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So I might buy an external hardrive so I was wondering if I ever have to unplug and plug back in my external hardrive will my game downloads/save data be erased/formated from it?

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  • Just for clarification, do you mean unplug the USB connection from the Xbox? Or unplug your hard drive's power supply from the wall socket?
    – Dpeif
    Commented Feb 15, 2017 at 5:04

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No.

Hard drives are non-volatile memory. They do not require power to maintain their data.

If you power off the drive while it is currently saving something, that particular file will likely be lost or corrupted.

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  • thank you for ure answer but i have one more thing to ask if the power goes out and I have the hardrive plugged in will it mess up? (in this situation it wouldn't be saving)
    – captaincj2005
    Commented Feb 14, 2017 at 21:41
  • @captaincj2005 That depends on why the power goes out. If there's a power surge, and your drive isn't connected to a surge protector, then it's possible it may be damaged. That's true of any piece of electronics, though, not just hard drives. In general, no, you shouldn't be worried about the power going out.
    – DCShannon
    Commented Feb 14, 2017 at 21:42
  • @captaincj2005 not sure about the XBone but the PS3 and PS4 when they are turned off improperly (ie. like a sudden cut in power) when they boot up they scan the hard rive for errors and try to correct them. either way this can be helped by getting an Uninterrupted Power Supply (UPS) which keeps things going for a little while longer when power is lost giving you a chance to save and shut down properly
    – Memor-X
    Commented Feb 14, 2017 at 22:46

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