Corsair MP700 Micro 4TB SSD Review: A monster in the tiny M.2 2242 form factor

Comparison Products

We’ll start with the two odd ones on this list: the Sabrent Rocket Nano 2242 and the SK hynix Gold P31. The first is the only other M.2 2242 drive on our list because, frankly, there aren't many compelling retail drives in this form factor. You can usually get away with an M.2 2230 SSD, using an extender if necessary, or an OEM 2242 drive. Most devices are set up to handle M.2 2280 and 2230 for its part is the most space-efficient, but there is still a need for 2242 drives, and not just for 2242 hosts. Being able to add a second NAND flash package on a single-sided drive means you can have a high-capacity option in a very tight area, which can be useful in HTPCs and even some desktops.

The second drive is a near-legend in some circles for its excellent power efficiency at the time of its release. We’re including it because SK hynix makes OEM drives with the same hardware in an embedded package. In fact, the M.2 2242 variant of the OEM drive is found in the Tube T31 and X31 Beetle, and shucking is a possibility. These have DRAM, which is almost impossible to find in smaller form-factor drives. The Gold P31 performs similarly to the OEM version with just a little bit more thermal and power headroom due to its use of separate chips. It’s the gold standard for use in comparison here because it’s probably the best option from Gen 3. The rest of the drives are Gen 4, and, for cases where a 2242 exists, the hardware would be the same, so we are covering all of our bases.

At the top, we have E27-based drives with TLC flash, like the Corsair MP600 Mini (E27T), and QLC with the Crucial P310. QLC with SMI’s comparable SM2268XT2 controller is represented by the Kingston NV3. For older hardware, we have the proprietary WD Black SN770M, the 1TB TeamGroup MP44S, and the 2TB Silicon Power UD90. These last two both have QLC flash, which is sufficient for our coverage, as the Nano 2242 handles this range with TLC. Instead, we’re looking at how different capacities perform, as one of the MP700 Micro’s top selling points is its capacity range.

Trace Testing — 3DMark Storage Benchmark

Built for gamers, 3DMark’s Storage Benchmark focuses on real-world gaming performance. Each round in this benchmark stresses storage based on gaming activities including loading games, saving progress, installing game files, and recording gameplay video streams. Future gaming benchmarks will be DirectStorage-inclusive and we also include notes about which drives may be future-proofed.

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The MP700 Micro puts up great numbers in 3DMark with excellent latency for predicted game workloads. In the real world, this may not translate to significant improvements, for example, in FPS gains, but it does mean you will have the best loading times. In some edge cases, such as playing a game after a massive update or when the system is facing one or more bottlenecks that can affect storage performance, a faster drive can make gameplay feel smoother. This is especially true when comparing QLC-based drives, like the P310, to TLC-based ones like the MP700 Micro. You’re not going to have fresh-out-of-the-box performance on a drive once it sees steady use, especially if it's fuller or handles regular I/O. In these cases, having a drive with this level of performance could provide a better overall user experience.

Trace Testing — PCMark 10 Storage Benchmark

PCMark 10 is a trace-based benchmark that uses a wide-ranging set of real-world traces from popular applications and everyday tasks to measure the performance of storage devices. The results are particularly useful when analyzing drives for their use as primary/boot storage devices and in work environments.

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The MP700 Micro can push an incredible amount of bandwidth for what it is, although we give credit to the P310 for keeping up. We’re a big fan of the P310, in fact, but with Crucial pulling out of the consumer market, this creates a void for smaller-form-factor drives. In that new universe, the MP700 Micro is the clear winner for the time being.

Transfer Rates — DiskBench

We use the DiskBench storage benchmarking tool to test file transfer performance with a custom, 50GB dataset. We write 31,227 files of various types, such as pictures, PDFs, and videos, to the test drive, then make a copy of that data to a new folder, and follow up with a reading test of a newly-written 6.5GB zip file. This is a real-world typeof workload that fits into the cache of most drives.

