External Hard Drive Controller Lag

[ImSoRandomM8]

Hello, recently I bought a 2TB Seagate Rescue Edition Hard drive. The first day it worked like a charm but the second my controller started to lag. When I press a button it recognises it 10 seconds later. I cannot play any game like this. It happens every 2 minutes I'd say.

[A12]

Reading thru the description of your external HDD, you must have gotten the "slow" version, and the drives they use for them are known to have lots of bad sectors. Also you really shouldn't be trying to play games stored on the external, it's going to lag no matter what.

Is this only happening while playing, or all the time like when you scroll in the xmb? If it only happens while playing, it sounds like the HDD controller in the external case is sleeping the drives every 2 minuets. Combine that with terrible read/write times and there's your problem.

[ImSoRandomM8]

8 minutes ago, A12 said:

Reading thru the description of your external HDD, you must have gotten the "slow" version, and the drives they use for them are known to have lots of bad sectors. Also you really shouldn't be trying to play games stored on the external, it's going to lag no matter what.

Is this only happening while playing, or all the time like when you scroll in the xmb? If it only happens while playing, it sounds like the HDD controller in the external case is sleeping the drives every 2 minuets. Combine that with terrible read/write times and there's your problem.

 

I think it happens in the XMB too and it doesn't only lag on the external hard drive all the other games lag too. Any solutions what I can do?

[RVMcypress_grave]

52 minutes ago, A12 said:

Reading thru the description of your external HDD, you must have gotten the "slow" version, and the drives they use for them are known to have lots of bad sectors. Also you really shouldn't be trying to play games stored on the external, it's going to lag no matter what.

Is this only happening while playing, or all the time like when you scroll in the xmb? If it only happens while playing, it sounds like the HDD controller in the external case is sleeping the drives every 2 minuets. Combine that with terrible read/write times and there's your problem.

I thought the usb 3.0 would read off the drive faster than the internal SATA II (I don't know about ps4pro)?

At any rate I don't have any lag and I play off of the external on a lot of games. I use a WD drive (I would never use a seagate product).

[ImplyingYouCare]

23 minutes ago, RVMcypress_grave said:

I thought the usb 3.0 would read off the drive faster than the internal SATA II (I don't know about ps4pro)?

At any rate I don't have any lag and I play off of the external on a lot of games. I use a WD drive (I would never use a seagate product).

 

I have a Western Digital external drive too and I play plenty of my games off of that without any issues. 

 

Same about never using Seagate too, I don't trust the quality at all. The 2TB one I got stopped reading in less than 2 months and the company wanted me to pay them to retrieve the data off of it. When I said no and had them ship me a new one instead, it came dead on arrival. OP, I think your drive might be screwed because mine was having all kinds of issues with my pc before it went out and games lagging was one of them.

[BlackCatBurrito]

I have a 4tb Seagate 3.0 in my PS4 with everything installed to it & the only lag I get is if I turn on the PS4 & immediately try to boot up a game. It takes maybe an extra 5 seconds. Other than that, everything runs perfectly. 

[melodicmizery]

if your using as a external, it may be going into "sleep" mode periodically. where it kind of powers down. look at the rpm on it and see what it says. 7200 is alot faster then 5400. ive swapped alot of hard drives (internal) in ps3 but have had friends join matches faster then me and stuff and they had more rpm. but hard drives have advanced since then so it shouldnt make to much of a difference. if it was just the external lagging i would say id expect that but the whole system is doing it? did you have any sort of improper shutdowns or anything where the database might need to be repaired? also i dunno about usb 2 or 3 with the ps4 might wanna read up on which one is more compatible or cable. usually though i think if you have a 3.0 itll downgrade to a usb2 if needed. i bought a 5tb hard drive and i have about 7 computers and 7 playstations and i cant even run it on windowsxp or tv or half the shit i own lol it works on my windows 7 and thats about it. did any of this happen before the hard drive? try taking the usb drive off and seeing if your playstation smoothes out so you know for sure if its the playstation or the usb hard drive causing the issue then you can narrow the problem down more. it might be a bad chip or processor or something inside the ps4

[ImSoRandomM8]

