Remove The Screw Holding The Drive
Next, you’ll see a single screw holding the HDD in place. It’s silver and has the PlayStation symbols on it. You’ll need a tiny Phillips head screwdriver for this. As a reminder, turn the screw left to loosen. Be gentle and take care not to strip it. Once it’s out, set it in a safe place since you’ll need to replace it in a moment.
Back Up Your Games Saves And Accounts
- From the PS home screen, navigate to Settings, then scroll down and select System.
- Scroll down until you reach Back Up and Restore and select it. On the next screen, select Back Up PS4. You should arrive at a screen asking you to select which items to back up.
- Insert your USB drive .
- Select the individual check boxes for the data youd like to back up. You can also deselect or select individual games and demos by choosing Applications from the list.
- Once youve settled on what to back up, select Next. Youll see the size of the backup file, and the name of the backup . Once youre done, select Back Up. At this point, do not remove the USB drive from your console or shut it off for any reason.
- Now you wait. The PS4 Pro will transfer the files to the connected USB device, shut down, and then reboot in a few minutes, completing the backup process.
How To Upgrade Your Ps4’s Hard Drive
The PS4 makes it easy to swap the internal disk drive. We’ll explain what drives you can choose and walk through how the process works.
Running out of space on your PS4? You have two options for upgrading your storage: replacing the internal hard drive or adding an external hard drive. Replacing the internal drive is easy, and is a great option if you don’t want to permanently take up a USB slot.
We’ll guide you through the whole process to upgrade the PS4’s HDD, along with some suggestions on what drive to purchase.
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How To Perform Ps4 Hard Drive Format
In order to format PS4 hard drive, this post will show you an easy way. The Format feature of MiniTool Partition Wizard can achieve that with ease.
In the following part, we will show you how to format with the step-by-step guide. So just download MiniTool Partition Wizard immediately and install it on your computer.
Step 1: Preparatory work of PS4 hard drive format
Step 2: Start to format PS4 hard drive
Step 3: Start to format PS4 hard drive
When you have finished all steps, the PS4 hard drive process is finished. And you can reuse it to save other files and data. However, if you want to further erase data to protect your privacy, you need to wipe the disk since data can be recovered after formatting through professional data recovery software. Thus, you can use the Wipe Disk feature of MiniTool Partition Wizard to protect your privacy.
When the PS4 hard drive format is finished, the hard drive can be reused.
How To Upgrade Hard Drive For Ps4 Pro
- Turn off and unplug your PS4 Pro and place it, upside down, on a table or other flat surface.
- In order to access the hard drive, you first need to use your finger to remove the plastic covering all the way to the right on the back of the console.
- Once the plastic covering is removed, you should be able to see the hard drive mounting bracket, which is held in place by a screw.
- Use the screwdriver to remove the screw and pull the mounting bracket out. You should see four screws holding the hard drive in its mounting bracket.
- Remove all four with the screwdriver and pull the hard drive out of its mounting bracket. Then, insert the new hard drive.
- From here, you will go back through the steps in reverse. Replace the four screws to secure the hard drive into the mounting bracket. Reinsert the mounting bracket into the PS4 Pro, and replace the screw to secure it in place. Finally, put the plastic covering back in place.
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How To Change Ps4 Hard Drive
You didnt think the day would come when the space on your PS4 hard disk would run out, but here you are: you have practically run out of space on the console and, even deleting some titles you no longer use, you are unable to download of the latest triple A title you purchased from PlayStation Store. Dejected by this situation, you decided to take courage and to look for a guide that would teach you how to change the PS4 hard disk , to understand if it is a feasible procedure, if it is within your reach, and therefore if you can definitively resolve your problem.
Thats the way it is, am I right? Then I have great news for you: the PlayStation 4 offers the possibility to replace the internal hard disk, in case it is damaged or simply insufficient to contain all your games and, moreover, it is an official solution that does not require very advanced technical knowledge. Of course: you have to get your hands dirty at a minimum, but the procedure is very straightforward and by carefully following the official steps which I will also point out to you shortly it is practically impossible to go wrong. Alternatively, I remind you that it is possible to expand the memory of the PS4 with an external hard drive .
How To Upgrade Hard Drive For Ps4 Slim
- To begin, turn off your PS4 Slim, unplug it, and place it, facing away from you, on a table or other flat surface.
- On the right side, you should see an L-shaped plastic piece that covers the PS4’s back right corner.
