Trainz on External Hard Drive?? Help, Please!

Hello all! Has anyone put their Trainz program onto an external hard drive to use, instead of on their computer's hard drive? Right now I have my TS12 set up on my C: drive of my desktop computer (like a majority of users, I'm sure). However, I travel a lot for work and would like to take Trainz with me, especially for when I have free/down time. However, my laptop has no where near enough space/memory to hold the program and all of the downloads. While I am thinking I will switch to a gaming laptop when the new Trainz is released in a year, I would like to keep my current computers for now (they work just fine anyway at the moment). I have two external hard drives that I use to backup my desktop computer - one for Trainz, and one for everything else. This got me to thinking... Could I simply use the Trainz program off my external hard drive and plug it into my laptop and run the game from there? I can still use my desktop while at home, and update my saved data to the hard drive periodically, and then make sure I do it right before going on the road. Changes would be made on the hard drive, and then synced back onto the desktop once home. I assume one can sync backwards like that as well... Anywho, just wanted to get a feeler from the community and see if others have successfully ran their game in this manner. Thanks for the help!

Chase Z.

hello rrfoose and yea you can use trains on a hard drive i have a external hard drive and i used it for ev erything now and it acts like a usb that you have to plug the power with so in other words u can play it ion a external hard drive

Yup - you can use it on an external hard drive.

Mine is a 2TB sized one and takes its power externally, i.e. not from the computer.

My laptop recently died so I use my Mother's desktop and will be until I get a new laptop.

I plugged my SSD into Mum's computer and after downloading Directx 9 Redistributable from the Microsoft website, I was able to keep using Trainz. When I get my new laptop, I'll be doing the same.

It's entirely possible as long as Directx 9 is installed on the computer. It's on the Microsoft website if you ever need it.

Kieran.

I have trainz on an external hard drive, I also experienced some lag issues, particularly when loading big routes. This could just be my computer though.

Probably is your computer. Having Trainz on an SSD rather than an internal hard drive shouldn't slow it down.

Try both OpenGL and DirectX, and play with the in-game and on the Launcher settings.

Kieran.

I'm sure a SSD would perform better than an external hd, but I'm not too hard pressed for premium performance on my laptop - that's what my desktop is for. My EHD is powered through my computer, not externally, but that shouldn't be an issue, right? I would only play the game with my laptop plugged in to keep from draining the battery.

I have done it myself with successful results. I have found that the USB 3.0 isn't that bad for performance, however, the drive its self isn't particularly quick. I suggest that you get a newer external drive with either a fast hard drive, or an SSD for better performance.

Keep in mind that the external drive is also prone to shock and damage and more so than your internal hard drive. This puts your data at a larger risk than you'd want and I'd suggest more than frequent back ups. If anything, I'd keep the main install on the desktop and synch over to the external drive. I do this myself using a free program called FastCopy. FastCopy has various backup and data copying routines that make the data handling easy. I do a daily backup to my external, with the first backup being a full copy. Any additional backups, to the same folder, are a Diff/Size/Date backup. This ensures that any new and different files are update and added to the existing backup, and ensures that this backup copy can serve as my external Trainz version should I take my laptop on the road.

John

JCitron said:

I have done it myself with successful results. I have found that the USB 3.0 isn't that bad for performance, however, the drive its self isn't particularly quick. I suggest that you get a newer external drive with either a fast hard drive, or an SSD for better performance.

Keep in mind that the external drive is also prone to shock and damage and more so than your internal hard drive. This puts your data at a larger risk than you'd want and I'd suggest more than frequent back ups. If anything, I'd keep the main install on the desktop and synch over to the external drive. I do this myself using a free program called FastCopy. FastCopy has various backup and data copying routines that make the data handling easy. I do a daily backup to my external, with the first backup being a full copy. Any additional backups, to the same folder, are a Diff/Size/Date backup. This ensures that any new and different files are update and added to the existing backup, and ensures that this backup copy can serve as my external Trainz version should I take my laptop on the road.

John

Click to expand...

John - thanks for the info! I use FastCopy as well to backup my desktop to my external hd. I'll check into the cost of a SSD, but may hold off on that until I get a new laptop with the power to run the game the way a SSD would allow. I won't be able to back up my external while I'm traveling, but at worst, I'd only lose the data from during my travels as my main computer would still have a good copy - I suppose there's always that risk! I'd be no farther behind than if I hadn't taken the external to begin with!

Chase