default header

Hardware

Playing games off external drives

Moderator: JC Denton

Playing games off external drives

Unread postby icycalm » 10 Jul 2021 18:21

I am looking at buying an external drive to archive TTRPG material, and I decided to take the opportunity to look into whether it’s possible nowadays to also play games off external drives. I don’t like uninstalling games, and I would ideally prefer to keep every game I play installed forever. Saves you having to figure out how to archive game saves for one.

So it seems that playing games off external drives is becoming quite possible. Not the cutting-edgiest games, you keep those on internal, but most anything else.

Best external SSD for gaming on PC and next-gen consoles
https://www.pcgamer.com/best-external-s ... e-storage/

The best external SSD is almost a must for gamers of all appetites, especially in a world of ballooning game install sizes. A large external SSDs should come as a tempting possibility for anyone rocking one of the best gaming laptops, but it's also increasingly important for our console cousins too. PlayStation 5, or Xbox Series X/S support portable USB 3.2 drives for extended storage, and realistically you want an SSD based one for that. And there's also something to be said for simply a handy drive you can use between PCs and other devices to keep your data flowing easily and securely.

The best USB Type-C drives deliver performance well beyond internal PC SSDs from just a few generations ago. Some external SSDs now crank out as much as 2GB/s of raw bandwidth. Admittedly, that’s a long way off the latest PCIe 4.0 M.2 drives for PCs, let alone the crazy-quick integrated storage in the new Microsoft Xbox Series X and Sony PlayStation 5.

What’s more, the Xbox Series X/S-specific expansion SSD is not only expensive; it’s also proprietary, so it can’t be used with other devices. By contrast, USB Type-C is the new universal standard. As for Sony’s Playstation 5, its M.2 SSD expansion slot has yet to be enabled, so USB-C is the way to go.
User avatar
icycalm
Hyperborean
 
Joined: 28 Mar 2006 00:08
Location: Tenerife, Canary Islands

Return to Hardware