Digital Foundry: Best SSD for PS5 2021

ethomaz

ethomaz

Banned
With the official specs for compatible SSDs Digital Foundry made tests with some SSDs in the market and listed the best ones.
Of course these are a small list with what they could test... more and cheaper options will eventually show up.

Best PS5 SSDs

As you can see from the table above, there are quite a few requirements, particularly around the heatsink size, but there should be a good selection of compatible drives available very soon. We're still contacting drive makers to confirm which drives will 100% be compatible and we're looking forward to testing out the new functionality ourselves, but for now here are drives that meet Sony's listed requirements:

  • Seagate FireCuda 530 (heatsink version available) - $255/£235 for 1TB
  • Western Digital Black SN850 (heatsink version available) - $250/£218 for 1TB
  • Gigabyte Aorus NVMe Gen 4 7000S - $199/£188 for 1TB
  • Patriot Viper VP4300 - $225/£210 for 1TB
  • Samsung 980 Pro (requires additional heatsink) - $199/£178 for 1TB
  • Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus (requires additional heatsink) - $199/£199 for 1TB
Note that the Aorus NVMe drive is listed as being 11.4mm tall, just above the 11.25mm maximum height, but I tested the same heatsink with a drive inserted and it seems to fit OK, not preventing the drive cover from being installed. We're leaving it on our list of recommendations for now.

Here are some standalone NVMe SSD heatsinks that should meet the height requirements - confirmation incoming!

Finally, here are some drives that meet the speed requirements but are unlikely to physically fit due to relatively tall (and hard-to-remove) heatsinks.

  • Corsair MP600 Pro (15mm tall)

www.eurogamer.net

Best SSD for PS5 and PS5 Pro: our recommended drives and heatsinks

Eurogamer's latest recommendations for filling the PS5's SSD expansion slot with a compatible NVMe PCIe 4.0 SSD.
www.eurogamer.net www.eurogamer.net
 
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Umbasaborne said:
Im gonna hold off for a year or two, hopefully prices will come down even just a little
Click to expand...
As more models are launched the prices will go down.
For example Samsung released just the high-end model of their SSD PCIE4 line up... the budgets ones, probably 880 EVO, is not announced yet so we don't know it it will be compatible.
 
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Affiliate link clickbait.

money cash GIF
 
KaiserBecks said:
Demand will rise, so…probably not.
Click to expand...
I mean.... these are high-end models PCIE4 SSDs... manufactures are still to release the budget ones.
For example.

PCIE3: 970Pro, 870EVO
PCIE4: 980Pro, ?

If the budget ones fits the specs it will be compatible.
 
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That Aorus one is a good deal.
Banjo64 said:
So basically get the 980 pro (y)
Click to expand...
I was trying to find some PCIe 4 drives on Amazon and shoulda just looked at my wish list. I ordered the WD with no heat sink, I was trying to stay in that $199 range.

I can see myself getting another drive, but will wait for further testing.

acm2000 said:
so price wise on par or above the 1TB xbox expansion, all is well in the world and everyone is getting shafted equally.
Click to expand...
Maybe you wanna compare the specs of the Series consoles drive and try again. It should be cheaper.

ethomaz said:
2.4GB/s SSDs cost near half what MS is asking.
Click to expand...
Exactly.

2.4GB/s vs 7GB/s. Hell, I posted a 5GB/s drive in another thread thats $160.
 
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ethomaz said:
2.4GB/s SSDs cost near half what MS is asking.
Click to expand...
why does that matter? its the speed the xbox requires so thats what you have to get, these are the speed ps5 requires so thats what you have to get, there are no choices either way.

the end user only cares about adding the storage not the specs, you have to pay what you have to pay on both sides of the war.
 
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acm2000 said:
why does that matter? its the speed the xbox requires so thats what you have to get, these are the speed ps5 requires so thats what you have to get, there are no choices either way.

the end user only cares about adding the storage not the specs, you have to pay what you have to pay on both sides of the war.
Click to expand...
It does matter... sppeeds defines the price of the SSD.
All SSDs in the OP works above 5.5GB/s.

The fact Sony options costs the same or even cheaper than MS options tells you a lot.
Tells you MS is really overpricing their SSDs a lot.
Tells you the non high-end PCIE4 (below 7GB/s) will be even cheaper.
 
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acm2000 said:
why does that matter? its the speed the xbox requires so thats what you have to get, these are the speed ps5 requires so thats what you have to get, there are no choices either way.
Click to expand...
Sony has listed that 5.5GB/s is recommended. Alot of us thought it was gonna be 7GB/s. Either something changed or we were all wrong.

No drive in the OP is 5.5GB/s. They are all 7GB/s.
 