6 hours ago, melodicmizery said:

if your using as a external, it may be going into "sleep" mode periodically. where it kind of powers down. look at the rpm on it and see what it says. 7200 is alot faster then 5400. ive swapped alot of hard drives (internal) in ps3 but have had friends join matches faster then me and stuff and they had more rpm. but hard drives have advanced since then so it shouldnt make to much of a difference. if it was just the external lagging i would say id expect that but the whole system is doing it? did you have any sort of improper shutdowns or anything where the database might need to be repaired? also i dunno about usb 2 or 3 with the ps4 might wanna read up on which one is more compatible or cable. usually though i think if you have a 3.0 itll downgrade to a usb2 if needed. i bought a 5tb hard drive and i have about 7 computers and 7 playstations and i cant even run it on windowsxp or tv or half the shit i own lol it works on my windows 7 and thats about it. did any of this happen before the hard drive? try taking the usb drive off and seeing if your playstation smoothes out so you know for sure if its the playstation or the usb hard drive causing the issue then you can narrow the problem down more. it might be a bad chip or processor or something inside the ps4

 

Its 5400 RPM and I never had this problem before. The cable is 3.0 as 2.0 is not compatible I think. I I just want to fix it I'll unplug it later I also bought it in Argos so I don't know if I can return it? 

Edited August 31, 2017 by ImSoRandomM8

[ImSoRandomM8]

I just unplugged the hard drive and it's just like before, very good. It must be the hard drive... I don't get how some people have the same one but it doesn't lag for them.

[pyrotempestwing]

I have a Seagate 2TB that I managed to run Sonic Mania off of just fine. Do you have an older PS4? Might make a difference. I have a slim myself.

[snacklepuss]

On 8/30/2017 at 9:29 PM, A12 said:

Also you really shouldn't be trying to play games stored on the external, it's going to lag no matter what.
 

 

 

As a gamer who has a 2TB external and a 500GB External, I can verify this is NOT the case. I read up on the subject and came to the conclusion that if I am to buy an External, then I would buy what I am using now which works flawlessly and no errors, and that is a Dual Carriage SATA SSD Hard Disk Docking station and heres a quick pic taken by a potato for a camera LoL.

Its just for for reference. But one drive is 2TB and the other 500gb and they work perfect. Also the PS3-PS4 OS actually auto picked up the Firmware name and the PC did not. THtas a Capture box with the green LED underneath...

  

[antithesis]

There's a clear misunderstanding here and shuffling of blame to the end-user. External Storage on a PS4 or PS4 Pro CAN cause stuttering during video and audio playback and general gameplay. It has NOTHING to do with user error, nor HDD brand, nor HDD RPM. It's a problem with the PS4 OS or hardware and it has not been fixed.

 

I get stuttering on a PS4 Pro with External Storage. I get none when the same game is moved to an internal HDD or SSD. My other two vanilla PS4s exhibit no stuttering and neither uses External Storage. It has nothing to do with specific games either - I get stuttering on Diablo 3 gameplay, Destiny 2 cutscene video stutter, and Horizon Zero Dawn audio desync, ONLY if the game is installed on an external HDD.

It's been postulated that the proximity of the external HDD to the PS4 causes interference with Wi-fi, which may explain controller disconnects or lag. It's also been postulated that moving the HDD away from the PS4 and using ferrite core shielded cables may fix the stuttering. I can confirm with absolute certainty that this does NOT work.

 

I'm a gear-head with 35 years of PC / console gaming experience. I know my tech inside-out. I have used WD, Seagate and Samsung USB-powered 2.5" and wall-powered 3.5" HDDs and get the same problem on all. I've used multiple USB cables, both long and short, shielded and unshielded. I've used different console USB ports. I've positioned the external HDD on top of the PS4 and up to 6 feet away from the PS4. I've toggle Performance Mode on and off. I've rebuilt the database, which did help temporarily, but not for long. None of this makes a shit-lick of difference to the core stuttering problem caused by using External Storage.

 

My advice is to NOT use External Storage. Instead, get a 2TB to 4TB internal 2.5" HDD or SSHD and you'll never have to worry about stuttering. If you're yet to experience the problem, good for you, but stop dismissing this as a non-issue when there are many reported cases of it on the internet. The issue lies with either the PS4 OS or the SATA3 interface and NOT user error.

