Yikes, Xbox Series X 1 TB SSD expansion card will purportedly cost at least $199 USD or half the price of a Playstation 5 Digital Edition

[MarxoBean]

A lot of you guys are making incorrect assumptions and trying to compare the Xbox option vs other SSDs and saying same price for same capacity. This is an incorrect perspective.

The Xbox expansion isn't even out and within possibly even one year, likely tops due to the recent insane growth of SSD capacities, you will likely began to see the price for 2-4 TB variants around this same price range except much faster. What about 2-3 years from now?...

[Ps5]

Apparently all of you who commented don't know what you're talking about. Do you even know what proprietary means? Lol it means only one hard-drive is compatible with the xbox and not only that...wait for it...its made different to...so yes before you try bringing in the ps5 and comparing it, maybe you should realize how screwed all of you are for xbox lol Also that USB expansion hard drive, well thats only to park your installed game and then you would have to transfer it over...lol 😆 so enjoy that, and maybe instead of trying to compare multiple of hard drive prices amd brands, you should only compare the proprietary. So welcome back to the xbox 360 era again lol

[_MT_]

A lot of you guys are making incorrect assumptions and trying to compare the Xbox option vs other SSDs and saying same price for same capacity. This is an incorrect perspective.

The Xbox expansion isn't even out and within possibly even one year, likely tops due to the recent insane growth of SSD capacities, you will likely began to see the price for 2-4 TB variants around this same price range except much faster. What about 2-3 years from now?...

I don't know what insane growth you're talking about. Yes, it has been possible for some time to buy a cheap 2 TB SSD (slower, shorter lifespan) for similar money (or even cheaper) than expensive 1 TB SSD (faster, longer lifespan). I won't even talk about enterprise grade drives. But the prices have been fairly stable and I can't see any reason why they should suddenly drop. That usually comes with new technology in flash chips and usually at the cost of lifespan and even speed (which gets masked by caching). Have you seen the prices of 8 TB drives? Sure, we can expect to see higher advertised speeds for the same money as PCIe 4.0 spreads. But 4 TB PCIe drives selling for the current price of 1 TB PCIe drives? Simply because bigger drives became available? I don't think so. If you want more capacity for your money, you need to bring down the cost of flash chips.

[Twattlez]

Ugh so what? This is the going price for a 1tb PCI 4.0 SSD. The ps5 is clearly being sold with little or no profit margin. It's a steal. You can't build a PC with that hardware cheaper. 200 is a good deal.

[CrimsonDethOmen]

You failed to mention that a standard sata drive (which I have a 4tb for my one x) can be used to store series x games not currently being used. They can be transferred back and forth. So while not an optimal solution, I will wait til microsofts nvme drops in price

[MarxoBean]

A lot of you guys are making incorrect assumptions and trying to compare the Xbox option vs other SSDs and saying same price for same capacity. This is an incorrect perspective.

The Xbox expansion isn't even out and within possibly even one year, likely tops due to the recent insane growth of SSD capacities, you will likely began to see the price for 2-4 TB variants around this same price range except much faster. What about 2-3 years from now?...

I don't know what insane growth you're talking about. Yes, it has been possible for some time to buy a cheap 2 TB SSD (slower, shorter lifespan) for similar money (or even cheaper) than expensive 1 TB SSD (faster, longer lifespan). I won't even talk about enterprise grade drives. But the prices have been fairly stable and I can't see any reason why they should suddenly drop. That usually comes with new technology in flash chips and usually at the cost of lifespan and even speed (which gets masked by caching). Have you seen the prices of 8 TB drives? Sure, we can expect to see higher advertised speeds for the same money as PCIe 4.0 spreads. But 4 TB PCIe drives selling for the current price of 1 TB PCIe drives? Simply because bigger drives became available? I don't think so. If you want more capacity for your money, you need to bring down the cost of flash chips.

Probably the growth where SSDs cost $200-500 only a few years ago for 256-512GB models and now we are seeing 1-2TB SSDs for less than $200 USD and they are already starting to release capacities of 4-8TB as well. We are talking SSDs already far faster than what the Xbox Series X will offer and capacities that will continue to rapidly grow while the Xbox Series X likely remains basically stuck at this price point, capacity, and especially speed. Oh, and it is proprietary so it can't be used elsewhere... That growth.

Lets not pretend that those SSDs have poor lifespans. They don't. Realistically, most SSDs will be upgraded from and abandoned rather than die. In terms of speed to capacity and price point they already beat to roughly tie the Xbox Series X.

You ask about the price of 8TB SSD... Yes, they range from around $900~1,500 USD. How about hmm, 2TB SSDs just a few years ago that were $2,000~7,000 USD and are now around $200 and even less? I'm not sure how new you are to the SSD market but their prices have been dropping pretty rapidly over the years. Heck, even around 2010 a 60-120 GB SSD with good speeds was around $400~600 USD. SSD prices have dropped so much, in fact, they have nearly reached HDD price points putting HDDs on the verge of being truly obsolete.

Console life cycles are typically a 10 year period. It wouldn't be odd to see 4+ TB SSDs with 4-6x the speeds of what this proprietary Xbox Series X solution offers for the same price point in 3-4 years and don't even mention near the tail end of its lifespan.

Also, you mention new technologies. Yes, there are certain new technologies on the horizon that may completely invalidate all existing storage solutions able to reach petabyte capacities and world class leading speeds in consumer drives.

There is a reason the Vita had so much trouble with their solution. Microsoft, of all companies, is walking into that trap and already its offerings are worse in, quite literally, every single category than the PS5's and 3rd party's and it hasn't even released yet.

[WtfAllen]

This article is complete BS. 200$ msrp for 1TB specialty accessory is fine. Its not great but PS has in no way a better solution.

[Nicholas E Passmore]

Yikes? who cares. It's a tiny ssd and good tech. It's price isn't that bad for its size and what it can do.

[Chris kelly]

Now that Western digital have announced that their SSD is compatible with ps5 and has an RRP of $229 are you going to revise this article taking into account the additional hassle of installing an nvme SSD on a PS5 which for many could be completely outside their comfort zone compared to the Xbox ssd which is as difficult as plugging in a usb drive