Team Group PD400 Portable SSD review - Features, Specifications, and... no unboxing?

Features, Specifications, and... no unboxing?

Shock, horror, and despair... no unboxing?? That's correct, there is no unboxing for this review, and for good reason... because there is really nothing to see. The drive comes in a nice looking box that - when opened - contains the sum total of four things:

• The drive (always a bonus);
• 2 cables, 1x USB-C to USB-A, and 1x USB-C to USB-C;
• An instruction manual (for what that is worth).

That really is it, and it didn't seem worth a section or separate part of the review on it. I have already mentioned that the drive actually looks very good, physically, finished in dark blue with a solid metal casing, it will sit well with any 'on the go' professional and/or creator who needs a dump drive to store their project files on.

In terms of more in depth specifications, we will look at the memory and controller used in the PD400. First of all, though, note that the product comes with an IP66 water resistance rating, meaning it has total resistance to dust, and resistance up to strong or high-powered water jets. This does not, however, mean that the PD400 will survive any meaningful (or even brief) period of water ingress, i.e. submersion below water's surface. If this happens, I suspect your data will be firmly consigned to 'bye bye' status.

So, memory type and controller specifications. These are the 'make it or break it' elements of all solid state drives, and can mean the difference between a good product, and a rubbish one (though that is somewhat stating the obvious, it reinforces the point that not all SSDs are made equal). I was unable, however, to find any concrete info on what is being used in this drive with regard to memory type and/or the controller used. If I had to hazard a guess, I would imagine it would be some form of 32 layer TLC. That is a guess, though, but it also an educated one, given that it is what a significant percentage of mid-grade internal and external SSDs use.

That really is it for this section. The performance of this drive will very quickly tell us whether it is up to the task of beating out the best external SSDs the market has to offer. I am very interested to see if it can hold a candle to Samsung's T5 or Seagate's 'Fast SSD.' Whilst they may occupy the same product space, their pricing is quite significantly different, which already lends the PD400 'one foot in the door' for a positive conclusion. If it can even hold a reasonably bright candle next to the other two products, then it's a bit of a winner. We shall start, therefore, with a simple file copy test.