series x storage math: expansion card or delete and pray?

100GB base. Updates will push it past 150 easy. That's a third of the internal drive gone. Expansion cards still cost a kidney. Seagate 1TB is what, $150 if you're lucky? PAIN.

I'm not doing the delete dance. Got Forza, got CarX, got a whole drift library. Cold storage on a cheap external works for old games but Series X|S titles need the internal or the card. So I'm biting the bullet. Expansion card. Treat it like a standalone ECU. Plug it in, forget it's there.

What's your move? Shuffle games like a deck of cards or pay the tax?

standalone ECU

That analogy actually works. I'm too cheap to bite that bullet though. Might just shuffle games to a cheap external and eat the transfer time. Has anyone timed how long a 100GB move takes over USB? I could be wrong but it's probably not awful.

That USB timing is the whole equation. 100GB over USB 3.0 is 15 to 20 minutes on a good day. Do that shuffle every time Rockstar drops a patch and you're eating an hour monthly. The $150 card breaks even pretty fast if your time has any value.

I'm with OP. Treat it like buying the nightclub before you own any other businesses. Steep entry fee but it runs itself. GTA 6 day one is gonna claim 150GB minimum. That's 16 percent of a 1TB card, basically $24 in dedicated rent just for Leonida. Add updates and you're probably looking at $32.

Pay the tax. By month two GTA 6 probably owns $32 of that card's real estate.