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The MP700 Micro’s competition is fighting at a disadvantage here, as the PCIe 5.0 interface has more headroom, even with a drive that tops out around 9.6 GB/s at this capacity. This is enough to put it more than 15% ahead of the next-fastest competitor, the P310. The better comparison would be the MP600 Mini E27T, which is basically a Gen 4 version of the MP700 Micro. You are getting substantially more performance here, but the real gains are hidden. Going from BiCS6 to BiCS8 and a 12nm controller to a 7nm one means a lot of power savings. This is a significant consideration for shorter form factor drives. The MP600 Mini E27T is fantastic for Gen 3 systems like the Steam Deck but things are murkier at Gen 4 against the MP700 Micro even without its 5.0 interface advantage. When you add in the 4TB capacity option it ends the debate about who is the king of the hill.

Synthetic Testing — ATTO / CrystalDiskMark

ATTO and CrystalDiskMark (CDM) are free and easy-to-use storage benchmarking tools that SSD vendors commonly use to assign performance specifications to their products. Both of these tools give us insight into how each device handles different file sizes and at different queue depths for both sequential and random workloads.

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While the MP700 Micro’s sequential CDM results are excellent, especially at higher queue depths, we do have some minor concerns. QD1 sequential read performance isn’t that much better than the SN770M’s. However, the SN770M’s relatively high power draw and heat production probably dulls this comparison a bit. Of more concern is the MP700 Micro’s read performance in ATTO, which appears to be off-point for most of the curve. The dip at 64KiB is most conspicuous and unusual, given that the four-plane flash should align fine with its standard 16KiB page size.

Our instinct is to look at other drives using this controller to see what’s going on. The Corsair MP700 Elite, which uses identical hardware, also has some struggles in this benchmark. The Crucial P510, which uses the same controller but Micron TLC flash, doesn’t. More generally, we see inconsistent ATTO read performance from this controller with BiCS8 TLC flash specifically. Given what we’ve seen with this flash on Phison’s E28 controller – see the MP700 Pro XT, which is excellent – we think this is something that’s been ironed out. The E28’s DRAM doesn’t hurt things, either. Luckily, the real-world impact from this appears to be small or even negligible, and possibly this will also be improved with future firmware updates. While we can think of some technical reasons about why the drive behaves this way here, at the end of the day, it’s something that can be overlooked when the real-world experience is so tight.

The drive’s random performance, thankfully, is excellent. This is a very responsive drive that really feels like an upgrade over the original crop of M.2 2230 SSDs. We do think that having a system that can take advantage of it – this means a PCIe 4.0 or higher link, a capable CPU, and sufficient RAM/VRAM – is required to fully appreciate the upward leap. When you factor in power efficiency, you are really squeezing every ounce out of your portable system with the MP700 Micro. If you happen to need 4TB of space, as well, then the decision is made easy for you.

One extra thing to point out here is that with rising memory prices, specifically DRAM, systems will become more expensive with potentially weaker base models in terms of the amount of memory that’s provided. This has a negative effect on storage as it’s not really capable of making up for a system memory bottleneck or shortfall. This means that the MP700 Micro is a high-end drive that might become even more of a luxury as it needs a more powerful system and heavier workloads to make a difference.

Sustained Write Performance and Cache Recovery

Official write specifications are only part of the performance picture. Most SSDs implement a write cache, which is a fast area of pseudo-SLC (single-bit) programmed flash that absorbs incoming data. Sustained write speeds can suffer tremendously once the workload spills outside of the cache and into the "native" TLC (three-bit) or QLC (four-bit) flash. Performance can suffer even more if the drive is forced to fold, which is the process of migrating data out of the cache in order to free up space for further incoming data.

We use Iometer to hammer the SSD with sequential writes for 15 minutes to measure both the size of the write cache and performance after the cache is saturated. We also monitor cache recovery via multiple idle rounds. This process shows the performance of the drive in various states as well as the steady state write performance.

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If any naysayers remain, then surely their criticism would be realized through our sustained writing test. Using a large pSLC cache is a great way to hide poor performance even in edge cases, and while in the real world there is usually little reason to worry about post-cache performance, we think it’s something that’s worth a look. It can be an Achilles heel for drives that otherwise perform well, so waiting for this test to decide can be wise. With that in mind, we’re glad to report that the MP700 Micro does not disappoint here.

