Teamgroup MP44 1TB SSD – Affordable, Fast, and Efficient, but Not Always the Same

Today we are testing an NVMe SSD from Teamgroup, the MP44 model, which the company kindly sent us for evaluation. Thank you Teamgroup 🙂

It comes in the M.2 form factor with a 64Gbps interface, meaning 4 PCIe 4.0 lanes, NVMe 1.4 protocol, and capacities ranging from 512GB up to 8TB. Its price usually falls around 70 USD for the 1TB unit and just over 120 USD for the 2TB model.

MP44 Specs

Here are some more detailed specifications of the SSD we tested (1TB unit):

Software

Teamgroup SSDs come with management software that allows monitoring, SMART data reading, and other functions.

Unboxing

The SSD comes in a white box highlighting the brand, model, and capacity, with a plastic window on the back that makes the drive and its label visible.

Inside, the SSD is placed in a protective plastic blister. No accessories are included.

This model uses a single-sided design with ICs only on the front of the PCB, which helps with SSD cooling, and it does not include a heatsink. We will see later how it performs in temperature tests.

On the front side of the PCB we find three main chips, two NAND Flash modules, a controller, and some load switches and MOSFETs that provide power delivery.

Controller
The SSD controller is responsible for handling all data management, over-provisioning, and garbage collection, among other background functions. And of course, this is what enables the SSD to deliver good performance.

This SSD uses a controller from MaxioTech, model MAP1602A, which is a 32-bit ARM ISA quad-core Cortex® R5 controller, manufactured on TSMC’s 12nm process. It is similar to other solutions from more well-known manufacturers in the market such as Phison and Silicon Motion. This controller is DRAM-less, so it relies on technologies like HMB to store metadata tables.

In addition, it supports 4 communication channels with a bus speed of up to 2400 MT/s, which stands out since most DRAM-less Gen4 4-channel controllers usually support only up to 1600 MT/s. It also provides support for up to 16 dies through “chip enable” commands, which are direct physical connections to the dies. As we will see shortly, its NAND Flash modules operate at 2400 MT/s.

DRAM Cache or H.M.B.
Every high-end SSD that aims to deliver consistent high performance needs a buffer to store its mapping tables, also known as the Flash Translation Layer or Look-up table. This allows it to achieve better random performance and improved responsiveness.

As mentioned earlier, since this is a DRAM-less controller, it does not support DRAM cache. Therefore, to store the metadata table, it allocates 40 MiB of the system’s RAM to speed up access to this table.

NAND Flash
Regarding its storage integrated circuits, the 1TB SSD comes with two NAND Flash chips from the Chinese manufacturer YMTC, model CDT2A. In this case, they are 512Gb (64GB) dies with 128 data layers and a total of 141 gates, resulting in an array efficiency of 90.7%. Out of the SSD’s 141 layers, 128 are allocated for storage, which leads to this efficiency.

Each NAND Flash chip has 8 dies with 512Gb density, totaling 512GB per NAND, which together make up 1TB. They communicate with the controller at their maximum bus speed of 2400 MT/s for optimal performance.

Each of these dies has 4 planes, allowing the controller to increase parallelism when accessing the dies, thereby improving performance. It is important to note that there are two models of YMTC 128-layer dies: the ones released some time ago, known as CDT1B, which also have 4 planes, as shown in the photo below.

The new dies feature a 1×4 die design, meaning they are positioned side by side vertically. In the CDT2A dies, also known as X2-9060, the planes are arranged in a 2×2 alignment, creating a different grouping of planes, as we will see in the image below.

These changes allow for greater efficiency in the 2×2 design, as the die’s shape is altered, modifying the layout of the management circuitry and CMOS. This results in smaller, easier-to-manufacture dies, not to mention a likely reduction in cost.

In YMTC’s “dual deck” design, the top deck contains 72 layers, while the bottom has 69 gate layers, totaling 141 gate layers when counting the string selectors, dummy word lines, and other components.

Just as a reminder, in our unit, the dies used appear to be the CDT2A.

PMIC (Power Delivery)

Like any electronic component performing work, SSDs also have a certain level of power consumption, which can range from a few milliwatts up to nearly 10 W, approaching the limit of some connectors or slots. The circuit responsible for overall power management is the PMIC, which stands for “Power Management IC,” a chip that provides power to the other components.

It was not possible to identify the load switch used.

SSD Power States

As we always mention in power consumption analyses, in this section we will take a closer look at the power states of this SSD.

This SSD has five primary power states: three active and two idle. The active states feature low input/output latencies and a maximum “consumption” of 6.5 W, which, as we will see later, is actually much lower in practice. The idle power states, on the other hand, have latencies above 5 ms and a maximum consumption of 500 mW.

Some TEAMGROUP MP44 1TB tidbits

Just as RAM modules can vary in their memory ICs, the same applies to SSDs, where components such as the controller and NAND Flash can differ.

Up to the time of this review, several other variants of this SSD have been identified. It can also be sold with Phison E18 and E27T controllers, as well as Kioxia BiCS5 and BiCS6 NANDs, or YMTC EET1A. In other words, this review represents only the variant with the MAP1602 controller and YMTC CDT2A NANDs.

