Team T-Force Vulcan G 1TB SATA SSD Review

TweakTown's Rating: 88%

The Bottom Line

With the push for 1TB SATA under $100, the Vulcan G lays claim for Team as one of the better value drives on the market.

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T-Force is the gaming brand of TeamGroup, offering a full range of USB flash drives, memory cards, and peripherals to SSDs, both SATA and NVMe.

In their current lineup, the Vulcan platform encompasses their entry-level 2.5" drive platform. Vulcan G, in house, is where the portfolio starts with a Silicon Motion SM2258XT, DRAMless solution aimed at gamers needing increased storage capacity with both 512GB and 1TB models available.

Performance of the Vulcan G is rated at 550 MB/s read and 500 MB/s write with random performance looking at 70K IOPS read and 60K IOPS write. Endurance is rated at 240TBW for the 1TB model and 120TBW for the 512GB.

MSRP of the 1TB T-Force Vulcan G comes in at $99.99 with a three-year warranty.

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Packaging certainly has appeal to it, Team using an almost holographic design to catch your eye. Capacity is listed to the right with features below.

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The back includes specifications along with warranty information.

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Unboxing, the Vulcan G offers a simple T-Force logo on an otherwise black enclosure.

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The backside finds a large sticker covering model identification and warranty above.

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Opening up the Vulcan G, it's a rather small PCB with two NAND packages facing. SATA connection setup appropriately for backplanes, etc.

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On the flip side, we have the SM2258XT DRAMless controller with two more 64L BiCS TLC packages.

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CDM is a staple in performance testing; version 7 has seen some updates in the testing workloads. Sequential Read comes in at 534 MB/s read while writes trails behind at 472 MB/s. Random performance starts with 30 MB/s read and 83 MB/s write both a Q1.

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Throwing the Vulcan G into the ring, we run through Quick System Drive and end with a score of 831, just above the S750 from HP and BX500 from Crucial.

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Over to Data Drive, the Vulcan G fares slightly better but still lands near the bottom with a score of 929.

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Price/Performance is always a test of a vendor's ability to determine the value aspect of their products. For Team, the Vulcan G does quite good with its rather low MSRP and decent performance, enough to land it right behind the FireCuda 120.

I'll be the first to admit that the Vulcan G isn't going to blow you away with its performance, but it features a basic SSD design that has been proven over and over again with so many vendors using the 2258XT. One better, Team chose to pair this solution with 64L BiCS TLC, making for a great combination.

About performance, the Vulcan G didn't quite meet marketing specifications in our testing but wasn't far off either at 534/472 sequential. 4KQ1 came in at 30 MB/s read 83 MB/s write, putting it at the lower-end of SATA drives. Running through PCMark testing, the Vulcan G landed near the bottom of our charts but always better than the BX500, the value arm of Crucial.

The biggest win for the Vulcan G comes with pricing at an MSRP of $99.99. As the market has evolved, we are now seeing a good amount of 1TB SATA SSDs reach under that $100 mark, and the Vulcan G is part of that push. As far as competition goes, you have the WD Green, Silicon Power A55, and BX500 all right there, and the Vulcan G is one of the best of the batch.

Tyler's Test System Specifications

• Motherboard: ASUS Crosshair VIII Formula X570 (buy from Amazon)
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 (buy from Amazon)
• RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16GB 2x8GB DDR4 3600 (buy from Amazon)
• Cooler: Corsair Hydro H60 (buy from Amazon)
• Case: Corsair Carbide 275R (buy from Amazon)
• OS Storage: Corsair MP600 1TB (buy from Amazon)
• Power Supply: Corsair RM850x (buy from Amazon)
• OS: Microsoft Windows 10 (buy from Amazon)