PS4 owners thread (1 Viewer)

[Clinton McClure]

Well spank me hard, I just went off and bought a PS4 Pro with Red Dead Redemption II, Diablo III Eternal Collection, Dragon Quest XI, and Spider-Man. I’m off work another week then again the first week of January. Gonna be a game playin fool for a while.

 

[DaveF]

‘Tis the season. I’m getting going with my new Switch.

 

[Clinton McClure]

I had forgotten the insane install and download times for PS4 games until last night.

When I finally got home and unboxed my PS4 Pro, it took about 2 hours to download a system update. Then I installed Red Dead Redemption 2 from disc - another 1.5 hours. Then it had to download a multi-GB patch for RDR2 - another 3 hours. It was close to midnight at that point so I went to bed. This morning, I have installed Diablo III (30 minutes) and it is currently chewing on Spider-Man (about 1 hour to install, possibly more time to download a patch). I still want to install Dragon Quest XI before I play anything this morning so I’m not stuck one afternoon waiting on an hour(s)-long install.

 

[DaveF]

Yep. Buy new system. Plug in an update for an hour or so. Then download games and wait another few hours. Be able to play new toy the next day or so.

 

[CraigF]

It doesn't help now, but those DL things are what you let the PS4 do while you're sleeping. Lots to do when they're new, almost like for a new PC but easier. I have a slowish internet connection, but it really does seem like the PS4 (Pro) is incredibly slow at doing any "system" stuff. All I can say is you'll love doing a system backup, if you ever do. The USB interface seems slow to me too.

 

[Clinton McClure]

One of my next tasks is to buy an external HDD and do a system backup after everything is installed and updated.

I would have let the updates happen last night while the system was idle but we had some pretty storm storms rolling through and I didn’t want to lose power while downloading.

 

[CraigF]

^ I was only using the PS4 backup as an example of "really slow". I wasn't promoting you doing one. So far I've been doing them, because I always do for "everything". But at least for the PS4, I question their value...for me anyway.

I have very few game DLs on this Pro, most of my games have hard copies, so they're safe along with the game DLs that I can always get again. Game saves are all backed up separately, and that's what we really care about. So...to re-install the games from discs, and do all the DLs for updates etc....this might be faster than doing a backup Restore, if it's as slow as doing the backup is. The Restore would be easier though.

Also, it seems you can only have one PS4 backup file on the HDD, so don't size it for multiple PS4 backups, size it for one full PS4 backup plus whatever else you'll use the HDD for. Actually, the PS4 sucks disc space, so if you're going to buy an HDD, you might want to upgrade the internal one (easy, cheapish). And put the stock 1TB in a case and use that for backup/etc. for a while.

 

[Clinton McClure]

After thinking about it, I might just add a 4TB external for extra storage and not worry about backups. Decisions, decisions.

 

[DaveF]

What's a PS4 backup for? What data can be lost from a console drive crash?

 

[Clinton McClure]

Game saves and downloadable content that might disappear from the PS store in the future.

 

[CraigF]

What's a PS4 backup for? What data can be lost from a console drive crash?

Exactly my question, now that I've had this Pro for a year. Never did a backup of the OG PS4, not a lot on it. Game saves are on a USB stick and on my PC...and that's all I don't want to lose. I did the backup from habit, but I do question it. Might be something you'd do before installing a new HDD or such. Might be useless...

After thinking about it, I might just add a 4TB external for extra storage and not worry about backups. Decisions, decisions.

4TB seems to be the sweet spot now re price, whether raw or in a case. Suppose you forget the backups, and decide to dedicate the new HDD to the PS4. The new decision is whether to put the 4TB internally, or use it externally as an "extended" drive. There are some advantages to using the HDD internally in that it's normal and can be used for "anything", plus is likely to be faster (perhaps not noticeably so during typical gaming use). Externally as an extended drive, it's about the convenience of not having to remove the existing HDD, make a new system disk, and re-install everything. I think replacing the internal HDD is where having a Backup could be useful/time-saving (you can walk away while restore is ongoing), or at least easier/less error-prone (need a third storage device to do that though).

 

[Chris Strnad]

Game saves and downloadable content that might disappear from the PS store in the future.

Isn't that what a PS+ sub is supposed to be good for (aside for an occasionally-good free game or 2?)

I would have let the updates happen last night while the system was idle but we had some pretty storm storms rolling through and I didn’t want to lose power while downloading.

A prime reason to have a reasonably-sized UPS in the mix...

For reference, I have 4 x 1kVA and a 1.5kVA APC SmartUPS to protect all the important electronics in the house. All it took was a quick succession of 3 brownouts one summer afternoon to roach one PC and the wall-wart for the wifi ap I had at the time...

 

[Clinton McClure]

I have a UPS with a dead battery that I need to replace. Once done, the PS4 will be plugged in to it.

 

[Sam Posten]

It constantly amazes me how some people use their gear so differently... Spending time to backup stuff manually rather than just getting a PS+ sub seems like a lot of cost and effort to me...

 

[Clinton McClure]

Some of us live in areas with relatively slow internet and high latency which renders a PS+ sub a huge waste of money.

 

[Dave Scarpa]

I had forgotten the insane install and download times for PS4 games until last night.

When I finally got home and unboxed my PS4 Pro, it took about 2 hours to download a system update. Then I installed Red Dead Redemption 2 from disc - another 1.5 hours. Then it had to download a multi-GB patch for RDR2 - another 3 hours. It was close to midnight at that point so I went to bed. This morning, I have installed Diablo III (30 minutes) and it is currently chewing on Spider-Man (about 1 hour to install, possibly more time to download a patch). I still want to install Dragon Quest XI before I play anything this morning so I’m not stuck one afternoon waiting on an hour(s)-long install.

Yep when you buy on disk forget about playing for a few days that’s why I buy digitally and let it install overnight

 

[Morgan Jolley]

The on-disc games that I've bought usually take maybe 10 minutes to install. I don't remember if they try to download updates right away or if they try to do that only after the game has installed off the disc first. Either way, I haven't found it to be a huge issue.

That said, I didn't play RDR2.

 

[Jeff Cooper]

Yeah, I'm a primarily physical media guy when available and I've never experienced install times like that. more than 15 minutes is crazy. Also updating system software rarely takes more than 10 minutes. Granted that is on an already established ps4 and not an out of the box update, but still those times seem like something else is going on there.

 

[John_Bilbrey]

Re: RDR2 install time - my son got it for Christmas and wanted to play on my system, it's really two disks of data that it copies over before you can play. Then it does the update, which if I remember correctly was several GB. This process took quite a bit of time - an hour or two probably. Most games don't have much to copy over. The only other one I can remember doing that was Mortal Kombat.

I'm a "physical disk" guy too - I don't own a single digital game, other than some free stuff from PS+.

 

[CraigF]

After fairly recently installing Uncharted 4 for the second time, I can say it took "hours" for me (I remember...). The Update DL was quite large too, and my DL speeds are not great, more than adequate for "quality" 1080p streaming, but nothing more. So if I had to DL the whole game instead of install from disc, I doubt it would save any time if immediacy is important (I recall my DLing of the UC: Lost Legacy game). It's not like any of us will stick around and watch the install/DL anyway, once we see the estimated time. And with the weird game pricing, least in Canada, discs are usually a couple bucks cheaper than the DL (???). I like to have the disc, have only got "burned" twice by having disc instead of DL.

For PSVR, if you're the type who likes to switch games a lot, DL is obviously far superior. If you're slow like me and/or mostly play only one PSVR game until you're finished, then might as well have the disc.