Microsoft's new Xbox One S All-Digital Edition chops $50 off the price of the console by removing the optical drive. And once the internet stops laughing at "Xbox One SAD Edition," we can discuss its merits as a piece of gaming hardware.

First, yes, Xbox One SAD is hilarious. When the name was leaked a few weeks ago, I thought it was a placeholder moniker that would be changed once Xbox execs got wind of the acronym. I'm not surprised it survived, though. The Xbox One was immediately shortened to "XBone," and the Xbox itself got its name because the project was called the "DirectXbox" and they couldn't think of a better name.

But that's just a name. Let's talk about features and the future of gaming. The $249 Xbox One S All-Digital has the same processing power and features of the excellent Xbox One S, save for one major change. There's no optical drive, so you can't play any games on discs; you need to download games from the Microsoft Store.

On paper, that isn't a big deal. Digital stores have grown in popularity, to the point that GameStop has been in trouble due to fewer people buying discs. I have a massive digital games library that spans a half dozen different platforms; if you're a gamer, you probably have something similar. In recognition of how big that market has become, PCMag's parent company, Ziff Davis, even acquired digital game bundler and seller Humble Bundle.

Keeping your game library digital is just more convenient, just as streaming Netflix is easier than waiting for a physical DVD to arrive in the mail. You don't need to change discs; just press a button and open the game of your choice. It's handy and nearly every game takes advantage of it.

The problem is the Xbox One All-Digital doesn't add that as a feature. You can already keep almost all of your games on the Xbox One S or Xbox One X's hard drive, or an external drive connected to the system. The convenience is already there. The Xbox One SAD only removes a feature, and it's a big one.

Maybe you keep every single game you own in a digital library instead of on discs. But the optical drive means the option is still there, and that opens up a wide number of choices outside the Microsoft Store. I've seen physical copies of games on sale for significantly less than they are on different digital stores; I picked up Dragonball FighterZ on disc for my PS4 because I found it at a GameStop for $30 when the PS Store still had it for $60. That isn't the case on the Xbox right now, where the Microsoft Store has it for $20 compared with $40 at GameStop and Best Buy. But my point is that these prices fluctuate. More game-buying options means more opportunities to save money by shopping around.

If you buy a game on disc, you own that disc, which means you can sell, trade in, or lend that disc to friends. If you buy it on a digital store, you own that game only as long as the store is up. Once the servers go down, your library is gone. That probably won't happen any time soon, but as consoles evolve, game stores and libraries can and will disappear. Even if the libraries stay, your old console's ability to get online will not.

Eventually hardware becomes obsolete, updates slow down, and access to services fade. Having a game on disc means that as long as you have a system that can play that disc, you can play that game (unless it's always online, which has its own issues). There are plenty of PlayStation 2 and Xbox games I can only play on my PS2 because I have the discs, including one of my favorite games of all time, Shadow Hearts: Covenant. Even with backwards compatibility and digital stores offering versions of many of those games, the compatibility lists and stores don't cover every game that was released on their respective systems.

There's another big disadvantage to losing the optical drive: no ability to play Blu-ray Discs. The Xbox One S remains an excellent Ultra HD Blu-ray player, supporting 4K HDR video in HDR10 and Dolby Vision. It has lots of streaming services too, like nearly every TV and device you can connect to a TV has, but that isn't always enough. The same logic about digital game stores applies even more to video-streaming services.

If you want to watch anything obscure or niche, you probably won't find it on the major streaming services. You might be able to find it to rent or buy on VOD stores, but that doesn't cover everything, especially when you get really esoteric or old. Sleepaway Camp IV: The Survivor? Need the DVD. Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends? It's $2 an episode on Amazon (the entire series is $50 on Amazon). Go Nagai's original Mazinger Z (not Mazinger: Edition Z Impact)? Not even Crunchyroll has it, so you better find a DVD. The Gen 13 animated movie featuring Mark Hamill as Threshold? Imported or bootleg DVD, since it was never released in North America (I have a very eclectic DVD collection).

I won't lie; I watch movies and TV on streaming services far more than I watch discs. But I still have a disc library because it means I own those movies, I can play those movies whenever I want regardless of internet connection, and many of them I simply can't find online through legitimate means. I can watch both streaming video and discs, and that means I have more choices.

That's a lot of flexibility to give up just to save $50. We'll take a closer look at the Xbox One S All-Digital Edition when we get closer to the system's May 7 launch, but giving up the optical drive seems like a pretty huge sacrifice for a pretty small discount, when the Xbox One S is still excellent.

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