This is one of the very fastest SSDs you can buy, with great sequential and random speeds, so it’s a great choice for running your OS and loading games faster than ever before. It’s also fully compatible with the PS5 thanks to its high speeds and integrated heatsink, making it a great plug-and-play solution for exanding your game storage on the Sony console. Either way, you should expect bleeding-edge performance thanks to high-end components and that extra cooling potential.
Get a WD Black SN850 1TB for $150 (was $270)
To take advantage of those speeds, you’ll need a motherboard that supports PCIe 4.0 or 5.0, such as AMD’s B550 and X570 boards, or Intel’s 500-series and later motherboards. This includes most computers built in the last two or three years, but it’s well worth checking which PCIe version you have available before hitting the purchase button. Thankfully, this drive will work on older machines with PCIe 3.0 slots, but you’ll be limited to around 3000MB/s - so it’s only really sensible if you’re planning to upgrade to a PCIe 4.0 or 5.0 system in the near future, I’d say. Picking up a high-end SSD makes more sense today than it did a few years ago, with the advent of DirectStorage nearly upon us. This technology cuts game loads times significantly in supported titles, by performing data decompression on the GPU rather than the CPU and optimising various parts of the storage pipeline. We’re yet to see the first DirectStorage games announced, but when we do it could be a real moment for PC gaming. With this drive, you’ll be fully prepared to take advantage of that bright future - and of course you’ll reap the benefits of a speedy drive in the here and now too.
