Ahoy from New Guy
 

Hi all. Retired US Navy Submariner here. Absolute newcomer wannabe to PC Games. Served on five boats - Diesels T1, and Quillback. SSN-637s Pargo, Bergall, and Trepang.



I have an old Laptop that is dying. Just got a new Dell Laptop: mDell - G Series 15.6" Laptop - Intel Core i7 - 16GB Memory - NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 - 128GB SSD + 1TB HDD



Working the courage up to set it up - never had two drives before. Looking for suggestions.


The game Cold Waters has caught my attention. User ET2SN has been welcoming me and has answered some basic questions.


Would like some help here - remember I'm new to gaming. Never done it. Comfortable with Submarine terms, and quite impressed with the savvy shown by lots of users/posters here. I hope to both learn and share.


First thing I am not sure about. To buy Cold Waters I really need to go to either Steam.com or GOG.com to make the purchase. I am thorougly confused as to what the involevment of Steam or GOG is after that purchase. I gather is it is not as simple as, Buy The Game, install it, and play it.


What are the differences between the two purchase sources?


With my new laptop, where should I install the Game? The SDD or the big HDD?


Let's say I get hooked on Subsim and decide to purchase another game. I'm guessing that the purchase process would likely be similar??? Steam or GOG?


If these questions are so basic as to offend, I apologize. I'm nearly 76 years old, spent 24 years in Submarines, and built my first Color TV in 1967.


Salti

Welcome to SUBSIM Salti
 

Nice presentation.:salute:

Welcome aboard and enjoy SUBSIM! :Kaleun_Cheers::Kaleun_Cheers:

If you have a Facebook account, you can join us!

https://www.facebook.com/groups/25990473292/

I have the Steam version. Go to Steam, buy Cold Waters, install it. The game starts via Steam with an icon in your desktop. It updates automatically when you start if an update is available. And have fun. Great game.

Fitzcarraldo :Kaleun_Salute:

These are what I like to call "modern problems". :D

I wish I could help with the HD/SSD issue but ,to be honest, I'm still on the fence with SSDs. Hard drives are still good and are still dependable. That's normally good enough for me which is why I still haven't played around with SSDs.
The one big benefit with an SSD is faster access and load times, which might point to that drive as a good candidate for games. :hmmm: The only thing which has kept me off the SSD bandwagon so far is data stability and read/write/rewrite cycles. As I understand it, there are a finite number of times an SSD can rewrite a sector. This finite number may be massive, but its still there. Mainly, I want to give SSDs a little more time to see if they have long term (5+ years) stability.

I've already PM'd you with my views about Steam and GOG. They have advantages but they also have some headaches. I'll leave it to the rest of the crew to chime in, since I don't use them.

In terms of sub games, check around the forums, here, for what's out there. Then head over to YouTube and enter the game's name in the search function. You can find many hours of play-throughs to give you an idea of the game's graphics and play-abilty. Its like a free demo before you decide to buy. :D

Thank you for the three, "Welcomes."


I have discovered youtube and I am watching lots of Cold Waters material. (Also watching right here!)


Absent some additional advice, I think I'll install my first game (Cold Waters) on the SSD drive.


I don't belong to Facebook, but my young Granddaughters want me to join... :doh:

Welcome Aboard!

From what I have read about SSD vs HDD, most people tend to put the operating system on a SSD, and load programs/games on the HDD.

Welcome to SubSim SaltiDawg. :salute:

Welcome to SubSim :salute:

Welcome aboard :salute:

Thank you for the welcome from all.


Yesterday I got my new laptop and spent the day figuring it out and installing all of my programs and sorting out on which of the two drives I wanted what to go.


Probably today or tomorrow I will purchase my first game - Cold Waters.


Based on feedback here, will get it from Steam.


Still not positive on which drive to install it - SSD or HDD. I will say that my new laptop is MUCH faster than my old as far as opening new programs and starting up Windows... maybe 10 seconds now, was about 1 1/2 minutes.

Let us know how it goes, buddy :up:

A Warm Welcome To The Subsim Community > SaltiDawg
Subsim <> Make A Donation <> See The Benefits <> Support The Community
SH3-4-5 Tutorials And Other Information Links In My Signature Below

Oops.


One last question. I started to buy Cold Waters and I noticed that there is an opportunity to download Steam.


I think I was confused. Is Steam a free program that I download and install on my new laptop. Then, do I order Cold Waters thru that app? Does that app check for upgrdes each time I run Cold Waters via that app?


???????

Yes, Steam is free to join. You open an account. You can then buy any of their products. They have some that are free to play. Steam updates on a regular basis. Not sure how Cold Waters gets upgrades but you could ask in that forum.

https://store.steampowered.com

Click the green bar, top right corner. :salute: