The TeamGroup T-Force Z540 sits among the fastest storage offerings from the Taiwanese brand. It can reach up to speeds of up to 12GB/s thanks to its utilization of the PCIe 5.0, which doubles the transfer rate of PCIe 4.0. But can it really perform as one of the fastest drives in the market? Let’s find out.
| Capacity | 1TB |
| Interface | PCIe 5.0 x4 |
| Sequential Reads | Up to 11,700MB/s |
| Sequential Writes | Up to 9,500MB/s |
| Controller | Phison E26 |
| Flash | 2048MB LPDDR4 |
| Shock Resistance | 1500G/0.5ms |
| Formfactor | M.2 2280 |
| Endurance (TBW) | 600TBW |
| Weight | 13g |
| Operating Temperature | 0˚C – 70˚C |
| Storage Temperature | -40˚C – 85˚C |
| Warranty | 5-Year Limited Warranty |
The T-Force Z540 comes in an unassuming box with its name and brand embossed at the front. The drive comes protected in a plastic frame. It doesn’t have much in the way of accessories, though it does come with a separate sticker with a graphene sheet to help with cooling. No external cooler bundled with this variant.
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The TeamGroup T-Force Z540 comes in a standard 2280 formfactor making it compatible with most rigs, the PlayStation 5, and some notebooks in the market.
There’s no built-in heatsink on the drive, so it bares for all to see. It is powered by the Phison PS5026-E26 controller. The controller is designed for the PCIe 5.0 x4 interface and could theoretically reach up to 14GB/s of sequential performance.
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There’s a LPDDR4 chip for the controller to store mapping tables to improve performance. The specific model is “H9HCNNBKUML XRNEE 307Y” and quick search reveals that it is a 2GB LPDDR4 chip running at 4226Mbps from SK Hynix.
Aside from the controller and memory, the M.2 sports four 3JC2D NY195 3D TLC chips from Micron. There are a few vacant mounts for other chips, presumably for higher capacity versions.
