Seagate has taken the wraps off a new Xbox accessory that aims to improve load times while simultaneously delivering additional storage capacity.
The Seagate Game Drive for Xbox SSD is essentially just that - an external solid state drive designed specifically for Microsoft's Xbox console. Tucked inside the brushed aluminum enclosure with familiar Xbox green accents is 512GB of flash storage which Seagate says should hold around 15 games and associated downloadable content (with the average game taking up 35-50GB of space).
The drive utilizes a single USB cable for both connectivity and power.
Seagate says the drive helps gamers get into the action quicker by reducing wait times at welcome screens and enabling quicker transitions between levels. The company didn't provide any hard numbers to back up the claims but I don't doubt for a minute that it's faster than what comes stock in Microsoft's console.
People have been putting solid state drives in next-gen consoles ever since their debut in late 2013 and the results are indeed tangible.
As you've no doubt surmised by this point, there's nothing really "special" about this drive short of its enclosure. If you've got a spare solid state drive lying around, you could just as easily throw it in an external enclosure and use it to boost console storage.
The Seagate Game Drive for Xbox SSD will be available later this month from Amazon, GameStop and other consumer electronics retailers priced at $199 which isn't a bad price for a 512GB external solid state drive.