Anyone using HDD for VaM?

[SortaLewd]

I am unfortunately a hoarder of vars acquired over the years, so VaM is devouring my 2tb external SSD space. Anyone still running VaM on HDDs? I see 4tb HDDs are only like $80 compared to nearly $200 for 4tb SSDs. Personally I wouldn't mind a bit longer load times, what do you guys think?

 

[atani]

I think that you should seriously consider running a slimmer VAM on SSD, and use the HDDs for archiving and backups. The more you have (kind of) the worst your performance is.
Running such a large VAM with a spinner HDD is for those who enjoy torture.

 

[SortaLewd]

I think that you should seriously consider running a slimmer VAM on SSD, and use the HDDs for archiving and backups. The more you have (kind of) the worst your performance is.
Running such a large VAM with a spinner HDD is for those who enjoy torture.

I use Var Browser. I figured it was pretty much essential for everyone that has decently chonky vam folders.

 

[atani]

The decision to downgrade to spinning HDDs is just as bad as having more than 2 TB of VAM content in active use.
You can move out things you don't want to use that often to some other place, do you really need everything available at all times?

 

[SortaLewd]

The decision to downgrade to spinning HDDs is just as bad as having more than 2 TB of VAM content in active use.
You can move out things you don't want to use that often to some other place, do you really need everything available at all times?

When using VAR browser you only have select vars active, that's its main driving feature and mainly why I was asking if others do the same. It automatically swaps in/out vars you want to use or put on the shelf, so inactive vars aren't eating your performance when not in use. If you're asking if I could move my vars to another drive, no.

 

[DitzyDitz]

All of my vam install in in HDD actually my main VAM install is about 1000~ var and it took like 3 mins to launch the first time

 

[SortaLewd]

All of my vam install in in HDD actually my main VAM install is about 1000~ var and it took like 3 mins to launch the first time

Do you use var browser?

 

[DitzyDitz]

Do you use var browser?

No but I use similar plugin called browser assist by jayjaywon

 

[SortaLewd]

No but I use similar plugin called browser assist by jayjaywon

Browser Assist and Var Browser does different things and can be used together. I use them both and would highly recommend pairing them together! Var Browser is essentially for managing your vars and other vam assets so that unused/inactive things aren't impacting vam's performance when you aren't using them. It has an in-game GUI that lets you add and remove stuffs rather than everything always being loaded in your vam setup.

 

[Fferrett]

Well, those of you with multi-terabytes of VAM need to clean your rooms. There's less than 1TB of quality stuff out there IMHO. If you want to maintain a museum, do it on HDD.

Personally I run VAM completely on HDD because I'm using my NVME SSD for AI models that truly benefit from the speed in loading. I probably have less than 600GB of content, but I actively rid myself of downloaded trash -- garbage collection should have been built in. You can do a hybrid of setting up an archive under your SSD AddonPackages folder by setting up a symlink archive folder that points to your HDD content.

The biggest factor in everything in VAM running smoothly was getting a decent GPU. An Asus Astral 5080 paired with an AMD Ryzen 9 7900 X3D, and VAM just works now. I don't pay attention to frame rates because it never seems like I'm losing any quality with decent quality settings. Go that route instead of buying faster NVRAM SSDs. My previous GPU was a 2080 Super, so yep, justified the change. Nothing kills quality or performance in VAM anymore... especially after implementing the fix for the CPU threading.

In 2030 when the VAM 2.0 releases, (and VAM 3.0 Patreon kickstarts to continue to fund the VAM fueled lifestyle of the founder ), I'm sure a new computer will be required.