Skilled’s Score
Professionals
- Obtainable with as much as 8TB of capability
- Good general efficiency
- Beautiful efficiency with the drive close to full
- Very inexpensive within the decrease capacities
Cons
- Lagged behind the MP44L and others in random efficiency
- Hefty surcharge on the 8TB capability
Our Verdict
Using a DRAM-less (HMB/host reminiscence bus) design, the MP44 is obtainable with as much as 8TB of capability. It’s a superb performer general, however lagged a bit in random operations.
Whereas sooner in some methods and slower in others than its cheaper MP44L cousin, the MP44’s use of 232-layer NAND permits it to ship as much as a whopping 8TB of capability. It additionally delivered a pleasant shock throughout our drive-nearly-full testing.
Additional studying: See our roundup of one of the best SSDs to find out about competing merchandise.
MP44 design and value
Other than being a 2280 (22mm extensive, 80mm lengthy) M.2, PCIe 4.0 SSD, the MP44 is a bunch reminiscence bus design (your machine’s reminiscence is used for major caching duties) just like the older MP44L. On this case, nevertheless, using a brand-spanking-new Maxio MAP1602A controller and 232-layer TLC NAND.
On the time of this writing, the MP44 was out there on Amazon at $58 for 1TB (the capability of our evaluate unit), $110 for 2TB, $267 for 4TB, and $820 for 8TB. There’s additionally a 512GB model, although it was not listed on Amazon.
Observe that the MP44 may also be out there in a 2230 (22mm extensive, 30mm lengthy) model–the MP44S, which can slot in smaller M.2 slots comparable to these discovered on a Steam Deck.
The primary takeaway right here is that the MP44 is obtainable in huge capacities, albeit at a slight premium per terabyte for the 4TB model, and a big surcharge per terabyte for 8TB.
If you happen to want 4TB or 8TB, then the MP44 is the SSD you need.
Contemplating that the faster-in-some-ways MP44L is obtainable for $42.49 for 1TB, and $77.98 for 2TB, that drive is perhaps the higher cut price within the decrease capacities (see the efficiency part under).
The MP44 is warrantied for 5 years, which is mitigated solely by some moderately fascinating, and general beneficiant TBW (terabytes which may be written to the drive) scores: 700TBW for the 512GB, 1,450TBW for the 1TB, 2,500TBW for the 2TB, 3,000TBW for the 4TB, and 6,000TBW for the 8TB.
Contemplating the additional cash you pay for the 2 bigger capacities, their TBW scores are merely respectable. In reality, most customers by no means come near exceeding even a low TBW score.
How does the Teamgroup MP44 carry out?
Although successor drives are usually sooner than their predecessors, that was not the case in each take a look at with the MP44. In artificial benchmarks the MP44 seems sooner when it comes to sequential throughput, but it surely fell nicely off the tempo in random operations and barely off in our 48GB transfers.
As you’ll be able to see under, the MP44 beat up on its MP44L cousin, in addition to two equally priced drives, the Sabrent Rocket This fall and WD SN580, in CrystalDiskMark 8’s sequential throughput checks. AS SSD (not proven) supplied the same opinion.
Nevertheless, aside from 32-queue, single-thread learn take a look at, the MP44 was far much less facile throughout random operations, as proven under.
In the true world, slower random ops means the MP44 could not run your working system fairly as shortly as another drives. Not that it’s doable to discern a gradual NVMe SSD from a quick one as of late with the bare eye.
The MP44 turned in excellent occasions in our real-world 48GB transfers, even when it misplaced by two seconds to the older MP44L, which is a really quick drive in these checks.
Observe that 1TB drives typically undergo a bit in our 450GB write (proven under) attributable to much less NAND to make use of in secondary caching (writing as one-bit SLC, moderately than QLC on this case).
The Sabrent within the charts is amazingly quick on this take a look at, but it surely’s a 2TB drive that by no means slowed down an iota from its frenetic 3GBps switch price.
You possibly can inform from the next picture simply the place the difficulty within the 450GB write was–the purpose at which the write slowed. The MP44L slowed to 1.6GBps simply previous the midway level, whereas the MP44 slowed sooner, a few third of the way in which by.
As distributors are enhancing HMB and secondary caching, and the aim of our giant file write is to drive the SSD to put in writing NAND natively, we’ve began writing much more knowledge.
That is the place the MP44 shocked us. Whereas writing 900GB to the 1TB drive, it by no means slowed dramatically as did the MP44L, to not point out each different drive we’ve “exhausted” secondary cache on. Native writing can drop to 100MBps with QLC, and we usually see 200MBps to 500MBps with TLC.
The Phison-based MP44L ultimately drops to 140MBps (or much less) and took 43 minutes, 24 seconds to put in writing the 900GB. The MP44 by no means dropped under 800MBps in our first run and took solely 11 minutes and 44 seconds to put in writing the file. It did, nevertheless, drop to round 600MBps on the 80 % mark on subsequent 900GB writes. This nonetheless made for sub-12 minute occasions.
This type of sustained efficiency when a drive is sort of full is unprecedented. In actual fact, we reconstituted our giant information to ensure that de-duplication wasn’t an element, or at the very least not a significant one.
We’re undecided how the long-term, high-rate sustained writing was completed, however hats off to the Maxio controller and Micron NAND people. If the pattern continues, it might change our suggestion to overbuy by 2X your wants when it comes to capability, to one thing much less drastic.
General, the MP44 is quick, however a combined bag performance-wise in comparison with its Phison-based MP44L sibling. We have been mightily impressed by the 910GB write, however that kind of operation is extraordinarily uncommon, and the random numbers have been subpar. Once more, not one thing you’re prone to discover and not using a benchmark.
Do you have to purchase the Teamgroup MP44?
Although cut price and mid-range SSD costs have dropped by the ground, each penny counts and also you’re probably higher off with the cheaper, and in lots of instances sooner MP44L as much as 2TB of capability. If you happen to want 4TB or 8TB, then the MP44 is the SSD you need. Additionally, go for the MP44 in the event you plan to fill the drive additional than the 50 % that’s at the moment the business suggestion.
How we take a look at SSDs
Inner drive checks at the moment make the most of Home windows 11, 64-bit working on an X790 (PCIe 4.0/5.0) motherboard/i5-12400 CPU combo with two Kingston Fury 32GB DDR5 4800MHz modules (64GB of reminiscence complete). Each 20Gbps USB and Thunderbolt 4 are built-in to the again panel and Intel CPU/GPU graphics are used. The 48GB switch checks make the most of an ImDisk RAM disk taking over 58GB of the 64GB of complete reminiscence. The 450GB file is transferred from a Samsung 990 Professional 2TB which additionally runs the OS. The 900GB file is learn off of a Essential T700 PCIe 5.0 SSD.
Every take a look at is carried out on a newly formatted and TRIM’d drive so the outcomes are optimum. Observe that in regular use, as a drive fills up, efficiency will lower attributable to much less NAND for secondary caching, in addition to different elements.
Caveat: The efficiency numbers proven apply solely to the drive we have been shipped and to the capability examined. SSD efficiency can and can fluctuate by capability attributable to extra or fewer chips to shotgun reads/writes throughout and the quantity of NAND out there for secondary caching. Distributors additionally often swap elements. If you happen to ever discover a big discrepancy between the efficiency you expertise and that which we report, by all means, tell us.
