With chip shortages being a nuisance that is only emboldening the scalper markets, choosing what electronic storage to spend your hard-earned money on is quite the feat! Or, you can just read this gift guide! In this guide, we list our top pick for each storage category. Now, most of these drives are actually on some sort of sale at the time of this posting but, just to be fair, we are reporting the MSRP in this list.
M.2 Storage Drives
Kingston 2TB (2000GB) Fury Renegade SSD M.2 (2280), NVMe, PCIe 4.0, Gen 4×4, Heatsink, 7300MB/s R, 7000MB/s
This drive is actually available with and without the heatsink unit, so you have your choice. Either way, the Kingston 2TB Fury Renegade is a fast M.2 drive for your PC or PS5 that will definitely allow you to load and store game data quickly and efficiently. Plus, if you get the version with the heatsink, you can rest easy with the knowledge that it has some enhanced cooling capabilities.
Price: $244.99
Internal 2.5″ SSDs
SAMSUNG 870 QVO SATA III 2.5″ SSD 2TB Internal Solid State Hard Drive
Samsung’s 870 QVO SATA III internal SSD is an outstanding upgrade for your desktop or laptop computer – so long as it can accommodate a 2.5″ SSD. The SATA drive technology might not be as fast as its newer NVMe brethren, but it is more widely supported by older hardware, and still tons better than older platter based magnetic storage. Plus, this drive is produced by Samsung and is extremely reliable.
Price: $199.99
External Hard Drives
WD 8TB My Book Desktop External Hard Drive
Western Digital has been making computer storage solutions for a long time, and the 8TB My Book USB 3.0 external hard drive is an outstanding way to keep your files safe. It does require an external power adapter but that’s okay – it’s got fans to keep running which will help extend the longevity of the drives. If you are in need of a backup or file store outside of your computer’s case, you won’t go wrong with this option!
Price: $199.99
USB Flash Drive
Samsung Fit Plus (MUF-256AB)
The Samsung Fit Plus USB 3.0 flash drive is, quite frankly, an incredible piece of technology. It is fast, reliable, small, and can be purchased in up to 256GB capacity (which would only cost $39.99). It’s the best flash drive we’ve seen all year and can’t recommend it enough.
Price: $39.99
