Sony Exploring Ways to Store PS5 Games on External SSD

"explorations" makes it sound like this isn't a given, and that even Sony themselves doesn't know this can/will be done. Which isn't great news given the competitor can do this.

Is this related to the now-locked slot for additional whitelist SSD?
Or only regarding usb external ssd drives?

If you can't play the PS5 games from an external drive then why bother storing them?

@gusglez If your download speeds are crap or you have a data cap. That way you’re limited by your drive’s write speed rather than your download speed.

@gusglez
Storage. It's much easier to transfer a game you've already downloaded from external storage than having to download it again.

@gusglez as @nessisonett said you’ll have them downloaded and installed which is already good, specially if your internet is not good.
It makes sense if there’s a quick transfer from your external SSD to the PS5. Imagine you always leave 300GB free and move games in and out when you wish to play them

We live in an age of technological marvel, where literally thoughts can become tangible devices...

And we can’t play a game from an SSD? PC’s come with this feature right out of the box. Sony is probably doing some strange anti-piracy measure, or just making it a super huge pain in the butt to crack their console.

Has any reason been given for why you cant store PS5 games on an external drive as standard? I get that in order to run them you need the internal drive since they're programmed to use the drive and the advantages it brings and I'm fine with that logic but given the space limitations of the smaller memory they're using (compared to Series X and likely done to keep the costs down) and the fact that there are no expandable memory drives available at launch it seems all the more baffling that you're forced to keep the games installed on the internal SSD?!!? As others have posted if you've got rubbish download speeds you could be spending a long time (re)downloading the games you want to play instead of actually playing them.

How hard is it? Microsoft isn't having any trouble making it work.

@gusglez so that when the internal ssd storage runs out (that will happen very quickly), you can transfer games to an external drive for storage RATHER than delete them and be required to re-download them from scratch. in theory, it should be a much quicker process to transfer game data between drives than to download a 100GB file etc. not everyone has gigabit bandwidth at their disposal.

I work 5 days a week...i'll probably continue playing warzone for a couple of hours each evening with my mates then play whatever at the weekends so the base ssd will be enough for me and at £70 a pop i cant see there being more than 3 games on there untill prices drop..i'm ok with this..

@Only1PJA no reason whatsoever has been given. sony is just trying to catch up. the os feature set is severely lacking in many key areas. as for upgrading the high speed internal nvme drive, i believe there is a western digital sku that is close to being released. maybe by the end of the year or early 2021. sony likely needs to do extensive testing to ensure it is fully compatible with its specs.

@Porco I didnt think I'd missed an explanation but once I decided I wasnt getting one at launch I did skip over some details so it may have been overlooked by me. Now that the launch is "here" its impossible to escape all these articles and it's making me happy about my decision to wait - next year when I do get a PS5 I'm sure all these "missing" features will be available and working properly

@Northern_munkey although of course it would be nicer to have this option at launch, I agree with you.

Most of my library will be PS4 for a long time, and that's all on a 2TB external SSD. The few PS5 games I am likely to have during this period will easily fit on the internal with space to spare.

Last month it was the size of the console, last week it was back compat, if Sony fixed this storage issue, people would find something else to 'concern' themselves about. It's just the way it is nowadays.

@Only1PJA so yes my case with crap internet speeds downloading ps5 games each time would be a major pain! This storage restriction really is a annoyance.

@Xiovanni Microsoft don't have any next gen games yet.

@Only1PJA completely agree with you. i knew purchasing at launch would have some issues. while i don't consider these features to be dealbreakers, they were expected to be the bare minimum going forward from ps4. other things i am waiting on before i purchase ps5:
-new colour (matt black)
-a stronger lineup of true ps5 exclusives to justify the purchase
-price falls somewhat ($630CAD here in canada is too high)

@gusglez save room on the internal.

@huyi I feel for you dude - I'll be honest my download speed is pretty good nowadays but I'd still rather transfer a game from an external drive than have to download it each time - especially since game sizes haven't reduced in size yet (hopefully some devs will take the time to compress the files better because of the internal SSD and thereby make the overall file size smaller but that may take some time to come into effect as games are developed and they learn to take advantage of what they're working with)

"Do you welcome this news?",
How is this news....? Wasnt this specified by Mark Cerny ages ago? That the uniqueness of the SSD and custom hardware will make it near impossible to play PS5 games from an external drive...

