The storage of the new consoles is as fast as it is scarce and many times we wish we had more space on our consoles. This is why we have searched for the best hard drives for Xbox Series. So that you do not have to be downloading the games continuously from the internet. Let’s see, therefore, which are the best HDD and the pros and cons of using them in the new Microsoft console.
The SSD has been the most important change in the new generation consoles. Its transfer speed not only allows games to load much faster, but also gives enormous potential for future games, specifically for the design of the worlds and levels in which the action takes place.
Unfortunately, this technology is expensive when it comes to the main function of a storage unit, which is to store data, and today’s games not only occupy tens of gigabytes of information, but there are games that have already surpassed the three figures. Therefore, an external storage unit is necessary to save at least the backup copies of the games.
Not all Xbox Series games work from hard drive
One of the peculiarities that the Microsoft platform has is the so-called Smart Delivery . Which is that when we enter a game what the system does is search the repository for the optimized version of the game for our console. Not all games have enhancements and optimizations for the Xbox Series, but those that do cannot be run from an external hard drive connected through the console’s USB ports. This is important to highlight due to the fact that if our game has an optimized version for Xbox Series, then you will not be able to play it from an external drive.
Does this mean that I can’t store my games on the external hard drive? Power you can, another thing is that you can play from them directly . In any case, you will be interested in knowing which ones you can send the hard drive to be able to play from it without problems, leaving space on the SSD and which ones cannot. Of course, when you play from the hard drive , forget about functions such as Quick Resume that allows you to continue with the games from where you had left them. So don’t forget to save your games like you do on other platforms so you don’t lose your progress.
How do I identify games optimized for Xbox Series?
It’s very simple, just follow these steps:
- Press the Xbox button, which is located in the center of the controller.
- This will open the console interface, go to my games and applications and there select see everything.
- In games select optimized for Xbox Series X | S and you will get all the games that if you copy them to the hard drive you will not be able to play them directly from the hard drive.
With the rest you can do it, but you will lose the loading speed of the games and the advantages of having an SSD drive.
A hard drive on Xbox for backups
Nowadays the physical format is dead and it is a slab, not only is it uncomfortable to get up again and again to take the game out of the console, put it in its box, look for the next game and place it in the slot of the console, but that also if we have to reinstall it we find that the Blu Ray drive is very slow. What’s more, if we have an internet connection, what the console will do is go find the installable from the store to download it from the internet, because it’s much faster.
On the other hand, if we have an Xbox Series, buying any game from the digital store of the console, we are going to have to save it in the storage unit of the console and this means that it will take up space on it. Well, what better than instead of having to connect to the internet to save it on an external hard drive. Of course, we must clarify that storing a game in this way for backup copies or to run it does not mean that we can use it on another user’s console. Installations are encrypted with a unique identification key provided to you by our console.
Also, because external USB interfaces are much faster, even than the console’s network card, once you want to recover games from an external drive it will be much faster to do so and without the need for an internet connection. So having one of these drives just for backup is not a bad idea at all.
Isn’t the official console storage better?
In terms of playing the games directly, yes, since only with official Xbox memory cards can we do both. That is, store the games and play from them. While as we have explained, with a hard drive we can only store and play those that have not been optimized for the new console. Which means that as soon as a title is upgraded to the new generation, then we can no longer run it from an external hard drive.
Although we must bear in mind that storage on an SSD drive is much more expensive than on a conventional hard drive. And even though we can’t play optimized games directly, what interests us is having our game repository without having to access the network. The official Xbox Memory Card , which is a modified CF Express card , is the best option of all, there is no doubt about that. The problem comes from the cost of storage. Remember, we are talking about using an external HDD to leave our games in a safe place and be able to play those that are not optimized for Xbox Series directly.
What is the best external hard drive for your Xbox Series X|S?
Once the pertinent explanations have been made, we have to make a quick selection of the hard drives that are currently for sale and that we recommend above average. In any case, we must take into account a series of points to take into account for the selection:
- The console’s USB ports are 3.2 with a transfer capacity of 10 Gbps, for real purposes this translates into 1 GB/s for reading and writing if you use the appropriate drive. An external SSD, however, this does not give you the advantages of the official memory card or the internal SSD that we have discussed in the first section of this article.
- A hard drive by its nature cannot exceed certain speeds, which is why it is totally the same whether it is internal or external. The performance will be exactly the same. So its advantage is not speed, but its storage capacity.
So in our selection we have ruled out all external SSDs, not only because they do not give us the advantages of internal storage and official Memory Cards, but also because of the high cost of each gigabyte of storage. Our advice is that before buying an external SSD for the console, consider the official storage, what size? It does not matter, the one that best suits your budget.
With that said, we’re going to give you our quick pick of external hard drives for the Xbox Series.
WD BLACK P10 5TB Game Drive
With a high storage capacity and an average price of 140 euros, the 5 TB WD Black P10 Game Drive from Western Digital not only stands out for having the Xbox logo on the case, but also for its large storage capacity. And it is that you will be able to have more than 100 games inside.
In the event that you are a user not of an Xbox Series, but of an Xbox One, then we recommend it 100%, since you will be able to play your favorite games, directly and without having to worry about downloading them again from new. And all this without performance problems.
Seagate Expansion 2TB
If your budget is not very high and you need a hard drive for your Xbox Series or Xbox One console, then you may not need 5 TB storage and 2 TB will suffice.
That is why the 2 TB Seagate Expansion , which is usually for 80 euros without a discount on Amazon, seems to us an excellent option in case you need to expand the storage of your Xbox and not leave a large amount of money. Of course, it takes second place due to the fact that the cost per gigabyte is higher than in the previous case.
Toshiba Canvio Basics 1TB
Our last option is the simplest of all, a 1TB hard drive for your Xbox, which you will find for just over €50 without a discount on Amazon.
The 1TB Toshiba Canvio Basics has the worst price-to-storage ratio of the three, but it’s the cheapest of them all. And as in the other cases, if you have games that are not optimized for Xbox Series, it will also serve as a drive to be able to play those games without spending internal SSD storage, although without its advantages.