I'm choosing a 1TB SSD for a gaming PC and am comparing the WD Black SN7100 at £158.94 with the WD Black SN850X at £178.99. The SN850X costs about £20 more and includes dedicated DRAM, while the SN7100 is a DRAM-less design. Will the extra cache make a noticeable difference in gaming, or should I save the money?
3 Answers
For gaming, either drive should work very well. Dedicated DRAM generally won’t make a meaningful difference to game loading times, so the SN7100 is the better value if gaming is the main workload. The SN850X is faster on paper, but most games won’t show a noticeable improvement.
You might be able to measure a small difference in a few games with careful testing, but it’s unlikely to be noticeable during normal use. Game assets are often limited by other parts of the system, and both SSDs are already fast enough that loading times should be similar.
Both are solid choices. If this drive will also handle the operating system and demanding file transfers, the SN850X gives you more headroom and may be worth the extra £20. Otherwise, put the savings toward another component or more storage. Whichever you choose, check the manufacturer’s utility occasionally for firmware updates.
Exactly. The extra DRAM is more useful for sustained transfers and heavier storage workloads than for ordinary game loading.