[SOLVED] Does removing SATA cable reduce gaming performance?

[Ishit Arya]

I'm newb when it comes to PC gaming and someone recommended me to remove SATA port if I want to format and reinstall Windows and so I did. I never did this before that's why I'm worried that I somehow dropped my PC performance by doing so. I should've removed SATA port from HDD and not from Motherboard.

My Motherboard is B450 Carbon PRO AC.

Removing SATA cable was quite a challenge, pressing down the steel lock and pushing the cable back was a lot scary for a beginner, once the setup was over It took 1-2 mins for Windows to recognize my drive, I hope I didn't break the SATA port as well.

I'm worried about two things right now-

1. Does re-plugging SATA port decrease game FPS in some way?
2. Did I damaged my SATA port after re-plugging?

You guys have more experience than I do, so I'll be really glad if anyone help me out.

 

[k1114]

This should not be a scary process. It's no different than taking a usb stick in and out of a usb port. Actually the sata tab is less force than the tabs on usb. If the hdd works then everything is working. You can't have a half working port without bluescreens.

 

[Frag Maniac]

The main reason a lot of people disconnect SATA cables when formatting is to make sure only the OS drive is connected, which means there's no mistaking what drive to install it on, and gives the user flexibility on what drive letter each other drive is given.

It's really a thing to do with order of SATA ports 1 through whatever being applied in accordance with the placement and location of your drives and the drive letters they are assigned. It has zero to do with performance.

The only thing drive wise that affects gaming performance is how fast the drive is that you install the game on. That used to only affect level load times for the most part, but as game engines now a days take on more as far as streaming textures and loading assets, it can also make a difference in game too.

 

[Ishit Arya]

This should not be a scary process. It's no different than taking a usb stick in and out of a usb port. Actually the sata tab is less force than the tabs on usb. If the hdd works then everything is working. You can't have a half working port without bluescreens.

The main reason a lot of people disconnect SATA cables when formatting is to make sure only the OS drive is connected, which means there's no mistaking what drive to install it on, and gives the user flexibility on what drive letter each other drive is given.

It's really a thing to do with order of SATA ports 1 through whatever being applied in accordance with the placement and location of your drives and the drive letters they are assigned. It has zero to do with performance.

The only thing drive wise that affects gaming performance is how fast the drive is that you install the game on. That used to only affect level load times for the most part, but as game engines now a days take on more as far as streaming textures and loading assets, it can also make a difference in game too.

Thanks for the reply! I've noticed that I dropped 2 max FPS in Deus Ex Mankind Divided, it used to be around 75.2, now i'm getting 73.5 and in Tomb Raider 2013 it dropped from 204 to 196 FPS. Should I be worried about this? I ran these 2 game benchmark multiple times in the past and my average max fps used to hover around 75 in Deus Ex and 200 in Tomb Raider.

Seems like re-plugging SATA did affect my FPS in some way but i'm still not really sure.

 

[k1114]

How many windows and driver updates have happened since the last time? How much have you used the pc and accumulated gbs of temp and junk files? It's a plug. It's plugged in. It's a physical electrical connection and either it's connected or not. It's not the cause.

 

[Ishit Arya]

How many windows and driver updates have happened since the last time? How much have you used the pc and accumulated gbs of temp and junk files? It's a plug. It's plugged in. It's a physical electrical connection and either it's connected or not. It's not the cause.

It hasn't been much long, I did both benchmark on 3/29/20. I hope the FPS drop is caused by higher room temps nothing else.

 

[Frag Maniac]

It hasn't been much long, I did both benchmark on 3/29/20. I hope the FPS drop is caused by higher room temps nothing else.

That could simply be the case if this happened when summer temps heated up. There's also typically a margin of error/inconsistency at about plus/minus 1 or 2 frames when benchmarking, so 2 FPS is not much really. Nothing to worry about.