Seagate Expansion Drive Xbox Series X

[Brinda]

DoI move flight sim fully to the seagate expansion drive now or not - or do I let the x box series s fill up to around 90% full - which it will at this rate - and then move the game to the expansion drive ?

The only thing I am worried about is that if I fully move the game to the seagate expansion drive - they can be difficult to read maybe in my experience for the USB type- so I am worried that I might lose all the game if I move the game to the expansion drive and that there is a reading problem further down the line

When we set out to design the Xbox Series X, we aspired to build our most powerful console ever powered by next generation innovation and delivering consistent, sustained performance never before seen in a console with no compromises. To achieve this...

I guess I could move the game from series s to the expansion drive, and leave the expansion drive permanently inserted in the back of the xbox. This would free up the series s hard drive to maximum available space to download and play other games, while I play flight sim from the expansion drive from the expansion drive which is permanently inserted at the back of the x box

Do you leave the expansion drive permanently inserted in the back of the xbox - if running the game from the drive - or do you remove the drive from the xbox once you have finished playing the flight sim, and re-insert at the back of the xbox when next playing ?

OK thanks - I best move the whole game to the expansion drive then -so therefore giving me 100% space on the x box series s hard drive to play other games - as almost 50 % space is a lot for one game taken up on the series s for flight sim on the hard drive - that I currently have

External SSDs are getting pretty powerful, and brands like Samsung, WD Black, and Crucial all have some excellent portable options. We prefer the WD Black P40, the Samsung T7 or T9 models, or Crucial's X10 Pro. There's also the option to go for an Xbox Series X expansion card, which gives you the very best performance possible from an Xbox SSD.

If you want to expand the storage of your Xbox Series X or S, you have the choice of an officially licensed expansion card from WD or Seagate, an external SSD, or a traditional USB hard drive. If you want to launch and Quick Resume from additional storage, you'll need an expansion drive. If you're on a tight budget, an HDD will do the trick, and a happy middle ground is a portable SSD.

With one of the best Xbox Series X hard drives, you can upgrade your console's out-of-the-box storage. For the best results, we'd recommend the WD Black C50, since it's better value than the Seagate Expansion Card. Both of these will let you increase your internal capacity, and use features like Quick Resume.

If you want one of the best Xbox Series X hard drives to hold the entire Game Pass library, and spend an awful long time getting it all downloaded, you'll need a hard drive that can hold give or take 10TB at last count. In short, you'd need a gargantuan size of hard drive. For example, this WD hard drive can hold the entire Game Pass library four times (and still have space left over).

The best Xbox Series X hard drives will also work with the Series S, which will no doubt be a lifesaver for anyone who immediately starts eating into that limited storage space the Game Pass machine offers. Of course, the Series X's internal storage doesn't last too long either, especially if you like to peruse the Game Pass library like you would the menu at a wine tasting.

Annoyingly, there's no M.2 port in the Xbox Series X or S, which means you won't quite get the benefits of the best SSDs for gaming as PS5 owners do. Having said that, you do have a similar amount of storage space out of the box. Just like the PS5, the 1TB claimed on the packaging of the Series X actually equates more to around 800GB once the OS bloat is factored in. As for the Series S, you're cutting that down by half. So either console can really benefit from one of the best external hard drives for gaming.

The fastest solution available to you (for the time being) is undoubtedly going to be the officially licensed Seagate Storage Expansion card or the WD Black C50. These allow for native performance that's on par with the Xbox Series X's very speedy internal SSD. Keep in mind that you cannot boot Xbox Series X games off of an external hard drive at present, whether it's an SSD or HDD, so we tend to view these options more as expanded storage for unused last-generation games. They also make transferring game captures and screenshots a lot easier.

There's a new king of Xbox Series X and S storage, and it's the WD Black C50. This is as close as you'll get to the best SSDs for PS5 because it boosts your console's internal capacity without dropping performance rates. In testing the C50, we found exactly what was promised, and it's almost a like-for-like match with the original Seagate Expansion Card.

