Fraps, SSD's and HDD's

[Deleted]

Hi there guys!

I've been thinking about buying an SSD recently (more specifically the Crucial M4 128). I have never recorded in-game footage seriously, because I only have a single HDD (Samsung spinpoint T3) and the footage/performance was under heavy strain of the read/write processes.

The new drive however has some serious write speeds, and thus should increase the quality of video. I do know however that using the SSD that intensively will probably significantly decrease its lifespan and/or performance. I also have the option of recording to the T3 as a dedicated drive. My OS, WoW and "regular" programs will be stored on the SSD.

In regard of the former, I have the following questions:

a) Will recording to the SSD increase quality by more than recording to a dedicated Spinpoint T3?
b) Will recording to the SSD really harm the drive as much as sometimes advertised?
c) Should I put fraps on the drive it's recording to (so if recording to the HDD, with WoW running on the SSD, where should fraps be installed?)

Many thanks in advance,

Achareat

[vesseblah]

The HDD can record full 1080p at 30fps if you have windows+wow installed on the SSD, might not be quite up for it if the disc is full. Also need to remember that the first half of HDD is always faster, so if the HDD is split into two parts, the first part will be faster for recording.

[Deleted]

I'd recommend a program called Dxtory over Fraps. The quality is much better and Dxtory has a full suite of options. The big thing for me though was that I could record WOW at 30 fps and play at 60 (my HDD isn't fast enough to record at 60 fps). Fraps for me syncs the game at whatever FPS you set it to record at, and I just refuse to play games at 30 fps as it's horrid.

It records 1920x1200 fine with an old 320GB HDD that can barely manage 50MB/s sequential write.

[Deleted]

Thanks Isda for that suggestion, I will definitely check it out!

I still don't really have an answer to my questions though, what I need to know is:

a) Will recording to the SSD increase video quality significantly compared to recording to a 7200RPM HDD?
b) Will recording to an SSD decrease its performance and lifetime as drastically as often warned? (I realize I could just test this)
c) This is a tricky question: does it matter whether Fraps/Dxtory/Playclaw is installed to the drive on which the game currently being recorded is installed on?
For instance, I have a drive S (SSD) and H (HDD). My WoW folder is on the S disk. Video files are written to the H disk. Will it matter if Fraps is installed on the H or S?

[vesseblah]

a) Will recording to the SSD increase video quality significantly compared to recording to a 7200RPM HDD?

Already answered but here goes again: 7200RPM HDD is enough to record full 1080p30 video. SSD will not help at all.

b) Will recording to an SSD decrease its performance and lifetime as drastically as often warned? (I realize I could just test this)

In theory yes, in practice no. Only the very first generation SSDs had low write durability. Modern SSDs can last for a decade of 24/7 video capture.

c) This is a tricky question: does it matter whether Fraps/Dxtory/Playclaw is installed to the drive on which the game currently being recorded is installed on?

No, since the capture program is loaded completely into RAM.

Playclaw, Fraps and MSI Afterburner are the only reasonably priced tools that can do nearly lossless compression. DXtory, Xfire and other pieces of crap do only very lossy compression with shit quality if you're interested in 1080p editing, and do not support DX11 mode in WoW or any other games.

[llDemonll]

Also, fraps doesn't lock framerate. it can play at one rate and record at another.

i have a 7200rpm usb external drive and i can record 720p @ 30fps to it with 0 problems. it doesn't take much for a drive to be a capture drive