Test bench
Operating System: Windows 11 Pro 64-bit (Build: 23H2)

Processor: Intel Core i7 13700K (5.7GHz all cores) (E-cores and Hyper-threading disabled)

RAM: 2 × 16 GB DDR4-3200MHz CL-16 Netac (with XMP)

Motherboard: MSI Z790-P PRO WIFI D4 (BIOS Version: 7E06v18)

Graphics Card: RTX 4070 Ti Super Colorful (Drivers: 555.xx)

Storage (OS): SSD Solidigm P44 Pro 2TB (Firmware: 001C)

Tested SSD: Teamgroup T-Force Z540 1TB SSD (Firmware: EQFM22.3)

Intel Z790 Chipset Driver Version: 10.1.19376.8374

Windows: Indexing disabled to avoid affecting test results

Windows: Updates disabled to avoid affecting test results

Windows: Most background apps disabled

Windows Boot Test: Clean image with only drivers and all updates installed

pSLC Cache Test: SSD cooled with fans to prevent thermal throttling from affecting results

Windows: Antivirus disabled to reduce variation between runs

Tested SSDs: Used as secondary drive with 0% used space, and in other tests with 50% used space to represent a realistic scenario

Quarch PPM QTL1999 – Power Consumption Test: Conducted with three parameters, in idle with the drive as secondary, and after a period in idle, write operations performed for 1 hour with the average consumption recorded

• The tests were carried out by Gabriel Ferraz, so our thanks go to him, along with the link to his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@gabrielferrazdetetivehardware

CRYSTALDISKMARK
We performed synthetic sequential and random tests with the following configurations:

Sequential: 2 × 1 GiB (1 MiB blocks), 8 queues, 1 thread

Random: 2 × 1 GiB (4 KiB blocks), 1 queue, 1/2/4/8/16 threads

When testing its sequential speeds, it delivers as promised, coming very close to the Acer Predator GM7 we tested previously.

As for its latencies, in reading it is similar to the Netac NV7000-T, while in writing it even surpasses the Kingston KC3000!

When testing its random speeds at a queue depth of 4, we observed that in reading it is basically a technical tie with the Crucial T700, while in writing its performance was slightly lower, yet still comparable to the T-Force Z540. It’s worth noting that both the T-Force and the Crucial are Gen5 models.

ATTO Disk Benchmark QD1 e QD4

We conducted a test using ATTO to observe the SSDs’ speeds with different block sizes. In this benchmark, the settings were as follows:

Queue Depth: 1 and 4

Blocks: 512 Bytes to 8 MiB

File Size: 256 MB

The ATTO Disk Benchmark is a software that performs sequential speed tests using compressible files. In other words, for simulating a typical data transfer load in Windows, performance is usually observed in the 128 KB to 1 MiB block range. In these tests, the SSD ended up lagging behind.

Using QD1, we noticed that in reading it competes with SSDs like the Netac NV7000-T, while in writing it even surpasses the Solidigm P44 Pro in some of the tests.

3DMark – Storage Benchmark

In this benchmark, various storage-focused tests are conducted, including game load times for titles like Call of Duty Black Ops 4 and Overwatch, recording and streaming gameplay at 1080p 60 FPS using OBS, installing several games, and transferring files from game folders.

In this benchmark, using more realistic and traditional everyday usage traces, the MP44 lagged behind in our comparison.

PCMARK 10 – FULL SYSTEM DRIVE BENCHMARK
In this test, we used the Storage Test tool and the “Full System Drive Benchmark,” which performs both light and heavy tests on the SSD.

Among these traces, we can observe tests such as:

Copying 339 JPEG files (Photos) to another drive (Read)

Windows 10 Boot

Adobe After Effects: Launch until ready for use

Adobe Illustrator: Launch until ready for use

Adobe Premiere Pro: Launch until ready for use

Adobe Lightroom: Launch until ready for use

Adobe Photoshop: Launch until ready for use

Battlefield V: Loading time until main menu

Call of Duty Black Ops 4: Loading time until main menu

Overwatch: Loading time until main menu

Using Adobe After Effects

Using Microsoft Excel

Using Adobe Illustrator

Using Adobe InDesign

Using Microsoft PowerPoint

Using Adobe Photoshop (intensive use)

Using Adobe Photoshop (lighter use)

Copying 4 ISO files, totaling 20GB, to a secondary drive (Write Test)

Copying an ISO file (Read-Write Test)

Copying an ISO file to a secondary drive (Read Test)

Copying 339 JPEG files (Photos) to the tested drive (Write)

Creating copies of these JPEG files (Read-Write)

In this other test, which is slightly older and more focused on productivity with a higher write demand, the MP44 ranked between the AIGO SMI70 and the SN850X.

TEST – Adobe Premiere Pro 2021
Next, we used Adobe Premiere to measure the average time to open a project of about 16.5GB, with 4K resolution, 120Mbps bitrate, and full of effects, until it was ready for editing. It’s important to note that the tested SSD was always used as a secondary drive without the operating system installed, as this could affect the results and introduce inconsistencies.

