#You’ll Have to Wait Before You Can Expand Your PS5’s Storage – Review Geek

The PS5’s SSD will be incredibly fast, but that comes at the cost of internal storage. Unfortunately, the console’s expandable drive bay that would solve the problem will be disabled at launch. Which means you’ll need to micromanage the system’s stock 825 GB SSD (only 667 of which is useable) if you plan on installing more than a few games.

Sony told The Verge, “[T]his is reserved for a future update.” However, the missing feature isn’t surprising as PlayStation hardware architect Mark Cerny mentioned back in March that the feature would likely release “a bit past” launch.

“It’d be great if that happened by launch, but it’s likely to be a bit past it, so please hold off on getting that M.2 drive until you hear from us,” Cerny said.

Cerny explains that the reason the feature won’t be available at launch is because not all M.2 SSDs are fast enough for the PS5, thin enough to fit the SSD bay, or compatible with Sony’s I/O controller. The company says they’ll do extra testing to make sure SSDs inserted into the console are compatible.

He says that SSDs will need to be able to deliver 5.5 GB/sec or faster over a PCIe Gen 4 connection, and the drive should not have a massive heat sink otherwise it wouldn’t fit into the PS5’s drive bay.

But for the time being, you might have to do some juggling with your PS5’s internal storage. The console ships with an 825 GB SSD. Some launch titles are as large as 133 GB, and as The Verge mentions in their review, system’s available storage is 667.2 GB.

Fortunately, the PS5 supports USB external drives, which will be available on day one. This way, you can load all of your favorite PS4 games without clogging up that internal drive since last-generation games don’t require super-fast SSDs to play.

Lastly, it’s worth noting that getting the disc version of the console won’t save you any space on the internal drive. Beginning with the PS4 and now with PS5, the disc simply acts as a middleman. Instead of having to download games directly from the internet, the system simply copies the game from the disc to your internal drive.

The PS5 is set to release on Thursday, November 12, which is less than a week from now. The digital edition starts at $399, while the standard edition starts at $499.

via The Verge