Game company Sony Interactive Entertainment has recently confirmed a feature that will not be supported on launch for the PlayStation 5.
SIE officially confirmed with media outlet The Verge that the PS5 will be able to support SSD storage expansions on launch. The representative did say that it will be supported, but needs a future update. They did not specify what kind, but it is probably a system update for the console.
The one that everyone saw during the PS5 teardown video where there is a dedicated internal slot for the stick-shaped M.2 SSD expansion will be disabled for the moment. That will probably be enabled after some compatibility testing by SIE.
PlayStation Hardware Architect Mark Cerny did state this during the technical preview back in March 2020 and assured everyone that it will be supported “a bit past” launch. He also explained that not all M.2 SSDs are fast enough to keep up with the next-gen PlayStation console. They could be not thin enough to fit too or compatible with SIE’s I/O controller.
Cerny did suggest that the off-the-shelf SSDs would need to have 5.5GB/sec of bandwidth over a PCIe Gen4 connection. It should not have a giant heatsink as well.
The Verge has spoken to several manufacturers of the PCIe Gen4 stick drive, and not one is confident enough to say it would work on the PS5. There were a couple that said the compatibility testing program done for the PS5 has not even started yet. There were some who were optimistic that their drives could pass later on.
PlayStation 5 will launch on November 12 in the US, Japan, and few select regions. The rest of the world gets it on November 19.
Source: The Verge