Performance difference between Sata 2 and 3

[pctech2012]

I've just discovered that although the hard disk in my system is rated as Sata 3 (6GB/s) my board actually only supports Sata 2 (3 Gb/s)

Do any hardcore gamers actually notice any difference between the two and is it worth my while to add a SATA PCI card?

[DLUK]

To be honest for games the throttle of 2 v 3 on a new SSD will add 2-4 seconds on level load in games, it won't affect to any great means how SSD's stream data for games that do that (waves at skyrim etc) as the superior IOPS vs HDD and seek is what really counts there and that's not nerfed for gaming.

For apps it can be far more a issue as you might have cut 30-50% of load times (for 3d apps video editing etc) and halved the iops (which can zerg coding and data work).

So for apps you might want a PCIE Sata 3 board for games it' a tiny nerf.

And if you really want to change over it's worth looking at a new mobo with PCIE 3 and USB (even thunderbolt on) that might fit your current CPU-RAM vs a extra board as pretty decent new mobo's start from £40 these days.

[pctech2012]

Thanks for the reply.

As its a brand new system I don't really want to replace the mobo but to be fair when I was speccing I did start with a budget gaming base and reigned myself in as could have literally gone mental on the Scan site as there's so much to choose from.

I'm not going to be doing any video editing (don't have any need to and if I did I have a mate that has all the kit and expertise to do it for me)

By the sounds of it no great issue in my case but I probably will add an SSD and boot the OS and apps from it.