will cause them to fail faster than normal, but that's no different than using any other storage drive.

edit: I will say that external drives do not cool down well in their cheap cases, and the large heat build up will cause it to fail much faster if you're running games off of it.

Originally Posted by at8mistakes I bought and popped open several WD green mybooks and installed them internally. They were identical to the WD-green drive I was already using for storage. However, most external drives are meant to be low-use storage drives, so using them as a primary or high-use will cause them to fail faster than normal, but that's no different than using any other storage drive. edit: I will say that external drives do not cool down well in their cheap cases, and the large heat build up will cause it to fail much faster if you're running games off of it.

this
and 5400 rpm =slow ,even if usb 3 interface speed is in theory up to it
greens are for storage only, they lack perfomance
they also stop after few minutes of inactivity in order to save energy, so frequent use means more start/stop circles=higher possibility of mechanical failure
and usb, come on get serious

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjZQGRATlwA

Originally Posted by at8mistakes There isn't any difference between an internal and external drive of the same kind. When a local Best Buy and Frys were having a price war, then had a pricing mistake, I bought and popped open several WD green mybooks and installed them internally. They were identical to the WD-green drive I was already using for storage. All of them have been running great for just over 2 years *knock on wood.* However, most external drives are meant to be low-use storage drives, so using them as a primary or high-use will cause them to fail faster than normal, but that's no different than using any other storage drive. edit: I will say that external drives do not cool down well in their cheap cases, and the large heat build up will cause it to fail much faster if you're running games off of it.

Exactly.
My second external drive that died was a Seagate (RMA's it few days ago) and indeed temps were very high and it would take a long time to cool down. I never noticed this untill the drive made some long beeps (very good feature). High temps caused some bad sectors and that's why I RMA'd it.
My first external HDD was a WD and it failed without a warning.
Both drives were used for games and this was the cause of the issues.

SSDs are great for games. Blazing fast loading times and installations, but don't know how reliable they are for high usage. Also he current spaces of SSDs are way too low for the number and sizes of games we buy thanks to Tony's Amazon deals

Originally Posted by r9800pro Exactly. My second external drive that died was a Seagate (RMA's it few days ago) and indeed temps were very high and it would take a long time to cool down. I never noticed this untill the drive made some long beeps (very good feature). High temps caused some bad sectors and that's why I RMA'd it. My first external HDD was a WD and it failed without a warning. Both drives were used for games and this was the cause of the issues. SSDs are great for games. Blazing fast loading times and installations, but don't know how reliable they are for high usage. Also he current spaces of SSDs are way too low for the number and sizes of games we buy thanks to Tony's Amazon deals

If you're ever using a low-end storage drive again for gaming, pop it out of it's case and install it like a normal drive. It's not going to win you any speed-awards, but the increased air flow and cooling will help it last much longer.

SSD drives do have a write-limit, but it's not something the average user needs to worry about. By the time you hit the limit the drive will be several years old and need replacing anyway. Not all games will get a benefit from a SSD though, so I wouldn't recommend it for most games either. It's great for booting up and programs though.

Originally Posted by puffy usb, come on get serious

I use a USB 3.0 PCI-E, and it has firmware updates about once per month. I've seen a gradual increase in overall drive performance as I've upgraded the firmware and drivers over the past year.

When I first bought my external 3.0 drive, I used it for FRAPS recording, which is quite intense when you're recording low-compression 1080p video (think 1 gig or more per minute). Not only does the drive handle this with aplomb, it's virtually silent when doing so.

So, while I can't speak for all uses, I'd say USB 3.0, with the right hardware and proper updates, is definitely a viable option for *some* games. I don't use it for that purpose, but, hey, if you can run Dragon Age on NAS over a high-thoroughput network, then I don't see why USB 3.0 would be a problem.

Well, I ask because I play on a laptop. I could swap out the optical drive for a third drive, but it may be cheaper/easier/more practical to just grab an external and play some games off of it (via USB 3.0).

And some games benefit drastically from an SSD. On load times though, not framerates or anything. Bethesda games are a prime use for this. I have Fallout New Vegas and Skyrim on my SSD and the loads times are night and day.

Originally Posted by Idiotekque Well, I ask because I play on a laptop. I could swap out the optical drive for a third drive, but it may be cheaper/easier/more practical to just grab an external and play some games off of it (via USB 3.0). And some games benefit drastically from an SSD. On load times though, not framerates or anything. Bethesda games are a prime use for this. I have Fallout New Vegas and Skyrim on my SSD and the loads times are night and day.

Just do some research on the USB 3.0 performance for your specific laptop. If other people say the performance is good, then I'd imagine you could play quite a few games without issues. Oh, and just be sure you get an enclosure containing a 3.5" desktop drive, getting something higher than 5400 RPM wouldn't hurt either. If you want to use it for gaming, you probably wouldn't want a 2.5" 5400 RPM drive in a USB 3.0 enclosure.