- Slide it to the right to remove it, revealing the hard disc drive. Pull on it to remove it.
- The hard drive is held in the mounting bracket by four screws which you will need to remove with the screwdriver.
- Take out the old hard drive and replace it with the new one, and replace the screws.
- Put the hard drive back in the console and replace the L-shaped plastic piece.
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Replace The Hard Drive
- Completely power off your PS4 Pro by holding down the PS button on the DualShock 4 controller, scrolling down to Power, and selecting the option to shut down.
- Unplug all cables, including the power jack, from the unit. On the back, left-hand side of the console, youll see a hard plastic cover. Apply moderate force to the cover and pull it off.
- Using your Phillips-head screwdriver, loosen the PlayStation-branded screw that keeps the hard drive tray locked in place. Save it in a safe place youll need it during reassembly later.
- Gently pull the tray out of the console. Next, using your Phillips screwdriver, unscrew the four screws holding the stock hard drive in the tray. Take great care not to scratch or drop the hard drive in the process.
- Take your new hard drive and place it in the tray. Align the four corners of the drive with the holes in the tray. Then screw in each of the four drive tray screws until the new hard drive is snugly in place.
- Ensure that the SATA connectors are aligned with the console , and then slowly slide the drive tray back in.
- With the last and largest screw, secure your new drive to the PS4 Pros chassis. Finish up by putting the plastic cover back in place so that the drive bay is not exposed.
Time To Consider A New Ps4 Hdd
All that and more make it inevitable for every serious gamer to replace the internal HDD of PS4 with a drive that is faster and more powerful if they wish to keep their console for the next year until they make up their mind about buying PS5.
Some PS4 users are content with their consoles performance and only want extra storage space. Although they will miss the significant performance boost that the PS4 internal hard drive upgrade offers, they can still go for an external hard drive for PS4. Just make sure to pick the best external HDD for your console in order to last for so long with you.
The PS4 stock hard drive is a quite old and outdated device that no longer meets the modern storage requirements of todays games. Additionally, as an old and traditional technology, after some time the PS4 HDD starts to generate errors and may completely fail in many situations. Thats when the PS4 freezes or even becomes very slow.
So, what are the major benefits of upgrading the PS4 hard drive? Is it really worth it? And if youve already decided to try it, so whats the best internal hard drive replacement for PS4?
There are lots of issues to address concerning PS4 hard drive replacement. We have covered almost everything you need to know in this comprehensive guide. You will learn about the best hard drive upgrade for PS4, how to upgrade, what type of storage devices is best suited for your needs, what capacity to choose, and much more within this guide. So, keep reading on.
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Solid State Hybrid Drive
This is an innovative solution meant to be a compromise between speed, capacity and price. With this hard drive solution youll get nearly the performance of SSD and the capacious space of HDD. All for an adequate price thats usually not $10 higher than a regular hard drive.
Solid state hybrid drives, or SSHDs, are a blending of the traditional hard drive and the new solid state drive technologies. If you have been looking at upgrading your PS4 internal hard drive, you may have come across the term SSHD. This is a new marketing term that was coined by Seagate to essentially label what had previously been referred to as hybrid hard drives. This new term can lead to confusion in the market as buyers can mistake these for full solid-state drives .
So an SSHD is basically a hard drive and SSD in one, which is why its called hybrid. The drive appears as a single device to PS4 system, and the SSD part is just used for temporary storage to speed things up: your data is stored long-term on the mechanical disks.
SSHD for PS4
An SSHD is still slower than any SSD, but its a good chunk faster than a plain old hard disk. Basically, if you want lots of storage at a reasonable price, an SSHD is a good choice. If your priority is speed and you want PS4 system to be more responsive, go for an SSD.
The SSHD is the best PS4 hard drive replacement for the majority of users. As for enthusiasts and power users, an SSD is the priority.
Second Suggestion Adding An External Drive
We also have a second suggestion to upgrade your storage problem. You can off course do both to really expand your PS4 storage. But that might be a bit expensive if you want to do all of this at once. If you need to buy a new external drive, make sure that the drive has a USB 3.0 connection and isnt above 8TB storage space. The PS4 accepts drives up to 8TB max.
What you need here is:
- An external hard drive with USB 3.0 connection
Your PS4 will only recognize one external storage drive at a time. Also have in mind that you have to use the USB port directly on your PS4 otherwise it wont work.
