Silent_Buddha
Legend
Very much so. As the internal drive isn't user replaceable, it doesn't matter to the user how that is configured or implemented. If they require more capacity in the future, MS can make those modifications. They don't even need to continue using the current SSD controller.
WRT the external storage slot, the user is free to use whatever compatible memory cartridge they purchase. This could be 1 TB, 2 TB or in the future any other capacity that gets made into the compatible form factor.
It's a little more complex than that. At least for the near future, the PS5 will require some exotic NVME (read: very expensive) drives in order to meet its speed requirements. The price of those will drop over time, but if the PC space is anything to go by, even 5 years from now, NVME drives capable of 7+ GB/s performance are likely still going to be at a relatively high premium.
Users buying those drives for PS5 will increase the market which could potentially drive down prices slightly, but PS5 users buying those drives are likely to be a drop in the bucket compared to traditional users of those drives.
The MS drive on the other hand is landing solidly in budget NVME territory. While even budget NVME carries a bit of a premium, it's nothing close to the premium of a 4, 5, or 7+ GB/s class NVME drive. On top of that it's using one of the cheapest (if not the cheapest) NVME SSD controllers you can use.
Of course, what isn't known is how much MS will charge to license a manufacturer to make those drives. How much of a premium do MS want and how much of a premium does the SSD maker want. If MS gets greedy this could get pretty spendy, if not they could be only marginally higher than comparable consumer NVME drives.
There is also a burden on MS to ensure that any certified NVME drives meets strict minimum performance and endurance benchmarks. It wouldn't be good if the user experience was degraded when using a certified drive. That could also drive up the cost even without them being overly greedy.
Even if MS gets greedy there's still a fair chance it'll still be cheaper than 7+ GB/s drives. But if 7+ GB/s drives drops rapidly in price (I can't currently see this happening looking at past NVME drive pricing, but it could happen) then they could end up cheaper.
Regards,
SB
. The NVMe drives that Microsoft are using are almost certainly lower bandwidth so cheaper. How the NVMe market pans out for PS5 owners is anybody's guess.