When using Premiere to load a project of over 16GB, the MP44 ended up tying with the Kootion X16 Plus and the Predator GM7.

GAME AND WINDOWS LOADING TIME TEST
We performed a comparison between multiple SSDs and an HDD using a clean installation of Windows 10 Build 21H1 along with the Final Fantasy XIV benchmark, opening the campaign mode. The test records the best result after three consecutive system boots, measuring the total time until reaching the desktop, with the score reported by the application. For this reason, it is slower than a standard boot to the desktop screen.

In this game, we see that the Teamgroup SSD took 7.5 seconds to load all textures and scenes in the benchmark, which is a good result, placing it between the Netac NV7000-T and the AIGO SMI70.

In this program, the measurement includes the time from boot until the last OS drivers are loaded. In this case, it was a clean installation with only essential system drivers, such as Network, Wireless + Bluetooth, Audio, Nvidia drivers, PCH, and others. Here, we can see that the MP44 ranked at the top of the comparison.

SUSTAINED SPEED TEST | SLC CACHING
Most SSDs on the market today use SLC caching technology, in which a certain percentage of the drive’s storage capacity—whether MLC (2 bits per cell), TLC (3 bits per cell), or QLC (4 bits per cell)—is used to store only 1 bit per cell. This acts as a read/write buffer, where the controller writes data to the cache first and, once the buffer is full, transfers it to the native NAND Flash (MLC/TLC/QLC).

Using IOmeter, we can get an idea of the SLC cache size on this SSD, since manufacturers often do not disclose this value. From our tests, we found that it has a pSLC cache of approximately 170GB, maintaining an average speed of around 5817 MB/s until the buffer is exhausted.

After writing 168GB, it began writing to the blocks programmed natively as TLC, where the average speed was approximately 2073 MB/s, which is good. It maintained this average speed from 169GB up to around 760GB.

After 760GB, the folding process began, where the blocks previously in pSLC mode were reprogrammed back to TLC, resulting in a significant drop in performance. The SSD maintained an average write speed of 685 MB/s until the drive was full.

We also conducted a test to see how long the SSD would take to recover part of its buffer during our test suite, which ranges from 30 seconds to 2 hours in idle, comparing scenarios with TRIM and garbage collection enabled versus disabled. When tested without using TRIM/GC, we observed that it was able to recover about 80GB in just 30 seconds of idle time.

With TRIM and garbage collection enabled, it recovers 168GB in just a few seconds.

FILE COPY TEST
In this test, files were copied from a RAM Disk to the SSD to see how it performs. The test used the Windows 10 21H1 ISO of 6.25GB (1 file) along with the CSGO installation folder of 25.2GB.

When using the Windows 10 .ISO image, the MP44 stood out and finished at the top of the comparison.

When using the Windows 10 ISO, the MP44 excelled and finished at the top of the comparison.

Temperature Test
In this part of the analysis, we will observe the SSD’s temperature during a stress test, where the drive continuously receives files, allowing us to determine if any thermal throttling occurs in its internal components that could cause bottlenecks or performance loss.

As seen above, this SSD has a default thermal limit of 95?°C, which is quite high—one might even recommend lowering it. The SSD performed well and did not exceed 74?°C according to its sensor, indicating a reasonable thermal margin, all without the need for a heatsink.

POWER CONSUMPTION AND EFFICIENCY

SSDs, like many other components in our system, have a certain power consumption. The most efficient ones can complete requested tasks quickly while consuming relatively little power, allowing them to return to idle power states, where consumption is typically lower.

In this part of the analysis, we used the Quarch Programmable Power Module, provided to us by Quarch Solutions (photo above), to perform these tests and assess the SSD’s efficiency. This methodology includes three tests: maximum power consumption, average consumption in practical and casual scenarios, and idle consumption.

This set of tests, especially the efficiency and idle measurements, is particularly important for users planning to use drives in laptops, since SSDs spend the vast majority of their time in low-power states (idle), which greatly helps in conserving battery life.

The SSD achieved a fairly decent level of efficiency, although it fell slightly behind other models equipped with the same MAP1602 controller.

Regarding its maximum power consumption, it delivered a good result, around 4 W.

On average, its power consumption was slightly higher than other SSDs with the same controller, but still a good result.

Finally, and most importantly, the idle test represents the scenario in which the vast majority of SSDs spend most of their daily usage. Even here, the MP44 performs excellently, staying below 770 mW, thanks to using the same power states as the NV7000-T, as mentioned earlier.

Conclusion

Taking all of this into account, is it really worth investing in this SSD?

The SSD’s performance is decent, and it comes at a good price, making it a solid value for money. However, it’s important to remember that the Teamgroup MP44 comes in several variants with different NAND and controllers, meaning there could be performance differences compared to what is presented in this article.

Pros

• Decent sequential speeds, in line with the manufacturer’s specifications
• Good latency performance
• Strong performance in practical and professional scenarios
• Uses a solid controller paired with TLC dies
• Does not require a heatsink to maintain safe temperatures
• Low power consumption
• Good energy efficiency
• Competitive price

Cons

• Does not support encryption
• Multiple variants of the model exist, using different controllers or NANDs