First step connect your external drive to a USB portSecond step Follow on screen instructions If the on screen instructions doesnt appear well have to format our external drive manually.
How to format the drive Settings Devices USB Storage Devices Format as Extended Storage
Thats it, your external drive will now show up as Extended Storage and now the default location for any game you purchase or download from your PlayStation library.
BEWARE!Removing the external drive while powered on may corrupt or data losses may occur. If you want to disconnect the device make sure to do so properly. Settings Devices USB Storage Devices Stop Using This Extended Storage
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Reinstall The Ps4 System Software
The next step will need your computer and a USB drive with at least 1GB of free space, formatted to exFAT, FAT32 or FAT you can use the one with your saved games on it.
Because your PS4 now has a brand-new drive in, youre going to have to reinstall the system software manually.
On your drive, create a folder named PS4. If youre using the USB drive with your save files on, there will already be one with that name. Within that folder, create another folder called UPDATE.
When youve done that, head here to find the latest version of the PS4 system software. At the time we did it, the file was around 900MB in size, and it took around 10 minutes to download. Make sure you only get the software from the above link, because there are several other sites out there with incorrect software.
Once its downloaded, drag your file into the UPDATE folder on your hard drive.
Youll next need to plug all your various wires back into your PS4, plug in the USB drive with the install file on it, and attach your DualShock 4 via USB cable.Next, boot up your PS4 in Safe Mode. You do this by holding the power button on your PS4 down for seven seconds or longer itll beep to let you know its booting up in Safe Mode.
When youre presented with a selection of options, go down to number 7 Initialise PS4 .
Once youve been through that, youll have to add your PSN account and sign in properly to be able to download all your games and apps.
Procedure 2 Remove The Old Ps4 Internal Hard Drive
Step 1. Power off PS4 and unplug the AC power cord, and then disconnect the other cables from the system.
Step 2. Place both of your hands on top of the hard drive cover and slide it to the left. Lift the right side first when lifting and removing the cover.
Step 3. Remove the screw and pull the internal hard drive toward the front of the system to remove it
Step 4. Remove the four screws with a Phillips screwdriver from the sides of the hard drive case.
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Power Off And Unplug Your Ps4
First, shut down your PS4 completely. Make sure that the light on the system is off if it’s orange, then it’s in Rest Mode and you need to start it up again so you can fully shut down your PS4. To do this, press and hold the Power button on the console until you hear two beeps.
Once it’s fully shut down, with no lights showing, remove all cables and USB devices from your system.
Why Need To Replace Ps4 Hard Drive With Ssd
The Play Station 4, or abbreviated as PS4, is an 8th generation home video game console published by Sony Entertainment. As the Successor of the PS3, PS4 has a bigger RAM, bigger hard drive, and provide a newer motion-sensing camera. Now, it has become one of the most popular and best-selling video console in the world.
However, many users would want to replace PS4 hard drive with an SSD for bigger capacity and better performance. The PS4 pro hard drive has 1T space, and PS4, PS4 slim only has 500GB space, which are smaller for their demands. Besides, an SSD also provides a better experience. It can significantly decrease the loading time and make your PS running more smoothly.
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Back Up Your Ps4 Data
Before you swap the disks, you need to back up your PS4’s data since you’ll be starting from a clean slate. This includes saved game data and any screenshots or video clips you’ve captured.
To back up everything, head to System > Backup and Restore > Back up PS4 and follow the steps to back up to an external drive. If you don’t have a big enough drive to back up everything, or only want to back up certain files, backing up individually is possible too.
If you’re a PlayStation Plus subscriber, you can back up your PS4 saves to the cloud by going to Settings > Application Saved Data Management > Saved Data in System Storage > Upload to Online Storage. From here, simply select each game you have, and upload all saved data to your PS Plus cloud storage.
If you’re not a PS Plus subscriber, you can copy your saves to a USB device. Go to the same menu as above, but choose Copy to USB Storage Device and follow the same steps to copy your saves to a flash drive.
To save any captures you don’t want to lose, go to Settings > System Storage Management > Capture Gallery, which will allow you to see everything you’ve recorded. Press Options and then Copy to USB Storage Device, or hit the button to upload media for safekeeping.
Don’t worry about backing up your games you’ll have to reinstall those after the swap.
Once you’ve done this, you’ve backed up everything you can. Make sure you have your PSN account login information, then proceed.