New Xbox external storage expansion from WesternDigital

[BRiT]

@Vivir

Who would of thought that having one company having a monopoly on your SSD’s would turn out bad for your consumers lol.

The price aspect is not strictly limited by Seagate. It is the technical requirements because of the chosen formfactor as I listed ealier. They could alleviate some of the price disparity if they had a means of using full length NVME 2280 instead of capping at 2230. Doing so would mean an L shaped plug where they could house a normal 2280 formfactor NVME. However they would still have the additional cost of the plug adaptor so an extra $20 to connect as CompactFlash (I think that’s the actual style of connector being used).

[MissingNo]

@BRiT

Not a concern for me, but I can see that view. I’ll just trade it into GameStop and use the credits towards other new accessories.

I view it as a one time purchase that runs the lifetime of the console. The Seagate was $180 on sale when I got it and I expect to use it to use over the 7 years of the console lifetime. In the end that’s $25 a year for convenience of not having to juggle storage.

I understand not everyone has the luxury, as it is a large upfront cost, but breaking down the cost over several years may help with the justification of purchase and alleviate buyers remorse.

Its not something I would buy if we were in the last 2 years of the console use.

Yeah, trading it in once its usefulness has run its course is also an option. Since internal space on the Series S is so limited, I’ll inevitably have to get one once games like Starfield, Avowed, etc. drop, because I sure will run out of space very quickly, especially since I want to have games I want to play periodically over a longer span of time, such as Forza, SF6, Diablo 4, permanently installed. Gonna be impossible to juggle on effectively 300something GB.

[Jeans]

@Khalid117x

What a timing after the 3 threads about how overpriced the storage on Xbox is on resetera

Yeah, I saw that and all the tribe got at it with the little stick, it was like watching some kind of ritual from a cult.

Although, yeah, it’s better late than never.

[KakkaKarrotKake]

Thankfully with unlimited internet and a good download speed I no longer need to worry about storage issues so I feel for those that do

The idea of paying close to the pirce of a Series S for 1tb of storage…no thanks

[Whistler]

@Staffy

Better late than never. Still a lot of money, and as the article says

At $179.99 it’s still hugely overpriced for 1TB storage, especially when you can find a Samsung 980 Pro 1TB PCIe Gen4 drive for $79.99 right now.

I’ll definitely wait for a lower price. Of all the things I wish MS had done differently, it’s this. I absolutely would have installed a SSD already if MS had done the same as Sony. A bit less user friendly when it comes to installation, but it’s only once.

Maybe next time.

I think that was part of it “one time installation” when what MS wanted was plug and play. Part of the reason for this form factor was so you could move games between consoles. I think MS felt using the plug in SSD cold storage drives would be fine for most people.

[Sparda3g]

Cheaper Xbox expandable storage cards are on the way

[Knottian (Daniel)]

@Vivir

I remember the PS5 being mocked relentlessly on here for their SSD method being cumbersome but it’s clearly the most consumer friendly aspect of the PS5 3 years later.

Who would of thought that having one company having a monopoly on your SSD’s would turn out bad for your consumers lol.

Conflating ease of use/installation vs price, and defining one element in that false equivalency as the more “consumer friendly” is a take. Yes, the form factor PS5 went with has kept prices lower (which is a win) but I know more than plenty of PS5 owners who aren’t savvy enough to be comfortable swapping out the storage. Even though you may find it easy, as someone who’s worked in technology for the better part of two decades, I’d say you’re over underestimating how many people fall into that category.

The simple fact is “consumer friendliness” covers a wide spectrum, and while PS5’s method wins on price, Xbox wins on ease of use - and that is where most of those commentators were coming from. No need to be reductionist and misrepresent folks.

As for the price, it’s better, but it’s still not great. That said I managed to snag the 2 TB for about 40% off - which made it actually cheaper than some of the 2 TB 2.5 SATA drives, so deals are out there often - never pay retail unless you have to.

[Ace_Maverick]

@Knottian

…is a win) but I know more than plenty of PS5 owners who aren’t savvy enough to be comfortable swapping out the storage. Even though you may find it easy, as someone who’s worked in technology for the better part of two decades, I’d say you’re over underestimating how many people fall into that category. The simple fact is “consumer friendliness” covers a wide spectrum, and while PS5’s method wins on price, Xbox wins on ease of use - and that is where most of those commentators were coming from. No need to be reductionist and misrepresent folks. As for the price, it’s better, but it’s still not great. That said I managed to snag the 2 TB for about 40% off - which made it actually cheaper than some of the 2 TB 2.5 SATA drives, so deals are out there often - never pay retail unless you have to.

100% agree!! In fact I know someone where I live that it’s taking advantage of this, he is charging $60 bucks for replacing the ssd of the PS5 of many that are not tech savvy.