 

 

[that_dude_cam_ps]

9 minutes ago, antithesis said:

There's a clear misunderstanding here and shuffling of blame to the end-user. External Storage on a PS4 or PS4 Pro CAN cause stuttering during video and audio playback and general gameplay. It has NOTHING to do with user error, nor HDD brand, nor HDD RPM. It's a problem with the PS4 OS or hardware and it has not been fixed.

 

I get stuttering on a PS4 Pro with External Storage. I get none when the same game is moved to an internal HDD or SSD. My other two vanilla PS4s exhibit no stuttering and neither uses External Storage. It has nothing to do with specific games either - I get stuttering on Diablo 3 gameplay, Destiny 2 cutscene video stutter, and Horizon Zero Dawn audio desync, ONLY if the game is installed on an external HDD.

It's been postulated that the proximity of the external HDD to the PS4 causes interference with Wi-fi, which may explain controller disconnects or lag. It's also been postulated that moving the HDD away from the PS4 and using ferrite core shielded cables may fix the stuttering. I can confirm with absolute certainty that this does NOT work.

 

I'm a gear-head with 35 years of PC / console gaming experience. I know my tech inside-out. I have used WD, Seagate and Samsung USB-powered 2.5" and wall-powered 3.5" HDDs and get the same problem on all. I've used multiple USB cables, both long and short, shielded and unshielded. I've used different console USB ports. I've positioned the external HDD on top of the PS4 and up to 6 feet away from the PS4. I've toggle Performance Mode on and off. I've rebuilt the database, which did help temporarily, but not for long. None of this makes a shit-lick of difference to the core stuttering problem caused by using External Storage.

 

My advice is to NOT use External Storage. Instead, get a 2TB to 4TB internal 2.5" HDD or SSHD and you'll never have to worry about stuttering. If you're yet to experience the problem, good for you, but stop dismissing this as a non-issue when there are many reported cases of it on the internet. The issue lies with either the PS4 OS or the SATA3 interface and NOT user error.

 

 

I highly doubt this is the HDD. I’ve been playing on my ext. 3TB usb 3.0 HDD since the update went live and I own horizon zero dawn, also played the whole game off it - no problems whatsoever.

 

could you define/describe stutter? What exactly do you mean? Dropping frames?  

[antithesis]

It's not a specific brand, type, size or speed of HDD. It's the External Storage mechanism at fault.

 

Here's a few examples I've experienced, only when using External Storage -
 

1. Diablo 3 will stall outright for 1-2 seconds before resuming again. This happens every minute or two.

2. There's a several second delay in audio when playing Horizon Zero Dawn. It happens on every cutscene. Lines of dialogue in-game cut short and overlay.

3. Destiny 2 cutscenes will stall momentarily, i.e stutter, every 15 seconds or so. Again, it happens on every cutscene.
4. Blood Bowl 2 audio cuts short and is desynced during the pre-game presentation.

Migrating the games to internal storage resolves the issue 100% of the time. Moving the games to external storage triggers the issue 100% of the time.

 

Again, it doesn't matter what brand, model, size, speed etc of HDD, nor which model of PS4 you own. It's a flaw on the console itself, likely the SATA interface or how the OS manages it - the game is simply not loading AV assets fast enough over SATA3 / USB3 to keep up, which doesn't make sense given the bandwidth at its disposal.

It's typically manifested in cut-scenes, though Diablo 3 demonstrates that it can happen in-game. Gameplay in most games remains largely unaffected - I had no issues playing Destiny 2 / Horizon Zero Dawn on an external drive with the exception of audio / video stuttering.

Part of the problem may be the volume of games stored on external storage - I have at least 50 sitting on the external drive, though data storage and data access are two entirely separate processes and one should not affect the other.

 

It's incredibly frustrating to have a game stutter and stall every few minutes. It completely breaks immersion and I stopped playing HZD because of it. The only way I can reliably play any game is to move them from external to internal, which is bloody annoying and eats 10-15 mins of time. I run an internal Samsung SSD which is a great bit of kit, but a 500GB SSD can only hold 5 to 10 modern games, so shuffling games is a repetitive process I'd rather do without.

