Xbox has collaborated with Seagate once again, and we’re excited to announce 512GB and 2TB Storage Expansion Cards for Xbox Series X|S will be available soon in all Xbox markets.
This plug and play experience is SUPER overrated when it comes to something like this.. If someone is spending $400 on an expansion card for their console that person is NOT a casual gamer, they are an enthusiast/hardcore/dedicated gamer. So this idea that Plug and Play would have any real bearing on the viability of being the better option simply doesn't matter, its ALL about price and performance
@Darkborn @Babadook7 - while it may be easy to access the expansion slot, asking someone who might not be super tech savvy to pick out an M.2 along with a heat sink and understand which are compatible isn't as easy as walking into a store that sells video games and coming out with a single package as is the case here.
WE all know what we are doing, that doesn't mean everyone does.
@neon your right, it's much easier for a parent to go into a gamestop and understand which xbox is which when the names are almost the same thing. If anyone has trouble doing something, it's called YouTube. I'm pretty tech savvy and I YouTubed a 5 min video of someone installing it before I opened my package to do it. Before that, yes I watched one of hundreds of videos of people reporting which m.2's are supported in the ps5 and ultimately I went with the one mark cerny recommended.
@prince Plug and play is also a plus if you have multiple consoles, or you want to take your games to a friend's house without taking the entire console.
To be fair, removing one panel that simply pops off and one screw is pretty easy to do as well and with a few minutes of internet research anyone can figure out the best SSD to get for PS5.
If someone is spending $300 - $400 on a hard drive upgrade, then they've done even the most minor research on this. They've either asked their friend, gone to playstation.com to see the details, looked at a YouTube video for advice, asked the Best Buy or Microcenter rep, or even the hundreds of Facebook/Instagram/TikTok/othe r social media groups which commonly show off their new NVMes and heatsinks and which ones to get.
Let's stop practicing lowering the average level of intelligence for people. Many of us came from the research essay generation, so let's stop acting like it's just too much to simply say Hey Siri / Hey Google how do I upgrade my PS5 hard drive.
@darkborn let it go your 2 minutes are up to 12+ including the 2 videos 🤦🏿 Not everything has to be a war of who’s better. Both are good one gives you more options with a cheaper price but you need to research a bit to install it yourself the other cost a bit more but it’s a easy way to install to the point a idiot can do it (I’m not saying that Xbox owners are idiots or lazy). Personally if I had both options I would go with the easier but my cheap side wouldn’t let me do it screaming that’s 4 + digital indi games 😂
@dark, when I installed the ssd in my ps5, it took longer than 2 minutes. I keep my system in standby so: I had to turn it on then wait for it to fully shut down then unplug it from the tv then remove the base to lay it down then remove the side panel then remove the ssd cover then remove the ssd spacer (we are already passing 5 minutes) then insert the spacer into the right hole then insert the ssd and screw it down then put the ssd cover back on then put the side panel back on then put the base back on then plug it back in to tv then power it on and finally format it.
All told, it was about 10 minutes from start to finish. You know how long it took to put in the expansion card on series s? About 22 seconds. Open package and plug it in. Formating was part of that as well.
There is a step-by-step tutorial video, was about 3:30 minutes long, that included a bunch of talking, unboxing an SSD, and also installing a heatsink on a different SSD that didn't have one preinstalled. The actual process was about 2 minutes. Kudos to you for taking a 2 minute procedure and dragging it out for an additional 8 minutes.
With this news, 2tb Series X and 1tb Series S skus are all but guaranteed to be coming out soon. We all know there is a speed difference but it doesnt really translate into real world performance problems. i mean we are talking 1-2 seconds... not minutes. Slower / faster doesnt matter. What matters is they finally got bigger options now. I expect to see 3 and 4tb plug in cards later on. And bigger options means more choices which means prices come down on the ones already out. WD should be releasing their own expansion cards within the next few months. Maybe others from Sandisk and Samsung as well. then prices would really get competitive.
People disagree but it's the truth. SSDs are so fast that an open world game can load in seconds. An optimized linear game could load in a split second. The speed difference between these consoles will only amount to between 0.5 to maybe 2 seconds once games are exclusively current gen. It's literally a non-issue.
I'm just happy we're finally starting to leave HDDs behind.
@darth you’re forgetting that those SSD are Microsoft properties designed and can’t be sold by anyone else unless they’re approved by Microsoft and they put the price tag or did you forgot the Xbox 360 HDD the price for those never came down till almost the end of the generation when it didn’t matter at all while the non propertied PS3 HDD prices dropped like a rock on water. I agree that they’re more convenient to install at first but you pay way more on the long run because there’s no competition or incentives to drop the price unless Microsoft say so.
I can literally guarantee you, that the Seagate cards are a time-specific deal between Microsoft and Seagate, there is a reason the internal SSD is WD and the expansion Seagate, once the deal has ran it's course (18-24 months) then we will see WD and all others using the expansion cards.
The nice thing about hot swapping is you can have 3 Xboxes and just pop out the card in another console not only does that cut the cost by 1/3 it also saves downloading time and cuts duplicate storage space. That’s a huge bonus for paying a few dollars more which I’d gladly trade
@barom of course money is always a concern that’s why smart buying is important in cases just like this which if you do consistently can allow you to have multiple consoles.
Or you know. Just being able to easily take your games to a friend's house. Rather than bringing an entire console, just bring the expansion card. This was something I really liked about the 360 era. You could put games on the memory card (or the easily removable hard drive on top) and just plug and play.
Hopefully some competition comes along because it's unfair to Xbox gamers who have to pay premium and don't have many options. Sony has allowed HD upgrades since PS3 and they are quite easily doable even for those who aren't really tech savvy like me
$400 for 2TB is expensive.
PS4 2TB SSD already $40 cheaper and twice the speed. All thanks to competition and not being proprietary.
https://www.amazon.com/WD_B...