If you want to maximize value as well as features, this is probably the best option on the market for Xbox gamers. You simply slot this into the back of your console, do a quick format, and you're off to the races. The speed of this small card is such that you can quick resume between games stored on the console's internals and the expansion seamlessly, without any delays signaling there are even two drives in play.

Besides some slow-downs during transfers, the C50 performs excellently, and just about keeps up with the Series X's ridiculous internal SSD. While that speedy drive managed to transfer Atomic Heart which ranges 78.96GB to the Expansion Card in just under two minutes, the C50 wrote it back in just under four. In specific speeds, that equates to the internal drive having a write speed of around 5.95GB/s, and the C50 having roughly 3.94GB/s.

We've seen the outer casing change a few times in recent years, but Western Digital's My Passport series has been a great fit for expanding the storage capacities of Xbox and PlayStation consoles for a few years now. In fact, this is undoubtedly one of the best PS5 external hard drives and remains one of the best Xbox One external hard drives. This series is always on lists of recommended options from ourselves and plenty of other sites too, mainly for the capacity-to-price ratio you get with them. With cheap and cheerful HDD storage, you won't get very good speeds, but you also won't break the bank.

Via the retailer links above you'll generally land on our favored 4TB model, but you can find smaller capacity drives are more than enough depending on how many games you want immediate access to without having to re-download them all the time.

WD My Passport has been released in a wide range of colors, so you will have more options to choose from and you should never pay the full MSRP for one of these as they're seemingly always on sale. If you just want plenty of space for the lowest cost without risking losing your data, the WD My Passport is the way to go for on Xbox Series X hard drive.

The WD_Black P40 SSD is the latest in WD's gaming-focused external hard drives, and it's one of the best performers you can get your hands on. It takes the speedy specs and robust design of the P50 and carries both over to a small form factor body that makes use of some lovely ambient RGB lighting.

Unfortunately, the P40 is one of the more expensive options up and down this list, particularly because it's a recent release from one of the biggest names in storage. For your purchase though, you get the drive itself, WD's Windows dashboard, a USB-C cable and USB-A adapter, a quick install guide, and a 5-year warranty I'd be surprised if you need to use.

Read and write speeds were great in testing. The 2000MB/s speed you see on the box is as good as you'll get in an external hard drive, but in reality, it translates to some great load times and transfer speeds on PS5 and PC. I had a load of game capture footage stored on my PS5 I had been meaning to move across to my computer for video editing, and even though it was about 30 clips spanning a total of 22GB, the P40 swallowed it up from the PS5 in about a minute. The same was true of games once I formatted the drive for some extra storage. I transferred three games that added up to 18GB, and it moved across in just shy of a minute.

We've extensively tested the load times of this card vs the internal storage of the console along with performance on games enhanced for Series X and it matches the internal NVMe SSD at every turn. As we mentioned, there really isn't much separating the C50 from this when it comes to expanding your game storage. Both are the best options you can go for.

If you can afford it, this is certainly the card to go for if you want larger capacities. the WD Black C50 only goes up to 1TB drives, whereas this goes up to 2TB. Admittedly though, that 2TB is more expensive. Thankfully, the 1TB model has dropped mostly everywhere to match the price of the C50 at 159 / $159. Hopefully, as the 2TB model continues to age we see more price drops.

The Samsung T7 Shield is the latest in Samsung's range of high-speed performance-first external SSDs but this one has an emphasis on durability. As the picture above might indicate, it doesn't matter which platform you plan to use it with, this is a universal drive. In fact, it's been on our list of the best PS4 external hard drives for a while now.

Samsung says that the T7 drives should offer double the performance of the still-excellent T5 drives - and our testing proves that's very much the case. While the 1,050 MB/s read and 1,000 MB/s write won't bother NVMe counterparts, as far as external drives go, the Samsung T7 Shield is certainly offering excellent sequential performance. We found that the claimed figures were largely in keeping with the maximum sequential performance, and solid figures from an external drive plugged in via USB 3.2.

Another main selling point of this drive is the rugged nature of its outer casing. Samsung has stated that the T7 Shield is able to withstand all manner of harsh conditions, with drop tests being done four times from three meters in the air onto solid concrete with no signs of physical damage to the casings or internals.

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