@Porco Being honest my decision to not get one (or at least try to get one) was partly financial and party down to spite that the UK and Europe have to wait an extra week for the launch lol! I certainly wont mind waiting 6-12 months and getting a full featured console that may be ~£50 less than it is now - I've got lots of games in my backlog to work through on my PS4 Pro and none of the initial exclusives are enough to make me change my mind

@daveofduncan very true but they do have games that are "optimised" for the new console which need to run on the internal SSD to receive those benefits but can still be stored on an external drive when not actively in use

Hope they manage to explore it quicker than PSN name changes...

For all the great this ssd is doing for the console I can't help but feel it is doing some harm too

@Only1PJA Well this isn't Nintendo, so those exclusives would still be there in 12 months anyway, and you'd probably get the deluxe editions for cheaper than the base edition by then too.

Waiting is the smarter choice.

Xbox have worked it out, yet again Sony are behind the curve

It's coming. Sony will not want a blocker on you buying digital games.

This just made me think of PS3 architecture for some reason. Maybe it's the complex nature of the custom SSD, and how it stores data and saves for fast access, that means this generation's games won't be compatible with third party internal or external SSDs for some time to come. Like the game isn't stored as one file (game) on the SSD and is in fact several. My thinking about this was based on Sony saying there could come a time when you can download separate parts of one game to play rather than the full game.

@CKFilms You're closer than you likely realise. I'm sure Devs can talk more about this at a later date. I know I can't. But yes, you're on the right track.

Also, they are also using aspects of their storage method to look into loading a game in the background whilst the UI is still there. I'll explain:

You see Spiderman MM on your UX/UI/sodding menu thing

You then move your cursor over it, launch it etc. Now the system isn't loading the game menu and engine until you officially launch it.

However, they're working on an option (discussed with first party developer's at least), that means it's always running the base menu as you go over an option.

Ergo, end result is that when you press "X", you'll quite literally immediately switch to the menu instead of waiting.

Cool thing thought I'd blab about. So yeah, there's lots of complications relating to game files on the PS5 architecture. But in the long run all this will pay off.

I can think of no valid, realistic reason why you can't store your games on an external drive - be it SSD or even a 5400rpm HDD - right from the off.

As much as I've loved Sony's consoles and games, they seem to have made a string of bizarre decisions with the PS5, which is puzzling given that they got so much right with the PS4.

Because of the games available, I wasn't overly fussed when I learned that I wouldn't be getting a PS5 for launch day. At this moment in time, I'm actually starting to feel glad that I'm not. I am actually wondering whether to cancel my current pre-order and wait until they've sorted this stuff out.

Best case scenario it's a long way off then.

@graysoncharles The internal SSD is an NVMe drive, right? My gaming laptop has one of those, yet it can play games off a thumb drive or external drive. Sony can make it work that way if they want to, but they have a money-making reason as to why they are not doing it, not a technological one.

@Porco The Western Digital drive is out now, it released at the end of October.

We should all keep our fingers crossed for that one because all the major players in the SSD market have released their latest drives and if this one doesn't work I wouldn't expect one that does for at least six months maybe a year.

@God_of_Nowt wow thanks for confirming what I was thinking about it. So this is likely why we don't see a faster loading speed for PS4 games on PS5 compared to xbox series x? and why some devs can't carry over saves from PS4 to PS5 when upgrading?

Microsoft are working with a 'generic' SSD and architecture so that is why everything is carrying over or loading that bit faster for backwards compatibility.

@graysoncharles Thanks for proving my point. Proprietary SSD incoming.

@graysoncharles Thaaaaats more like it. Can’t wait to see how much a Sony SSD costs. Thank goodness I only have around 120gb of games on my PS4, and will basically just get this thing for Demons Souls, and the potential of a Bloodborne sequel.

@TG16_IS_BAE The NVMe/s that will be approved for PS5 will also work on high end motherboards, it's not going to be proprietary.

@God_of_Nowt Ah, I’m saying that the external SSD will be proprietary, not the internal drive.