To make matters worse, know-nothing know-it-alls on every forum this topic comes up blame the user and/or accuse them of installing inferior HDDs. That's bullshit, plain and simple. The mere fact that it doesn't happen to everyone is no reason to dismiss it as a non-issue. That attitude lets Sony off the hook and prevents a fix that is desperately needed for those affected. It's a big deal to me and others who suffer from stuttering on external storage.

I've scoured the internet looking for anything that'll fix the problem and the closest I can get is to run a database rebuild. It does help for a short while, but it also nukes all patched states of installed games, resulting in the PSN redownloading mountains of gigabytes of data to repatch games that don't need it....gah!

Save yourself the potential headache and stick to internal storage. It doesn't hit everyone, but when it does it's a bit rich to spend 100-200 bucks on external storage only to have it stutter, then rinse and repeat with a different HDD for the same outcome.

 

 

Edited November 26, 2017 by antithesis

[that_dude_cam_ps]

4 hours ago, antithesis said:

It's not a specific brand, type, size or speed of HDD. It's the External Storage mechanism at fault.

 

Here's a few examples I've experienced, only when using External Storage -
 

1. Diablo 3 will stall outright for 1-2 seconds before resuming again. This happens every minute or two.

2. There's a several second delay in audio when playing Horizon Zero Dawn. It happens on every cutscene. Lines of dialogue in-game cut short and overlay.

3. Destiny 2 cutscenes will stall momentarily, i.e stutter, every 15 seconds or so. Again, it happens on every cutscene.
4. Blood Bowl 2 audio cuts short and is desynced during the pre-game presentation.

Migrating the games to internal storage resolves the issue 100% of the time. Moving the games to external storage triggers the issue 100% of the time.

 

Again, it doesn't matter what brand, model, size, speed etc of HDD, nor which model of PS4 you own. It's a flaw on the console itself, likely the SATA interface or how the OS manages it - the game is simply not loading AV assets fast enough over SATA3 / USB3 to keep up, which doesn't make sense given the bandwidth at its disposal.

It's typically manifested in cut-scenes, though Diablo 3 demonstrates that it can happen in-game. Gameplay in most games remains largely unaffected - I had no issues playing Destiny 2 / Horizon Zero Dawn on an external drive with the exception of audio / video stuttering.

Part of the problem may be the volume of games stored on external storage - I have at least 50 sitting on the external drive, though data storage and data access are two entirely separate processes and one should not affect the other.

 

It's incredibly frustrating to have a game stutter and stall every few minutes. It completely breaks immersion and I stopped playing HZD because of it. The only way I can reliably play any game is to move them from external to internal, which is bloody annoying and eats 10-15 mins of time. I run an internal Samsung SSD which is a great bit of kit, but a 500GB SSD can only hold 5 to 10 modern games, so shuffling games is a repetitive process I'd rather do without.

To make matters worse, know-nothing know-it-alls on every forum this topic comes up blame the user and/or accuse them of installing inferior HDDs. That's bullshit, plain and simple. The mere fact that it doesn't happen to everyone is no reason to dismiss it as a non-issue. That attitude lets Sony off the hook and prevents a fix that is desperately needed for those affected. It's a big deal to me and others who suffer from stuttering on external storage.

I've scoured the internet looking for anything that'll fix the problem and the closest I can get is to run a database rebuild. It does help for a short while, but it also nukes all patched states of installed games, resulting in the PSN redownloading mountains of gigabytes of data to repatch games that don't need it....gah!

Save yourself the potential headache and stick to internal storage. It doesn't hit everyone, but when it does it's a bit rich to spend 100-200 bucks on external storage only to have it stutter, then rinse and repeat with a different HDD for the same outcome.

 

 

I’ve never had this issue on any game, but I’m not saying it’s your fault. Maybe your PS4 is the problem, I mean specifically yours, some sort of defect

[antithesis]

It's not specifically my PS4, there are too many reports for it to be that granular and there's no clear pattern. It doesn't just affect just vanilla PS4s, or launch, slim or Pro models. For example, the Yellow Light of Death was far more likely on Fat PS3s, but there's no such obvious pattern here for External Storage stutter.

