The console war never changes.
While fans on both “sides” fight over subjective things like the games and whether or not the Activision-Blizzard deal is a good one, there’s at least one thing (among others, to be fair) that the PlayStation 5 absolutely does better than the Xbox. X|S series.
Released in 2020, the so-called ninth generation of video game consoles pitted Sony’s PlayStation 5 against the two-pronged approach of Microsoft’s Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. While the Xbox Series X supposedly had a power advantage on paper, in practice they both output similar 4K visuals, often running at 60 FPS or even 120 FPS in some cases. The Xbox Series S offers a more affordable 1080p to 1440p resolution experience while incorporating many modern architectural features.
At launch, the PS5 lacked an expandable storage solution and was heavily criticized for it. With many games now frequently reaching 50-100 GB in size, this gave Xbox an advantage. Microsoft launched Xbox Series X|S with proprietary SSD expansion cards created by Seagate that seamlessly expand your console’s storage space. It wouldn’t be until a few months later that Sony caught up, offering gamers the ability to incorporate virtually any high-speed NVME M.2 SSD into the PS5 to store and run games.
As it turns out, Sony’s solution was absolutely and unequivocally the best option, but what’s the full story?
SSD prices are plummeting, for everyone except Xbox fans
We cover many PC components in Windows Central. Our team publishes articles dedicated to the best SSDs and the like, and as I updated our coverage for Black Friday last year, I really started to realize just how much delta there was in price.
There were some really crazy deals over Black Friday for PS5-compatible NVME M.2 drives, while Seagate’s equivalent expansion cards for Xbox Series X|S were lucky enough to score $50 off here and there in the US. Although a couple of great deals popped up for the card from time to time, for most of the year, the prices are insane.
EDIT: Case in point, WD slashed 50% off this monster NVME M.2 SSDwhich makes it cheaper to get 2TB for PS5 than it is to get 1TB for Xbox Series X|S.
Currently, the cheapest option for 1TB of Xbox Series X|S onboard storage costs more than twice as much as a 1TB NVME compatible PS5. And that’s considering a deal that Amazon has currently cut $20 off. (opens in a new tab) Xbox expansion price.
In fact, as global chip shortages eased and pandemic demand subsided, SSD prices fell more than 30%, following analysts’ accurate predictions in 2022. The same analysts predict that SSD prices could drop by as much as 50% by the end of summer 2023. This graph from Tom’s Guide below gives you an idea of how hard prices are falling right now, and it’s for basically all storage solutions except for from Microsoft.
| Drive | Price | January price | Price reduction |
|---|---|---|---|
| WD Black SN770 | $59.99 | $89.99 | 33.34% |
| Crucial P3 plus | $54.99 | $79.99 | 31.25% |
| Intel 670p | $49.99 | $69.99 | 28.58% |
| Samsung 870Evo | $64.98 | $89.99 | 27.79% |
| Crucial MX500 | $51.99 | $69.99 | 25.72% |
| Solidigm P41 more | $52.99 | $69.99 | 24.29% |
| WD Blue SN570 | $52.99 | $69.99 | 24.29% |
| Samsung 980Pro | $99.99 | $129.99 | 23.08% |
| Silicon Power UD90 | $57.99 | $74.99 | 22.67% |
| samsung 980 | $69.98 | $89.99 | 22.24% |
| Crucial P3 | $49.99 | $63.99 | 21.88% |
| SK hynix gold P31 | $107.99 | $136.99 | 21.17% |
| Samsung 970 EvoPlus | $79.98 | $99.99 | 20.01% |
| Kingston KC3000 | $86.75 | $106.99 | 18.92% |
| kingston fury renegade | $91.76 | $111.99 | 18.06% |
| Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus | $99.99 | $119.99 | 16.67% |
| Crucial P5 Plus | $89.99 | $99.99 | 10.00% |
| rocket saber Q | $79.99 | $79.99 | 0.00% |
| Samsung 990 Pro | $169.99 | $169.99 | 0.00% |
| SK hynix platinum P41 | $149.99 | $149.99 | 0.00% |
| WD Black SN850X | $99.99 | $99.99 | 0.00% |
Not all of the above units meet the minimum PS5 requirements, but many do. The fact that you can jump into Amazon or Walmart and find PS5 1TB SSDs for around $90, compared to Xbox Series X|S’s $180 to $200, is hard to explain to people asking. And sure, cheaper non-brand parts are likely to be more prone to failure, but even premium brands like Samsung et al. they are offering prices well below what Microsoft wants for an equivalent amount of storage.
