For an efficient gaming drive SSD, our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review will show you the best. It is a perfect product, especially for those struggling with space for games on your console.
If you’ve noticed, SSDs are getting a lot cheaper. However, there are instances when you can’t replace or upgrade your gaming device’s drive for whatever reason. It’s like when you own a gaming laptop with 256GB or less SSD drive. Soon enough, you’ll realise that you’ve run out of space too quickly.
Or, if you download/install new games from online stores, you juggle between deleting the older ones for newer ones.
But with the Black P50 Game Drive SSD, you can install new games without worrying about running out of space. Plus, you can also keep your old games intact.
With the USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 support, it comes with optimised speed. Since it’s so fast, you won’t even remember your game’s running from an external USB drive, which is great.
If this piqued your interest, continue reading our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review for more details about it.
WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD Packaging
This part of our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review focuses on the packaging and contents of the drive.
We received our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD in a simple black cardboard box. The front displays an image of the game drive, and below it are various details about the product. These include the name of the drive, its capacity, and other primary aspects about it.
The rear portion of the package features more details about the game drive such as its compatibility. Aside from these, you’ll find information about the other items included in the box.
Aside from the Black P50 game drive, you’ll find other accessories such as a USB Type-C to Type-C cable. There’s also a USB Type-C to Type-A cable. Of course, Western Digital included the user manual to make installation easier.
The next part of our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review talks about its exterior and uses.
WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD Review – Design and Functionality
This part of our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review focuses on the SSD’s design and functions.
Starting with its style aesthetics, the P50 is similar to past WD Black products sporting a hardened-case exterior. It gives off a somewhat military feel to it which is great.
Technically, the P50 is a straightforward storage designed primarily for gamers. It sports a cool-looking design with enough space to save all their favourite games in the library.
This WD Black P50 comes with an excellent-looking drive that’s suitable for your console or gaming rig.
Functionality
Generally, most people aren’t fond of setting up new internal drives and dealing with using tools for the task. It’s also a tedious task for them to assign drive letters then choose different file formats to use. The good thing is that the WD Black P50 Game Drive is formatted right out of the box.
With that, you’ll immediately have a drive letter after plugging the P50 to your console or PC. Since it’s formatted in the exFAT file system, the P50 can work with any hosts like Mac, Windows, and consoles.
Its design and functions can help solve the classic problem of not having enough internal storage space. And by using your console or PC’s USB port, you can readily optimise storage capabilities and efficiencies.
Note that the drive doesn’t support encryption, which is great, since consoles don’t often feature mechanisms for accessing encrypted drives. This is the reason why the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD doesn’t need any reformatting.
Key Features of the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD
Now on our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review, it’ll all be about the key features of the drive.
Western Digital’s Legacy
Like every product under the WD Black series, the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD has been tried and tested. The brand creates products for saving and enhancing your gaming experience. Its reliable drives come with optimised speed boosts, stability, and a 5-year warranty for you to fully enjoy your games.
Compact SSD with Superior Performance
The WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD has the tools for your PC and console to enhance your gaming experience. It’s available in varied storage capacities that go as high as 2TB and has read speeds reaching 2000MB/s. With that, you’ll have less loading time and longer gaming hours.
Additionally, this P50 Game Drive SSD has a SuperSpeed USB interface that is compatible with new gaming components. This feature makes the drive future-proof so that you can use it until the upcoming years.
Fast and Stable Performance
Experience fast and stable performance with the P50 Game Drive SSD’s capabilities and high read speeds. It accelerates the startup process so you won’t have to wait on sluggish load screens. Just spend more time playing and aim for victory.
Battle-Tested
With its storage capacity, you won’t have to delete files to make room on your hard drive for new games. Keep your old, favourite titles in your drive and feel free to save any of the new ones without worries. With the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD, you can build a huge game library. What makes it a lot better is that it’s a portable, shock-resistant drive so that you can take your games anywhere.
Premium Storage
WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD is a purpose-built drive for gamers. It has excellent speed and reliability designed for PC and console use. Although it’s primarily a portable gaming library, you can also use it for other files. Save movies, music and other files that you need, and you won’t have to think about which files to delete.
The next section of this WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review is all about its specifications.
Specifications
The WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD comes with capacities of 500GB, 1TB, or 2TB that you can choose from. It uses the USB 3.2 Gen 2×2 interface, with a USB Type-C connector.
It’s compatible with Windows 8.1 and 10, as well as macOS 10.11+. For consoles, the drive works with the PS4 Pro or PS4 with 4.5 or higher system software. It also works with the Xbox One.
The P50 Game Drive SSD measures 4.65″ (L) x 2.44″ (W) x 0.55″ (H). Plus, it comes with a 5-year limited warranty.
Hands-on with the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD
This section of our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review focuses on the performance of the game drive.
One thing we can say about the P50 is that it’s a solid performer as a USB gaming drive. It sure changed our perspective when it comes to running any game via an external USB drive. We were expecting slower gameplay, but instead, even at half the speed, it performed excellently.
Writing performance was fast too since we were able to successfully copy an entire gaming folder to the P50. It’s suitable for those travelling with a gaming laptop since you can also store a ton of movies to watch.
During our tests, the drive got slightly warm, but it didn’t get hot to the point of concern. Of course, it’d be smarter and more convenient to position the P50 in an open area for better heat dissipation.
When it came to gaming, everything felt smooth, and loading was surprisingly quick. There weren’t any lags throughout the game testing session, and it lasted continuously for hours. If your console comes with a USB 3.2 Gen2 support, then you’ll be satisfied with the P50’s performance.
Of course, we utilised the P50 with our Xbox One that makes use of USB 3.1 Gen1. Here, we learned that games loaded faster compared to when we utilised the console’s internal drive. Plus, today’s latest games took less than half the time to start, and it’s a positive change that we enjoyed.
Overall, the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD performed amazingly, and we’re satisfied with it. Would we recommend it? We definitely will.
WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD Review Summary
The WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD is an impressive drive. It delivered fast, stable, and efficient performance, which is ideal for gaming. The P50 offers compatibility for both Mac, PC, Xbox One, and PS4, making it highly versatile. Also, its compact design allows you to carry it around.
With the WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD, you won’t have to worry about running out of storage space. Simply plug it to your console or computer, and you can start playing and accessing every single file you have. Although it’s called a “game drive”, you can also store other files in this SSD.
To conclude our WD Black P50 Game Drive SSD review, it’s one of the best drives in the market. With its compact design and excellent performance, we highly recommend it. If you want to get your hands on this SSD, it’s available for online purchase from the official website.