Originally Posted by Idiotekque Well, I ask because I play on a laptop. I could swap out the optical drive for a third drive, but it may be cheaper/easier/more practical to just grab an external and play some games off of it (via USB 3.0). And some games benefit drastically from an SSD. On load times though, not framerates or anything. Bethesda games are a prime use for this. I have Fallout New Vegas and Skyrim on my SSD and the loads times are night and day.

Yes, games that load a lot (like Bethesda's) will see a huge improvement with a SSD. Games that have less loading, or are more efficient with resource handling will not see much, if any, improvement though. Whether it's worth taking out your optical drive is up to your own uses though. With my luck I would have to reformat it soon after, and it wouldn't recognize the installer from a boot drive.

Originally Posted by at8mistakes If you're ever using a low-end storage drive again for gaming, pop it out of it's case and install it like a normal drive. It's not going to win you any speed-awards, but the increased air flow and cooling will help it last much longer. SSD drives do have a write-limit, but it's not something the average user needs to worry about. By the time you hit the limit the drive will be several years old and need replacing anyway. Not all games will get a benefit from a SSD though, so I wouldn't recommend it for most games either. It's great for booting up and programs though.

I am out of SATA ports on my Rampage III Extreme mobo (old but gold lol) so I had to get external drives and install games into them. I replaced a 640GB internal with a new 3.0TB WD Green and copied all Steam/Origin and other games into it and changed the letter to the same died external HDD. From now on, I will use internal drives for heavy usage and external for backups.

Originally Posted by Echoes Risen 2 is listed at $10 right now.

$7.5 for a complete pack/edition is the sweet spot for me. My backlog's far too large for it to be worth me paying $10 for just the base game when it's bound to be cheaper before I get around to playing it.

Originally Posted by r9800pro I am out of SATA ports on my Rampage III Extreme mobo (old but gold lol) so I had to get external drives and install games into them. I replaced a 640GB internal with a new 3.0TB WD Green and copied all Steam/Origin and other games into it and changed the letter to the same died external HDD. From now on, I will use internal drives for heavy usage and external for backups.

If you end up replacing other drives in the near future, I'd recommend the WD Black series. It costs a bit more, but you do get a 5 year warranty, which is pretty much the best you could hope for with a hard drive.

Originally Posted by Xaliqen If you end up replacing other drives in the near future, I'd recommend the WD Black series. It costs a bit more, but you do get a 5 year warranty, which is pretty much the best you could hope for with a hard drive.

I'll vouch for the black-series as well. I use the green drives for backup and movie storage since my TV will play them directly off of it, and black for regular use. They've been very reliable for me so far. SSD is by far the way to go for booting up and editing programs though, as well as loading intensive games if you've got the extra GB's to spare.

Originally Posted by Xaliqen So, while I can't speak for all uses, I'd say USB 3.0, with the right hardware and proper updates, is definitely a viable option for *some* games. I don't use it for that purpose, but, hey, if you can run Dragon Age on NAS over a high-thoroughput network, then I don't see why USB 3.0 would be a problem.

7200 drive on a great-and very expensive -nas would be faster than a cheap enclosure and disk but why do that seriously???for fun)
dont get me wrong,external disks have their uses ,we agree in that

Originally Posted by Idiotekque Well, I ask because I play on a laptop. I could swap out the optical drive for a third drive,

you could try a custom enclosure + a fast 7200 rpm drive, id say wd black too

id prefer e-sata over usb,if your laptop supports it
e-sata is basically sata and works natively ,
usb is universal- this means good but not great -and needs driver. an extra and not neededlayer that may cause problems on poor implementations


also consider that external drives frequently change letters, if you are swaping external drives , and it may be annoying in that case

---
alternatively you can download any game
and move the installation directory anywhere without uninstalling the game
when you want to play the game just copy it t again to your int hdd in the appropriate dir
this is the best compromise but may become boring
-

Originally Posted by Detruire $7.5 for a complete pack/edition is the sweet spot for me. My backlog's far too large for it to be worth me paying $10 for just the base game when it's bound to be cheaper before I get around to playing it.

I got Risen 2 for $6.43 from GMG on 12/12/12
I hope to get the DLCs for cheap from Amazon.

Originally Posted by Xaliqen If you end up replacing other drives in the near future, I'd recommend the WD Black series. It costs a bit more, but you do get a 5 year warranty, which is pretty much the best you could hope for with a hard drive.

Where I live, they give 2 years warranty for "any" HDD

I do have 3x 1.0TB WD Black HDDs and they are indeed very reliable. The oldest one has 33484 Power On Hours