PS5 Digital Edition doesn’t come with a disc drive but what if you tried to mod one into it? Someone was crazy enough to try it and share their findings on YouTube.
There doesn’t appear to be much of a difference between the PS5 Disc and its Digital variant. The price difference is obviously $100 but aside from losing the disc drive, there is no other loss for the PS5 Digital Edition.
Theoretically, it should be possible to put a disc drive on the PS5 since the firmware supports it, and thus run a game this way. This is what transpired the idea for a popular YouTube channel TronicsFix who shared a video of this experiment.
This is a fascinating video to watch because it shows the difference between the PS5 Digital and Disc Edition motherboard. It also leads to the discovery of how the disc drive actually powers up and operates on the PS5.
Long story short, the experiment ends up as a failure because while the modder is able to successfully power up the disc drive and solder the necessary parts on the Digital Edition motherboard, there is no way to let the console read and recognize discs. Keep in mind that the user actually inserts the disc the wrong way in the video but later clarifies in the comments that he tried the correct way and it was still a failure.
If you were curious to see how an experiment like that could end up, make sure to watch the video. The PS5 Digital Edition is available for $399 while the Disc Edition can be bought for $499.
