How much space does MSFS take anyways?

[LCAir 7]

My pc is almost 2 years old now. When built SSDs were kinda pricey so I went with a 500GB SSD for the OS (Win10/64 Home) and flight sim and a 1TB HDD for everything else. When MSFS came out I uninstalled XPlane11 from the SSD and replaced it with FS2020. Everything worked well until today. There isn't room for the 102.82 GB update. So I am downloading it to the HDD not knowing if the sim will access it there or not. At least I can get the sim up and running and go in and limit the scenery cache size.

Long term though I am considering options. Most likely is to add another SSD of 1TB and swap MSFS over on to that and leaving it as the sole occupant and Win10 alone on the 500GB SSD. I am seeking opinions on this or any other ideas you may have. Will FS2020 access the update on the HDD? 

P.S My motherboard is an ASUS Z370A. The 500GB SSD occupies the M.2 slot. I can just add a 2.5" SATA SSD no problem right?

[Bert Pieke 7,585]

You can add a 500 GB SSD (or larger) and use the Windows Settings / Apps / MSFS / Move option to move MSFS to the new SSD.

My MSFS install is currently 200 GB.

Edited September 24, 2020 by Bert Pieke

[JustanotherPilot 241]

I'm pretty sure the last update was about 15gb (1.8.3.0) and approx 100gb the complete install, I have the same problem with the latest Win 10 2004 update, there isn't enough space on my Lenovo Netbook SSD (32g) to install, I'm slowly deleting bloatware and programs to make space. I would suggest you go that bit extra and buy a 2TB SSD, painful now in price, but good insurance in the long term.

 

Steve

[LCAir 7]

When downloading it said 1.2 and change GB. Took forever- course it was going to the HD. MS wouldn't mislead me would they? 

[RaptyrOne 1,412]

I have given MSFS its own dedicated 500GB SSD. This is more than enough. The sim takes up somewhere around 120GB at the moment, leaving plenty headroom for add-ons and future updates. A 256GB SSD might become too small in the future. 1 TB is huge overkill, unless you put other stuff on it.

Windows gets its own 500GB SSD which also holds all programs and Steam if you use it. SSD’s and HDD’s do not function at peak performance if they are nearly at max capacity. In fact your whole pc will be slowed down if you max drives out. They need some free space to hold data while it is being processed by both programs and Windows itself.