If you’ve never considered adding a solid-state drive (SSD) to your PC or game console, October Prime Day is a great time to start — and if you already know what a difference extra storage can make, October Prime Day is the perfect time to outfit your build. For those who haven’t heard of SSDs, they’re physical upgrades that stack on top of a device’s storage to make more files accessible at once. The more data a console or PC can hold at a time, the quicker it can retrieve and process that data, which makes everything run faster. Here are the best SSD deals we’ve managed to find on Amazon.
Best October Prime Day SSD deals
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Crucial BX500 1TB 3D NAND SATA 2.5-inch Internal SSD for $69 (28 percent off): The BX500 is Crucial’s budget-conscious SSD option, but that doesn’t mean it disappoints. This internal solid state drive cuts down on battery consumption and improves processing with read speeds reaching 540MB/s. It comes with a three-year warranty, too.
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Crucial P310 2TB for $112 (25 percent off): The 2TB level of the Crucial P310 is a compact drive that works great in small laptops or Steam Decks — especially the latter, given Valve’s warning against cramming in large SSDs. For this small size and great price, you get read speeds of over 7,000MB/s, plus a built-in heatsink and more efficient use of the device battery.
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Samsung 990 Evo Plus 1TB for $60 (43 percent off): This is an incredible deal on an internal SSD from a reliable brand. All capacities of the Samsung 990 Evo Plus are currently on sale, but even the 1TB option can visibly boost your performance with top read speeds of 7,250MB/s. There’s no heatsink, but nickel plating on the controller reduces both heat output and energy use.
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Samsung 990 PRO 2 TB for $140 (33 percent off): Samsung’s 990 Pro series represents a massive leap forward for the brand, cutting energy costs by around half while boosting speeds up to at least 7,000MB/s write and 5,000MB/s read. This version comes with 2TB of storage and its own built-in heatsink.
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Samsung SSD 9100 PRO 4TB for $370 (35 percent off): The 9100 Pro series comes with speeds and capacities that dwarf even the 990 Pro. If you need to improve your speeds while training large AI models or simply playing massive games, this is about the most power commercially available right now.
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Samsung Fit Plus 256GB for $23 (30 percent off): The Samsung Fit Plus isn’t just the best thumb drive on the market right now — it’s one of the best SSDs, period. This deal gets you 256GB of storage and read speeds of 400MB/s for almost unfathomably cheap. It’s also built to resist water, extreme temperatures, magnets and even radiation.
Best October Prime Day portable SSD deals
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Crucial X10 4TB Portable SSD for $240 (39 percent off): The Crucial X9 is our current favorite portable SSD, but the X10 is a step beyond. Based on USB 3.2, it’s compatible with a wide range of devices, and reaches reading speeds of 2,100MB/s — all in an extremely portable pocket-sized case.
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SanDisk 2TB Extreme Portable SSD for $150 (29 percent off): The SanDisk Extreme line of portable SSDs provides a great middle ground in both price and performance. Read speeds of 1,050MB/s are enough for transferring most files you’ll encounter day-to-day. Its external design holds up too, with a large carabiner loop, IP65 waterproofing and dustproofing and drop protection as high as three meters.
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Kingston SX1000 1TB High Performance for $75 (35 percent off): If you can’t swing a Crucial X9 or X10 right now, Kingston offers a much more affordable alternative. The SX1000 can handle both PC backups and gaming storage with ease, nearly matching the X9 in our speed tests. It’s also easy to carry around, though keep a tight grip as it’s not officially rated for any drop height.
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Seagate Storage Expansion Card 2TB for $200 (44 percent off): This Seagate SSD is specifically for expanding storage on the Xbox Series X and S, and it’s designed to meet Xbox specs exactly. You’ll get exactly the same performance booting a game from this card as you would from internal Xbox storage, which makes data management infinitely easier.
Best October Prime Day microSD card deals
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Lexar 256GB Professional Silver SD Card for $22 (52 percent off): The Lexar 256GB Professional Silver line serves up fast sequential read and write speeds, both in the neighborhood of 200MB/s. That’s more than enough space and speed for photos and videos in a high-end camera, and comes with professional waterproofing at a very good price.
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Samsung PRO Plus microSD Memory Card for $75 (35 percent off): The Samsung PRO Plus was a strong runner-up in our testing of the best microSD cards, with speeds only beaten out by an even higher-end card from Samsung. This excellent deal should be plenty of speed and space for most normal tasks, though, from photography to gaming.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/deals/the-best-prime-day-ssd-deals-save-on-gear-from-samsung-sandisk-crucial-and-others-170039457.html?src=rss