Write performance is relatively weak at just 8.09 GB/s in the fastest single-bit mode. You can certainly do better with this hardware, and the drive will be faster than this at 2TB. That said, it can sustain this mode for just over 54 seconds with a 438GB cache. This is a reasonably large cache, and it is many times bigger than the Crucial P510's small cache. The P510 had very consistent sustained performance with that cach,e but the MP700 Micro can manage something similar while also being able to write longer in the pSLC mode. Yes, the P510 can eventually sustain 4 GB/s in TLC mode, but its primary drop is to a speed very close to MP700 at 2.14 GB/s. This is a good result for a drive this large, and it dispels any lingering questions about its performance.

Power Consumption and Temperature

We use the Quarch HD Programmable Power Module to gain a deeper understanding of power characteristics. Idle power consumption is an important aspect to consider, especially if you're looking for a laptop upgrade as even the best ultrabooks can have mediocre stock storage. Desktops may be more performance-oriented with less support for power-saving features, so we show the worst-case.

Some SSDs can consume watts of power at idle while better-suited ones sip just milliwatts. Average workload power consumption and max consumption are two other aspects of power consumption but performance-per-watt, or efficiency, is more important. A drive might consume more power during any given workload, but accomplishing a task faster allows the drive to drop into an idle state more quickly, ultimately saving energy.

For temperature recording we currently poll the drive’s primary composite sensor during testing with a ~22°C ambient. Our testing is rigorous enough to heat the drive to a realistic ceiling temperature.

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The MP700 Micro is very power-efficient and also runs relatively cool. It’s the 2nd most efficient drive in our testing today, but keep in mind that it will be even more efficient if limited to a slower interface speed. Head-to-head it should beat any drive here.

The drive also runs cool, with a maximum reported temperature of 67°C and a nominal throttling threshold of 83°C. We would like to see more headroom here, but there are two things to keep in mind. First, running the drive in a slower slot will reduce its temperature by a noticeable amount. Second, this drive is M.2 2242, with two NAND flash packages compared to single-package drives, mostly in the 2230 form factor. The MP700 Micro has more surface area and more space, which helps improve cooling if you’re using any sort of heatspreader or thermal interface such as thermal padding. This means that in many systems, it will be easier to cool the drive. We’re testing the worst case, and there is still enough distance to the throttling temperature that we don’t expect any issues outside hot environments.

Test Bench and Testing Notes

We use an Alder Lake platform with most background applications such as indexing, Windows updates, and anti-virus disabled in the OS to reduce run-to-run variability. Each SSD is prefilled to 50% capacity and tested as a secondary device. Unless noted, we use active cooling for all SSDs.

Corsair MP700 Micro Bottom Line

As with the MP700 Pro XT, we’re on the edge of awarding this drive a perfect score. It has excellent performance across-the-board even with sustained writes. Power efficiency is very high and the capacity being offered is simply bonkers for this form factor. Minor glitches aside – the ATTO read performance is questionable – this is the best drive you can get in M.2 2242. In basic terms it’s as simple as that.

There are some factors that keep us from giving it a 5/5 score, though. One is that, at the time of review, we could only find the 4TB SKU at normal retailers. We think the 2TB would be extremely popular, while the 4TB is a significantly larger investment with a higher cost per GB. The 4TB is also slower due to the nature of the technology, although this isn’t a big drawback, as the drive is faster than anything else out there.

Pricing overall isn’t bad, but we worry about how this drive will remain viable in the future. It’s unlikely to have any direct 4TB competitors – if it does have any, they will probably use the same hardware – but lower capacities may become more attractive as time goes on. The M.2 2242 form factor is somewhat niche as it is. Additionally, the MP700 Micro is a PCIe 5.0 drive, while the install base for the form factor is essentially only 3.0 and or 4.0.

This makes an older drive like the Sabrent Nano 2242 a more realistic solution for upgraders, and many people might go back to OEM drives as well, given the nature of supply and demand. You can also extend M.2 2230 SSDs, and there are a lot more of those around. The MP700 Micro is, therefore, the holy grail for anybody who wants max performance and 4TB of space, but it’s probably overkill for anybody else. We love this drive and do suggest you pick it up ASAP if you’ve been waiting for something like it, but if your needs are more modest, you have other options to explore.

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