[Resist]

MS said this would happen before the console was even out. But for some reason, a lot people thought they were lying. Pandemic probably massively pushed things back though.

[Vivir]

@Knottian

…is a win) but I know more than plenty of PS5 owners who aren’t savvy enough to be comfortable swapping out the storage. Even though you may find it easy, as someone who’s worked in technology for the better part of two decades, I’d say you’re over underestimating how many people fall into that category. The simple fact is “consumer friendliness” covers a wide spectrum, and while PS5’s method wins on price, Xbox wins on ease of use - and that is where most of those commentators were coming from. No need to be reductionist and misrepresent folks. As for the price, it’s better, but it’s still not great. That said I managed to snag the 2 TB for about 40% off - which made it actually cheaper than some of the 2 TB 2.5 SATA drives, so deals are out there often - never pay retail unless you have to.

Meh. Not buying this at all lol. It was a bad bet.

[Proven]

I will pick ease of use over price 99% of the time, I will not open my PS5 because I’ve heard horror stories of fucking up the SSD swap.

[Searsy82]

I dont think what is or isn’t the best choice really matters. Id be willing to bet the subset of users that care enough to buy expanded storage is so exceedingly small, that it makes almost no difference. MS assuredly has the data on the number of customers that use extra storage at all, and made choices accordingly.

The average user doesn’t install 60 games at a time.

I am a pretty hardcore user, and I probably own more games than any five average users combined, and despite buying the 1TB drive, I rarely even utilize the expanded storage. I might have 10 things installed at any given time.

And while anecdotal, I don’t personally know a single other person who has bought the expanded storage or needed it. Out of roughly 10 or so family/friends/acquaintances who own Series consoles.

[Jeans]

And cold storage exists ! I know I know, we are all about SSD now, but if you’re really savvy, you can use you’re whatever number of TB HDD to store your games if you want to keep them installed.

To be honest, I always forget about that option while deleting games…

[Staffy]

@Jeans

And cold storage exists ! I know I know, we are all about SSD now, but if you’re really savvy, you can use you’re whatever number of TB HDD to store your games if you want to keep them installed.

To be honest, I always forget about that option while deleting games…

You mean a regular HDD for BC games? I still plan to get a 1 or 2 TB SSD solely for BC. Since the loading times differences are so small compared to internal.

[Searsy82]

I had all my OG Xbox/360 games on a 4TB external (~300 games) and it only used roughly 1TB.

After I upgraded my internet and can download older stuff in a few minutes. I just repurposed the drive.

[Jeans]

@Staffy

You mean a regular HDD for BC games? I still plan to get a 1 or 2 TB SSD solely for BC. Since the loading times differences are so small compared to internal.

You can store Series X|S games on a HDD, just not play them from there, but it can help if you don’t want to redownload games all the time. I always forget about that feature, but it may be useful to some.

[BadNews]

@Vivir

Meh. Not buying this at all lol. It was a bad bet.

I fully understand what he’s saying because I used to work technical support, and you won’t believe how inept people are with the simplest tasks.

I fully agree with what you’re saying because at the end of the day you can go on youtube to figure out how to swap drives on PS5. I think options are great and would’ve been nice if Series X/S had option to swap drive, and provide the option of current method.

Anyways, I think people willing to swap drives or expand it are savvy enough to swap it out because I don’t think the average consumer is looking to do that

[Knottian (Daniel)]

@Vivir

Meh. Not buying this at all lol. It was a bad bet.

[Vivir]

@BadNews

I fully understand what he’s saying because I used to work technical support, and you won’t believe how inept people are with the simplest tasks.

I fully agree with what you’re saying because at the end of the day you can go on youtube to figure out how to swap drives on PS5. I think options are great and would’ve been nice if Series X/S had option to swap drive, and provide the option of current method.

Anyways, I think people willing to swap drives or expand it are savvy enough to swap it out because I don’t think the average consumer is looking to do that

Yep. That’s why I’m not buying that weak excuse lol.

I get the logic behind it, I just don’t think it’s justifiable enough. Just give the consumers more options. I doubt there’s even 1% of the console base who actually buys these SSD drives, that 1% are either hardcore/tech savvy consumers.

[TeamAndromeda]

@Staffy

You mean a regular HDD for BC games? I still plan to get a 1 or 2 TB SSD solely for BC. Since the loading times differences are so small compared to internal.

I have 2 SSD’s hooked up to my Series X and also have the expansion card. I disagree with people in how SONY’s option is better at all. I get it for the price, but I have 2 expansion cards and its much easier swapping them, compared to the SONY sou expansion card where you need to power off the console and open it up

Price is an issue mind and MS need to sort that out and hopefully the likes of Samsung will follow WD