Teamgroup M200 moveable SSD evaluation: Quick, fashionable, tremendous inexpensive

Peter Johnson

May 2, 2023

At a look

Professional’s Ranking

Execs

Quick on a regular basis efficiency
Out there in as much as 8TB (finally) capability
Attractively styled

Cons

No TBW ranking
Firm will change elements if shortages demand
Writes gradual to 200MBps off cache

Our Verdict

Teamgroup continues its behavior of offering wonderful bang for the buck; 4TB of quick, engaging 20Gbps USB storage for $300 is one thing we are able to’t assist however respect.

Greatest Costs In the present day: Teamgroup T-Pressure M200 20Gbps USB SSD

$39.99

Some of us, like players and toters, will respect that the T-Pressure M200 20Gbs SSD is styled after the CheyTac M200 (aka Intervention) anti-material rifle—or as Teamgroup says “a M200 sniper rifle.”

Alternatively, there will likely be those that don’t love that reality. In reality, nevertheless, it’s unlikely most individuals would see a resemblance with out being advised. In total phrases, it’s gentle, good-looking, and quick—similar to I as soon as was.

Additional studying: See our roundups of the most effective exterior drives and greatest SSDs to study competing merchandise.

Teamgroup M200 design and options

Measuring 4.13-inches lengthy, by 2.18-inches large, by 0.43-inches thick, and weighing a shade beneath 3 ounces, the M200 is black and banded with alternating tough and semi-glossy surfaces.

It sports activities a military-style anchor level for lanyards, clips, and so forth. if for some purpose you’d truly like to hold it from a utility belt. Teamgroup made no claims that I noticed about IP rankings, however did say the drive has survived a 2-meter drop take a look at. From my hands-on, that appears believable. Then once more, most SSDs will survive such a fall.

The T-Pressure M200 is at the moment out there in $40/250GB, $58/500GB, $260/2TB, and the $300/4TB model we examined. The $90/1TB and 8TB variations needs to be out there in some unspecified time in the future—if I needed to guess, I’d say $700 for the 8TB just because super-capacious drives typically carry a premium. I could possibly be improper and Teamgroup will value it consistent with the others.

Notice that the “blue” stripes are reflections from the room’s lighting—the T-Pressure M200 is all black.

The interior SSD is NVMe (it must be to realize 20Gbps speeds) and makes use of both TLC or QLC, in line with the fact-check sheet the corporate returned. They’d not, nevertheless, specify which capacities used which. The corporate advised me they reserve the correct to vary elements if shortages come up. Hopefully, they don’t seem to be swapping TLC and QLC in the identical fashions and capacities.

As you’ll learn under, benchmark and naked drive on a regular basis efficiency of the 4TB mannequin was certainly that of a 20Gbps SSD, however that was whereas caching information (writing it as SLC, or one cell/bit at a time) was absolutely engaged. Information is later transferred to the native format as time permits.

The place you typically see a distinction in TLC versus QLC efficiency is when the NAND is written off cache, natively as 3-bit or 4-bit. TLC can usually nonetheless preserve 450MBps or higher, whereas QLC can drop all the way in which all the way down to 90MBps to 200MBps.

After filling the drive, the M200’s final low velocity was round 150MBps, so I’m calling the NAND in our 4TB take a look at unit: QLC.

The M200 is warrantied for 5 years; nevertheless, Teamgroup didn’t present the TBW (terabytes which may be written) numbers which may reduce that brief. As exterior SSDs are hardly ever written to sufficient to wear down NAND in 5 years, I’m considering you’re protected on this occasion.

The T-Pressure M200 moveable SSD seems to be powerful and walks the stroll with its speedy efficiency.

How does the Teamgroup M200 carry out?

The M200 wasn’t the quickest 20Gbps drive we’ve examined—nevertheless, it was shut and definitely quick sufficient for the common consumer. We’re speaking a one % drawback total to the WD Black Sport Drive P50.

The M200 was a bit slower beneath CrystalDiskMark 8, however dominated the 450GB write take a look at. Most certainly, the M200 having 4TB of NAND in comparison with the WD’s 2TB influenced the latter end result to a point.

The Teamgroup T-Pressure M200 wrote quicker, however learn slower than the WD Black P50.

Notice that our new take a look at mattress utilizing the latest model of Home windows 11 has proven some decrease numbers, particularly with regards to sequential assessments with fewer threads and queues. Nonetheless, any drives in contrast have been re-tested on the brand new system and can share within the phenomenon.

Whereas the M200 couldn’t fairly match the WD Black P50 within the 48GB transfers, it was darn shut and subjectively tied. Shorter bars are higher.

As soon as once more, the M200 is a 20Gbps USB (USB 3.2×2) SSD and USB 20Gbps ports aren’t almost as frequent as 5/10Gbps (USB 3.x) ports. However the M200, as with all of the exterior 20Gbps drives we’ve examined, is backwards appropriate. You’ll get roughly 1Gbps sustained throughput over the way more frequent 10Gbps ports, and someplace north of 500MBps with 5Gbps USB.

That is the place the T-Pressure M200 caught and surpassed the P50. However a part of the benefit was probably as a result of it having 4TB of NAND for caching in comparison with the WD’s 2TB.

You’ll have observed you could divide USB’s velocity ranking by 10 to get the precise anticipated throughput. Usually (and logically), you divide bits by 8 to get MB or GB. Nonetheless, USB protocol overhead is roughly 20 % of accessible bandwidth so the rule of thumb is divvy by 10.

The 4TB M200 is probably going utilizing TLC in line with this efficiency off cache.

As acknowledged earlier, as soon as off cache, write efficiency slows to a snails tempo as proven within the display screen seize above.

How we take a look at

Exterior drive assessments at the moment make the most of Home windows 11 (22H2) 64-bit operating on an X790 (PCIe 5.0) motherboard/i5-12400 CPU combo with two Kingston Fury 32GB DDR5 modules (64GB of reminiscence whole). Intel built-in graphics are used. The 48GB switch assessments make the most of an ImDisk RAM disk taking over 58GB of the 64GB whole reminiscence. The 450GB file is transferred from a Samsung 990 Professional 2TB, which additionally comprises the working system.

Every take a look at is carried out on a newly formatted and TRIM’d drive so the outcomes are optimum. Notice that in regular use, as any drive fills up, efficiency will lower as a result of much less NAND for caching, and different elements. The coverage for all drives is ready to “Higher efficiency” with write caching enabled.

The efficiency numbers proven apply solely to the drive we have been shipped in addition to the capability examined. SSD efficiency can range by capability as a result of extra or fewer chips to learn/write throughout and the quantity of NAND out there for secondary caching (writing TLC/QLC as SLC). Distributors additionally often swap elements and Teamgroup reserves this proper. In the event you ever discover a big discrepancy between the efficiency you expertise and that which we report (programs being roughly equal), by all means—tell us.