@TG16_IS_BAE Ohhh, got ya! Still a no! I already used the external USB feature, it was enabled for all of us who got them just before the press. But shhh, Sony doesn't want us talking about that until they make another blog post that barely anyone reads.

There's nothing proprietary needed for them to store the files on an external drive for cold storage.

It'll be enabled for any USB drive enclosure once they've finished backtracking and testing their issue out. I know of one person who had a corruption issue when passing the files back and forth, so I'd say that's the most likely reason it stopped being a workable solution for now.

Nothing proprietary planned though. Just generic support.

@God_of_Nowt Thats what I’m trying to say to the other guy, but he seems to know something I don’t.

@TG16_IS_BAE playing PS5 games from an external drive won't happen. The bandwidth just isn't there for USB. The internal storage is highly optimized to make loading near instant, and the expansion NVMe slot requires an even higher speed to compensate for the less optimized setup.

PC games can run off a drive because the USB drives are roughly the same speed as modern hard drives. Devs plan for loading screens and loading rooms where they need to cache more files. With the speed of PS5, the devs are making their games with less loading areas that USB couldn't keep up with.

@CKFilms Bingo! You've literally just explained the entire reason why. It's not a secret Sony are keeping to themselves or us Devs not blabbing about it. Though I'm sure Sony would help themselves by actually discussing it.

To be honest, a lot of us assumed enough was known about the storage technology for it to be rather obvious. But that's a big assumption. And both the press and consumers are proving how little they know about computer science, not a suprise, but it's probably best someone from Sony explains a little more before it all gets rather dramatic and YouTube clickbaiters are explaining from their mothers spare room instead.

So, I'm going to go over this really quickly, because it's clearly not sunk in from Cerny's consumer unfriendly talk. As in mass market, not you haha.

The SSD, as in the on board solution, it uses various flash modules, as you likely know. Then, a flash controller, that's where a lot of the magic is, but not the only place.

Now, as Cerny stated during his talk in a dark room to himself and Sony DSLR, they (Sony), have cut out a lot of the delay in getting a file, either say 1KB or 1GB, to and from a chip.

One of the aspects they've used to do this is get around a long known issue of flash storage, that inside those modules are, well, imagine two or three rows and columns. All lined up.

Take say 30 of them, and make three columns and three rows of 10.

Now, data travelling to and from a block on one row, will take priority with the flash controller, as in say it takes first place. Great! But then when the CPU demands a bit from say block 3 that's next to block 2 and 1, it can't access them all at the same time.

Meaning, in consumer terms, your system is essentially waiting for the data to be collected, causing what we see as a huge read/write differential when compared to marketed speeds of SSD drives and even NVMe m.2.

This is why a Samsung 980 Pro can read a concurrent 1GB file stored in one block, or correctly neighboring blocks quickly, at the speed advertised.

Yet when trying to access random blocks, it gets all kinds of slow, roughly half the speed advertised.

So, as well as the chips used, the actual silicon, along with the flash controller, Sony also use a custom Unix OS, which then can use filesystem structures that even on Ubuntu (a public free OS), allow files to be stored in such a way they are faster to access than on say a Windows subsystem.

Now, combine this with Oodle not requiring the CPU compute units, because PS5 has hardware to do that now, it means there's a whole bunch of things making the SSD faster than markets can currently offer on a mass scale.

It also means, as you wisely point out, that games running on BC Xbox will have an edge load time wise. As if they use Oodle (it's not new), then the Xbox CPU will shred it faster. As the engine on the PS4 game doesn't know about the hardware in the PS5, thus doesn't use it.

There's so many others reasons, and things I can get into. But frankly I'd bore people. Just wanted you to know you're right and why.

@God_of_Nowt Thanks very much for the info! That's great to know! I'll let my wife know I was right about something for once haha

It took a while for PS4 to get external HD support as well, but I thought this'd be a higher priority than this.

@Only1PJA maybe buy physical short term until they release the internal ssd?

Is it just me, or does anyone else think this whole PS5 ordeal is one big comedy show? 🤔

@CKFilms Haha, happy to help!

@Aexurion what by using cutting edge technology that even PCs are not utilising yet to the fullest extent.

The PS4 has had numerous updates and revisions that have added a ton of functionality over the launch OS.

