You'd almost certainly expect a bigger performance gain with computer games. However, most of the program codes can be held in system memory these days whilst the graphics board handles rendering. Access to the hard disk is only necessary when loading altered game data (e.g. a new level, another opponent etc.) or textures.

With Expendable, the (much) faster hard disk only gave about a 4% gain, which is just about noticeable.

Quake 3 Arena also ran about 4% faster. The lower result, by 0.1 percent with 128 MB, is due to benchmark tolerances.

Exchanging the hard disk has the advantage of offering much more space for programs and data. As with other components, you should take a look at the price/performance ratio, in cents/MB. The hard disk performance plays a subordinate role for games. Of course, it makes sense to compare hard disks that belong to the same speed class - 5400 rpm or 7200 rpm. Hard disks will soon be a more important topic for us.