Best Storage Devices
One overlooked area of retro gaming tech is that of storage devices. True, it’s not one of the more glamorous subjects associated with this fantastic hobby, but it is a subject that needs to be addressed. The decision you make regarding which storage device you utilise can have a significant effect on your gaming experience.
The storage device you end up going with will not only determine the number of games you can access on your device, it will also have an effect on the speed at which your system accesses the files. In some cases users have seen significant delays when booting up systems and loading ROMs, purely down to their storage device.
I have experienced both the good and bad effects of different storage devices. Below are the different ones that I would recommend.
Best Micro SD Card – SanDisk Extreme Pro 32 GB microSD Card
The type of storage device normally associated with single board computers is the micro SD card. It is rare that you will find any other type of storage device (except eMMC but these are generally utilised as an alternative to an already installed micro SD card port) that has been natively incorporated into any modern SBC. For that reason it is important that you consider which micro SD card you decide to go for when building your retro gaming machine.
The SanDisk Extreme Pro 32 GB micro SD card has been bench, boot and speed tested against a number of other leading brands of micro SD card and overall has come out on top in the majority of categories. I have selected the 32 GB version as it is documented that this is the maximum size a Raspberry Pi SBC can use. There have been reports of a 64GB micro SD card being usable but I think it best to stick with what is documented in this case.
As it is, every single board computer requires some form of storage device and that is generally a micro SD card. You could do a lot worse than to select this version for your retro gaming machine.
CHECK PRICE ON AMAZONBest Memory Stick – SanDisk Ultra Flair 256GB
When it comes to building a retro gaming system on a single board computer you generally store the main operating system files on a micro SD card, the port for which is commonly incorporated into the SBC itself. The only issue you have from there is that the maximum size of SD card that most SBCs can use is usually 32GB. This therefore limits the storage space you have available for ROMs. A solution in this case is to keep your operating system files on the micro SD card, but store your ROMs on an external memory stick which you can connect to one of the USB ports.
The SanDisk Ultra Flair is my go to memory stick of choice. Physically It’s small in size but still manages to cram in a lot of storage capacity. For me 256GB is plenty of storage space for this type of device. There are larger capacity options available but the higher this gets, the larger the price becomes. If you’re looking for anything more than 256GB I would suggest considering an external hard drive. As it is, this memory stick suits my needs perfectly.
CHECK PRICE ON AMAZONBest External Hard Drive – Toshiba Canvio Basics 2TB External Hard Drive
If you’re looking to include CD based ROMs in your retro gaming library, then you’re going to need a whole heap of storage space. A single CD based game for the PS One, for example, generally comes in at over 1GB. So if you want the entire PS One gaming library as well as maybe the Dreamcast and/or a few Mega CD titles, you’ll need to start thinking about which external hard drive to get.
For me the best option has always been the 2TB Toshiba Canvio Basics external hard drive. Powered by USB it doesn’t need it’s own power source to get it up and running. It’s also reasonably priced for its size and functions with speed and reliability. What more could you ask for?