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ManaByte said:
I don't think anyone makes a 5GB/s drive.
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Most manufactures didn't launch the PCIE4 budget models yet.
But there is some:

Amazon.com: Silicon Power 1TB NVMe 4.0 Gen4 PCIe M.2 SSD R/W up to 5,000/4,400 MB/s (SP01KGBP44US7005): Computers & Accessories

Buy Silicon Power 1TB NVMe 4.0 Gen4 PCIe M.2 SSD R/W up to 5, 000/4, 400 MB/s (SP01KGBP44US7005): Internal Solid State Drives - Amazon.com ✓ FREE DELIVERY possible on eligible purchases
www.amazon.com


Amazon.com: Corsair Force Series MP600 1TB Gen4 PCIe X4 NVMe M.2 SSD, Up to 4,950 MB/s (CSSD-F1000GBMP600): Computers & Accessories

Amazon.com: Corsair Force Series MP600 1TB Gen4 PCIe X4 NVMe M.2 SSD, Up to 4,950 MB/s (CSSD-F1000GBMP600): Computers & Accessories
www.amazon.com
 
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I'll probably wait with buying bigger storage, like I did with PS3 and PS4.

I've got fast and reliable internet so buying a NVME is more about conveniance rather than absolute necessity. I might buy an external HDD for my PS4 games, shouldn't be any storage problems if you keep the internal exclusively for PS5 titles.
 
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Yeah, I think I'll stick to moving in-out from the external HDD for quite some time

Prices here in Brazil wont go down anytime soon
 
Tommi84 said:
SSDs main differentiator is the speed. You may wanna check that for Xbox Expansion and PS5 compatible
Click to expand...
The significantly higher SSD Speed of the PS5 doesnt lead to significantly better results though. Last time people talked about this was before both consoles launched 😂
 
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Umbasaborne said:
Im gonna hold off for a year or two, hopefully prices will come down even just a little
Click to expand...
Prices already went down a little bit here in the US. About $30 for the WD Black.
 
ManaByte said:
I don't think anyone makes a 5GB/s drive.
Click to expand...
There are 5GB/s SSDs and they are a bit cheaper than 7GB/s SSDs. Its just most of them have 5GB/s read and less than 4GB/s write. But in this case I think the read is more important than the write speed. I can't wait to see DF do testing on those.
 
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Tripolygon said:
There are 5GB/s SSDs and they are a bit cheaper than 7GB/s SSDs. Its just most of them have 5GB/s read and less than 4GB/s write. But in this case I think the read is more important than the write speed. I can't wait to see DF do testing on those.
Click to expand...
Yes but PS5 needs > 5.5GB/s reads but there is none in the market below 7GB/s.
Of course PCIE4 5.5GB/s SSDs will eventually get launched.
 
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scydrex said:
I think no and he don't watch DF or other game channel on YouTube.
Click to expand...
He probably just focus in BC and outdated last-gen engines games comparisons.

Devs that took time to update their engines get similar results to first-party games... the last example was Resident Evil VIII.
 
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ethomaz said:
Yes but PS5 needs > 5.5GB/s reads but there is none in the market below 7GB/s.
Of course PCIE4 5.5GB/s SSDs will eventually get launched.
Click to expand...
I know what they said is recommended. I just think there is a chance using something a little less will still work and I can't wait to see DF try and benchmark 5GB/s SSD. There are quite a bit on the market for around $150 which is the most I am willing to pay for this. Lol

Let me dream damnit.
 
Tripolygon said:
I know what they said is recommended. I just think there is a chance using something a little less will still work and I can't wait to see DF try and benchmark 5GB/s SSD. There are quite a bit on the market for around $150 which is the most I am willing to pay for this. Lol

Let me dream damnit.
Click to expand...
It is worth to be tested indeed ;)
 
ManaByte said:
I have the 2TB WD in my PC and when I said it's as fast as the PS5 SSD people said I was lying.
Click to expand...
Actually, it may be as fast on paper, but your PC still can't do what PS5 can do until Direct Storage comes out. Your GPU doesn't have direct access to the data on the drive right now and it has to be processed by the CPU which creates a bottleneck.
 
I've always been a massive cheapskate about SSDs in my PC, I bought a 120GB one (ancient, not even NVMe) to use as my system drive way back and even though the games themselves are still on mechanical drives I still seem to get a big benefit, games rarely take more than 20 seconds to load.

Stuff thats made to reload fast takes literally 2-3 seconds, like Hitman. So I've never felt the need to upgrade the storage drives to SSDs, would cost me near a thousand for the same amount of space as I have on the mechanical drives am I out of date on that too:

How much is it for 8TB of good speed SSDs?
 


stick to major brands some SSD makers have been swapping parts on later models to save cost after reviews hit.
 
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