TeamGroup PD20M Mag 2TB External SSD Review - The Ultimate iPhone Accessory

TweakTown's Rating: 98%

The Bottom Line

TeamGroup's PD20M Mag 2TB external SSD is the Swiss Army Knife of storage, making it a must have item for your digital arsenal.

Pros

• Native USB Type-C
• Sleek design
• Powerful
• Designed for iPhone

Cons

• None

Should you buy it?

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Introduction & Drive Details

Now and then we get a storage device in the lab that could be best described as a nifty gadget, and that's exactly what we have in the TeamGroup PD20M Mag. The "Mag" is short for magnetic as in this sleek and designed specifically for iPhone 15-16 portable SSD can attach magnetically to the latest iPhones.

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With this "nifty gadget", you are unincumbered as it relates to shooting extended hours long sessions of high-quality videos. It is also important to note that this device is not only double the capacity of the highest capacity micro-SD cards, it also can deliver up to 10x the throughput (1,000 MB/s) through your iPhones Type-C port than you will get from an SD card.

Additionally, you get a huge advantage when offloading those massive video files for processing. When offloading files from the PD20M Mag to your PC or MAC, they can be transferred at rates of up to 2,000 MB/s or roughly 20x faster than most high-capacity micro-SD cards can muster. This can literally save hours of transfer time.

This portable SSD can work with iPhone or Android, PC or MAC, PlayStation or XBOX as fast portable solid-state storage delivering all the benefits enabled by such devices, with the bonus of being magnetically attachable to devices that accommodate the standard, such as the new iPhones. Being that this device is native USB it is supremely compatible across all platforms and can serve competently no matter the use case scenario, even if it involves older hardware.

Now, let's get into the review so we can show you by the numbers what this portable and magnetic SSD can deliver.

Drive Details

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Synthetic Benchmarks: CDM, ATTO & Blackmagic

CrystalDiskMark

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And there you have it, more than 2,000 MB/s throughput via a USB 3.2 Gen2 x2 interface. With speed like this this on tap, the PD20M Mag is fast enough that on-device editing is not only possible, but it might even make more sense in some cases.

ATTO

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ATTO demonstrates the 2TB PD20M Mag SSD capable of delivering essentially full sequential throughput at 128K transfers at the standard test queue depth of 4. Excellent. Exactly what we are looking for from any SSD, internal or portable.

Blackmagic

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When programming (writing) data, we find our test subject delivering about as good as it gets for any similarly interfaced device we've ever tested. Impressive. Additionally, when serving data to the host (reading), the PD20M Mag delivers a new lab record for its interface type. Impressive.

Real-World Testing: PCMark 10, 3DMark SSD Gaming & Transfer Rates

PCMark 10 Data Drive Benchmark

The Data Drive Benchmark is designed to test drives that are used for storing files rather than applications. You can also use this test with NAS drives, USB sticks, memory cards, and other external storage devices.

The Data Drive Benchmark uses 3 traces, running 3 passes with each trace as follows:

• Copying 339 JPEG files, 2.37 GB in total,?into?the target drive (write test).
• Making a copy of the JPEG files (read-write test).
• Copying the JPEG files to another drive (read test).

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Again, top of the food chain performance for its interface, demonstrating clearly via real-world simulation that it is powerful enough for on-device editing.

3DMark SSD Gaming Test

UL's newest 3DMark SSD Gaming Test is the most comprehensive SSD gaming test ever devised. We consider it superior to testing against games themselves because, as a trace, it is much more consistent than variations that will occur between runs on the actual game itself. This test is the same as running the actual game, just without the inconsistencies inherent to application testing. In short, this is the world's best way to test an SSDs gaming prowess and accurately compare it against competing SSDs. The 3DMark SSD Gaming Test measures and scores the following:

• Loading Battlefield V from launch to the main menu.
• Loading Call of Duty Black Ops 4 from launch to the main menu.
• Loading Overwatch from launch to the main menu.
• Recording a 1080p gameplay video at 60 FPS with OBS (Open Broadcaster Software) while playing Overwatch.
• Installing The Outer Worlds from the Epic Games Launcher.
• Saving game progress in The Outer Worlds.
• Copying the Steam folder for Counter-Strike Global Offensive from an external SSD to the system drive.

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Gaming is a performance metric that matters to most DIY consumers, especially to the enthusiast crowd that TweakTown caters to. We are now including gaming performance as a part of our external SSD reviews, as using portable storage for gaming duties is very popular among avid gamers.

Ultra-portable, fully compatible storage is a nice complement to any console or PC gaming device.

Although not advertised as such, the PD20M Mag demonstrates that it is one of the best choices possible for a fast portable gaming experience. Outstanding.

DiskBench - Transfer Rates

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We brutalize our test subjects with our extremely hard-to-swallow 100GB data block. This data block is the same one we use for our internal SSD testing and is composed of more than 62K files. 100GB is probably right at the upper limit for a single transfer, so as we see it, this is a much more realistic test scenario than a sustained filling of the entire drive.

At roughly 548 MB/s the PD20M Mag delivers a programming rate about as good as we've seen from a high-capacity native USB storage device. When transferring to the host, the magnetic SSD is delivering at near thunderbolt rates. Impressive.

Final Thoughts

TeamGroup has done it again. The PD20M Mag is not only supremely innovative, it's a masterpiece of design and powerful performance that exceeds expectation. As we see it, its versatility is unmatched across the spectrum of portable solid-state storage, making it one of those must-have items for your everyday digital life.

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It's the niftiest device of its kind we've ever encountered, making it worthy of our highest award. Editor's Choice.