TEAMGROUP T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L PCIe 4.0 NVMe M.2 SSD Review

What we have here is TEAMGROUP’s T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L in the flesh. And that's what we're going to check out today.

It’s amazing how NVMe SSDs went from being an expensive storage option to now viable selections even to those without too much budget to spare. Why settle for 2.5-inch SATA SSDs when you can get a pretty decent M.2 drive that can leave them in the dust. Easy enough now. Now with that said, what we have here is TEAMGROUP’s T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L in the flesh. And that's what we're going to check out today.

TEAMGROUP T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L Technical Specifications

Form Factor	M.2 2280
Interface	PCIe Gen4x4 with NVMe
Capacities	250GB, 500GB, 1TB, 2TB
Weight	7g
Voltage	DC +3.3V
Operation Temperature	0˚C ~ 70˚C
Performance	Crystal Disk Mark: 250GB Read/Write: up to 3300/1400 MB/s 500GB Read/Write: up to 3300/2400 MB/s 1TB Read/Write: up to 3500/3000 MB/s 2TB Read/Write: up to 3500/3200 MB/s
TBW	250GB – 150TBW 500GB - 300TBW 1TB - 600TBW 2TB - 1200TBW
Price and Warranty	Php1,980 (250GB) Php2,950 (500GB) Php5,225 (1TB) Php8,695 (2TB) (Prices at the time of writing March 30, 2023, PCHub Online for reference) 5-year limited warranty

 

UNBOXING AND DESIGN

This is actually our first brush with any of TEAMGROUP’s products, so it’s nice to see a new player in our testing space for storage. Unto the unboxing, the T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L comes in a compact box, a breath of fresh air from our usual storage devices for testing that more often than not come in a blister pack of some sort. The capacity is listed upfront, and for this we have the 500GB version. 

At the back are the key features and specs, the rated speed and warranty duration. There’s also an instruction on how to install the T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L as well as the graphene sheet that’s included in the box. 

The T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L and the graphene sheet are encased in a plastic shell. And yes, you have to install it yourself. No idea why this is the case, but it’s fairly easy to install anyway. Do take note that this is a review sample, so it might be different from how it’s packed for retail.

So, this is pretty much a standard 2280 M.2 drive similar to others you've seen before. There's the Phison controller laid bare upfront, and you'll likely end up just slapping the graphene sheet on top of that.

PERFORMANCE

The T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L is available in four capacities: 250GB, 500GB, 1TB and 2TB. Again, what we have here is the 500GB version, which is rated at 3300MB/s read and 2400MB/s write on CrystalDiskMark according to TEAMGROUP.  We’re testing this one on rig with a Ryzen 5 3600X on an AORUS X570 ELITE motherboard and 16GB of DDR4 3600MHz RAM.

Test System Setup

Motherboard	AORUS X570 ELITE
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 3600X
GPU	COLORFUL iGame GeForce GTX 1080 Vulcan X OC
RAM	ZADAK 16GB DDR4 @3600MHz
Cooler	Noctua NH-D15
Storage	Plextor M9Pe(G) 512GB + TEAMGROUP T-FORCE CARDEA 500GB
PSU	CORSAIR RM750 80 Plus Gold
Case	NZXT H510 Elite
OS	Windows 10 Pro
Monitor	ASUS VP249 144Hz 1080P Monitor

PCMark 10 - Full System Drive Benchmark

PCMark features a full system drive benchmark that utilizes a wide-ranging set of real-world tracer from popular applications and common tasks. 

Crystal Disk Mark

CrystalDiskMark is an open source benchmark software used to measure the transfer speed of different media data storage drives including such as HD, SSD, USB memory, SD card and NAS. SEQ1M Q8T1 is recorded for the comparison.

AS SSD Benchmark

AS SSD tests the sequential or random read/write performance without using the cache. 

Anvil Storage Utilities Benchmark

Anvil Storage Utilities is a benchmark tool that offers its users a simple way of assessing the read and write performance of SSDs and HDDs.

ATTO Disk Benchmark

ATTO Disk Benchmark is an industry leading benchmark that help measure performance of system storage such as hard drives, solid state drives, RAID arrays, and so forth.

Final Fantasy XIV Endwalker Benchmark Tool

The Final Fantasy XIV Endwalker Benchmark Tool is a convenient tool that measures your computer's hardware performance and at the same time also logs the total loading time between runs.

Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition

Final Fantasy XV has very long load times during start up, so we'll be using this opportunity to log the time of drives to boot up the game from the main menu to the start of a new game when the loading screen appears.

TEAMGROUP SOFTWARE

TEAMGROUP also has a software that lets you monitor the status of your SSD, as well as measure its performance. It's also not exclusive to TEAMGROUP's products, so if you have other drives you want to test out, this can be a handy tool for that.

CONCLUSION

So, here we are. It's great to see how the competition in the M.2 storage space has become much fiercer as of late. And all the better for consumers as it becomes a competition in performance, features, and price to boot. The T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L certainly brings a strong game in its approach - a value-oriented option that still delivers a solid performance for its price. Sure, it won't shatter any records, but it can definitely serve as a great option for gamers looking to ditch 2.5-inch SATA SSDs and upgrade to an M.2 drive. The graphene sheet is, yes, a DIY chore here. But it's a pretty straightforward task anyway.  The 5-year limited warranty backing it up sweetens the deal even further. 

Simply put, the TEAMGROUP T-FORCE CARDEA Z44L is a capable option for anyone looking to get into PCIe Gen 4 storage, or simply for just expanding their storage space without spending too much.