The price of these cards has simply not changed in two years of availability, due to the expensive CFExpress interface standard that Microsoft opted for. Why they chose this method boils down to a bet on how the markets would move with respect to storage, and ultimately it was a bet that didn’t work out the way Microsoft would have hoped.
Why did we stay with this only option?
CFExpress is a proprietary storage interface solution initially developed by SanDisk. “CF” stands for CompactFlash, and these devices are typically used in high-end cameras. The benefits for photography are quite clear, as the cards support high read and write speeds for high-resolution burst recording and photography, while being less prone to corruption and failure compared to other types of storage.
The Xbox Series X|S range is the only time CFExpress has been used in a gaming context. Microsoft’s solution is also semi-proprietary, which means you won’t be able to take your Xbox card and reuse it as a camcorder storage option, either.
Speaking with sources familiar with the development of the Xbox Series X|S storage solution, Microsoft chose CFExpress primarily for its simplicity. It’s great that you can insert and remove the Xbox storage solution without having to use a screwdriver, but I guess most people would prefer a card that’s up to a hundred bucks cheaper for the sake of a little convenience.
Microsoft heavily promoted Xbox’s Velocity Architecture and Direct Storage solutions when the console was released. The architecture is supposed to bring improvements and benefits for Xbox and PC games regarding storage optimization, particularly for load times, data transmission, etc. Speaking to those familiar with console design, Microsoft wanted to ensure a standardized SSD speed for its game development environment. However, PC developers already have to take into account a variety of read/write speeds on the market. And indeed, no one on Earth uses a CFExpress card to store their PC games.
Update (March 11, 2023): I previously suggested that Forspoken was only known to use Direct Storage on PC, but according to sources, there are more games taking advantage of the APIs on Xbox.
When Microsoft initially developed the hardware, high-speed NVME M.2 drives were priced comparable to CFExpress. However, as the pandemic has subsided and global demand for PC components has plummeted, the market price of standard M.2 NVME SSDs has plummeted as well. With CFExpress cards still being a niche interface, prices have stayed high, and most likely will. The engineers I spoke to suggested that Compact Flash also has some benefits regarding defragmentation and sequential read/write operations. The frequency of data read/writes performed by Xbox consoles created a preference for this storage solution, which should be less susceptible to degradation over time, and this is something Microsoft was keen to compensate for. But again, this assumes that the upcoming Xbox consoles won’t just ditch this storage card system entirely when the next-gen consoles arrive. What’s the point of that longevity if we’re going to move to a standard next-gen M.2 drive anyway?
Perhaps over time the Xbox Velocity Architecture will need these specific storage cards and change the game for development later in the generation, but it’s little comfort to those who, right now, can’t justify the cost.
Is the situation likely to change?
Well, it’s not like Microsoft can change course now. We’re stuck with these CFExpress cards for the foreseeable future, though I wouldn’t be surprised to see them disappear when the next generation rolls around. Knowing that Microsoft might abandon its proprietary solution makes investing in one today even more difficult.
Future data transfer protocols are likely to go far beyond what Compact Flash can offer. USB 4 now works with Thunderbolt as part of Intel’s royalty-free commitment to try to standardize the 40 GB/s transfer speed and power delivery interface. It potentially opens up opportunities for cheaper external storage solutions that behave like internal ones, although we’ll have to wait and see how market conditions might fluctuate. Console development is all about finding the best possible value, for the lowest possible price. The Compact Flash bet didn’t work out this time, but PC component markets are extremely volatile and highly exposed to fluctuations.
In any case, it seems unlikely that the cost of Seagate Xbox Series X|S expansion cards will drop anytime soon. And from what I understand, Seagate still has exclusivity regarding the manufacturing of the cards at least for now. So don’t expect the competition to cut prices either.
If you’re looking for expanded storage for your Xbox, it may be more cost-effective to choose an external USB storage device for Xbox and transfer games to and from your console as needed.
Congratulations to PlayStation. Sony definitely beat Xbox on this one.
