I typically install XBox360 games, mainly because I'm wary of my ancient console's disk drive wearing out the mechanism. Usually when I start playing a game, the drive spins a little when I start playing but eventually stops since it can then read further data from the installation.

With Skyrim I've noticed that even if I play in long sessions (12+ hours), the disk will seem to continously spin. While it does (on occasion) stop for a while, within about 10 minutes it will usually start spinning again.

I know there were some problems at launch where textures wouldn't work while the game is installed, and I'm wondering if this is the fix - the game never actually using the huge file I have on my HDD - but I'm also wondering if it could be a corrupted installation or maybe a new glitch in one of the recent patches.

Does having the game installed have any benefit, or should I just delete the huge file from my HDD to free up a bit of space on my cramped system? I wouldn't normally play a game uninstalled, but if the file's not being used I can't see any benefit.

Is anyone else getting this, or is it just me?