NBA Live 10 Hard Drive Evaluation

With NBA Live 10 in hand I have gone through and timed different loading areas when running off the disc compared to running off the hard drive on the 360. Installing to the hard drive not only has proven to cut down on load times, in some cases significantly, but it also reduces stress to the system and the noise it produces.

Interestingly in the case of NBA Live 10 there is only marginal improvement in the initial boot up to the main menu. In other areas there is more time saved but in general the game has a lot of time spent loading. The main culprit seems to be the practice gym (the “Hangar”) that you’re directed to upon starting up Live and after leaving other areas of the game.

Install Size- 5.9 GB
Install Time- 8:15

Loading Times
Load to Main Menu- 1:09 disc vs :59 hard drive (10 seconds)
Load into Play Now Game- :46 disc vs :28 hard drive (18 seconds)
Load out of Play Now to Main Menu- :32 disc vs :26 hard drive (6 seconds)
Load into saved Dynasty Mode- :32 disc vs :16 hard drive (16 seconds)
Load out of Dynasty to Main Menu- :23 disc vs :12 hard drive (11 seconds)

So clearly there is benefit seen from installing the game to the hard drive. Saving 16+ seconds loading into a game or Dynasty is significant. However Live 10 has too much loading time regardless. From booting to reaching the menu is comparable with some other sports titles but the other areas are taking longer. As always it is a good idea to install not just to save the loading time but also to take advantage of putting less wear and tear on the system. For all the games that I’ve done the hard drive evaluations on check out the tag page.