We're getting more space for storage than the launch PS4 and I am glad I live in the UK as data caps only really exist on cheap phone tariffs and I pay 25 pounds a month for unlimited 4G data.

Give it a while we'll get the gen 4 SSD in stock (Jan 21 apparently for UK retailers) and hopefully by then we should have the whitelist.

And I have seen the potential price of the gen 4 SSD already drop which I don't expect for the Xbox.

And to anyone who thinks MS is doing any better they are ticking off a huge amount of windows 10 users with constant bugs and massive arrogance.

Got my PC forced upgrade to the next version of Windows 10 and it bricked my PC and now it's blue screen on startup and I need to fix it when I get the chance.

@vapidwolf if you mean an actual game disc then it still has to install onto the internal drive and download the latest patch every time you want to play it - the games don't run from the actual disc anymore they are basically just drm/unlock keys to price ownership these days once the data is installed on your hard drive so while you may save some time you're still not solving the problem and you're also shafting anyone that buys the PS5 digital console when this whole situation could have been avoided by allowing PS5 games to be stored on an external drive!

Thinking about it now I don't actually know why I'm even surprised by this - how long did it take Sony to allow external storage on PS4 as it too didn't allow it from the off.

As a person with 4GB of HDD on my PS4 and a LOT of games I will have some problems in the future with the small SSD. Big compatible SSDs will be quite expensive. I want my collection within reach and not deinstall and redownload games again and again. So at least to park them on and external drive would help.

Playstation, I love you, but you got to have this feature and have it fast.! We dont have much room on SSD to work with... Need to be able to offload and archive PS5 to external HDD.

Another thing to show that they more than likely have rushed all this to compete with the timeframe of Microsoft. Hence one reason why the reveal of the UI was left till really late.
Although I have also heard RUMOURS that the download speeds are much faster on the PS5, like 5-10x faster.

I don't want to seem like I am moaning to much but it would of been AMAZING if I could of stored all my past PS4 games on my new PS5 and even have space for loads of PS5 games to (I don't want a external Hard drive really making my home set-up looking to messy) Seems to low the storage on next-gen consoles really :-/ Well you can buy more storage but it seems very expensive really(for now anyway) NEXT JOB FOR Cerney is work out MASSIVE storage for cheap for the PS6!

@stu123 I ordered a series x, too. But I'll hardly use it. Only bought it because I'm a tech nerd and want to own every single console. Sony will of course patch this.

I think Sony will soon be deploying their top spin doctors.

@Only1PJA im not disagreeing with you and obviously the storage would be a better solution but disc based games do install a lot quicker than digital regardless of whether they need a patch or not how fast they install on ps5 I have no idea guess I'll find out next week

@LiamCroft Can you guys at PushSquare explain us how the storage system works in details? A single file for every game?
With a PS4 when an update is released we are forced to download the whole packet (game fixes + multiplayer + dlc) even if we don't care for online gaming or dlc. A big waste of GB both for capped internet and storage.

@deathaxe
Yes, that's all fun and games but are we just completely ignoring the fact that a company like Sony, with decades of experience in the gaming industry, are portraying themselves as amateurs?

Obviously, storage cards are going to be introduced soon, that's a given, and they better!!
But who in their R&D was in charge?
Didn't they test stuff before releasing the console?
The slot is there but they disabled it because they couldn't get it to work.
Its ridiculous to compare PS5's usable launch storage to that of the launch PS4s. Games have grown bigger and use considerably more storage these days. With the current PS4s using 1TB, it's weird to take a step back to 825GB.

I haven't even tried pre ordering the console because the thing costs 500 bucks and I want value for my money. And the real value is service, not the buzzwords used to get the masses hyped for the console. How on earth would you sell a console if it doesn't provide any improvements over the the previous gen? Also, this console is a purchase that has to survive for around 7 years, it can't impossibly be outdated when released otherwise it's dead on arrival.

By the way, this a PS oriented site. Its kinda pointless to include windows or xbox stuff. I don't care how good or bad Microsoft is doing. I care about PlayStation and want it to succeed! But hey, if you want to, fine by me 👍

Barely any info on the console until very short before release. But this has been done on purpose to build up hype. And pre orders went live while many questions where still unanswered. Basically, buying a loot box!! 🤦‍♂️