 

I'd suggest the units aren't defective because there are no other issues aside from stuttering with External Storage.  Even then, it's restricted to audio and/or video playback within a game, whilst the rest of the game is unaffected, which implies some sort of bottleneck during heavy read operations.

 

If it was a USB port, surely that would manifest itself some other way, for example a steering wheel working on one port but not another would indicate a power supply issue (I had that problem on one PS3).

 

It'd be nice to say it's just Seagate 4TB or WD 3TB or Samsung 8TB on PS4 model number XXX, but there's no evidence of that. It'd be helpful if Sony provided a list of supported (and therefore tested) external HDDs, but that doesn't exist. I was careful to purchase HDDs that were tested at Eurogamer and proven to work with external storage, but I get the issue nonetheless.

 

If it's not the HDD and it's not the USB ports and it's not the USB cables (I've used multiple of all), then it must be something internal and beyond my control. All HDDs work, which again implies that the intended pathways are working rather than defective. But they're not working at the touted capacity as evidenced by widespread reports of stutter, and internal drives are very definitely faster and more reliable than external, which flies in the face of benchmark results.

 

Regardless, my point is the fault lies with Sony's implementation of External Storage, not with specific use cases, nor specific external HDDs. I'm not doing anything different to anyone else and I'm using vanilla rather than exotic HDDs. Something triggers it, but what that is is as clear as mud. Those who are unaffected need to stop the finger-pointing at end-users and help us to aim that finger at Sony for a fix.

 

 

 

Edited November 26, 2017 by antithesis

[AffectatiousDonk]

I don't know how it all works but I play everything on external Seagate on a Pro and have had no problems. 

[antithesis]

Exactly the same setup as mine (before I started trying other HDDs), but I get stutter. Ergo, it's highly unlikely to be the end-user at fault due to HDD selection (there's little other margin for error). If it was the end-user, we'd either both have the same issue, or both be in the clear if we have the same setup.

 

The nearest thing we get to a pattern is no pattern at all. It affects some users but not others. It affects some games but not others on the same HDD. It affects some parts of some games but the rest of the game is clean.

 

That's the frustrating part - if it was as simple as "don't use Seagate 4TB 2.5" HDDs", then it'd be an easy fix. Sony's said nothing of the issue which means they're going to do nothing about it unless those affected get our voices heard instead of drowned out by the chorus of "I don't have a problem, you're doing it wrong". We went through that with the YLoD, which ultimately proved to be a hardware flaw and was fixed in later iterations.

 

The closest thing I can get to an educated guess is how much stuff is stored on External Storage. Perhaps the database starts bursting at the seams, which would explain why a rebuild helps in the short-term. If there was a capacity issue, surely Sony wouldn't promote support for 8TB drives.

Edited November 26, 2017 by antithesis

[Mayadome]

I'm having the same issue. Before my Sony Pulse wireless headset would drop out periodically when the external HDD was connected so I only ever hooked up my external HDD when I needed to transfer game installs over to free up space on the internal HDD. Well I figured I'd give it a try as maybe Sony fixed it with a firmware update, and lo and behold it no longer has the issue with my headset dropping out. Everything was fine until about 1 hour or so of playing when my controller starts dropping inputs and lagging for up to 10+ seconds. I tried two separate controllers (one a V1 and the other V2) and both exhibit the same issue so it couldn't have been something wrong with the controller. Only restarting the console rectifies it and it's working fine again until it starts dropping inputs after an hour or so. I disconnected my external HDD and the controller never drops inputs or lags anymore.

I'm running a base PS4 with a Seagate Ultra Slim HDD (this one: https://www.amazon.com/Seagate-Backup-Portable-External-STDR2000100/dp/B00FRHTSK4/). The drive inside is undoubtedly a 5400rpm 2.5" Seagate. It's the same one inside my PS4 as I bought two and extracted one to use inside my PS4. It's really frustrating because Sony fixes one problem but introduces another with these external hard drives. I can't even use my controller wired as the base PS4 has just a measly 2 USB slots and I need three to connect my controller, headset and HDD.

Edited December 8, 2017 by Mayadome