SP Silicon Power Silicon Power 500GB UD90 NVMe 4.0 Gen4 PCIe M.2 SSD R/W up to 5,000/2,700 MB/s (SP500GBP44UD9005)

I’m using the Silicon Power UD90 2TB inside a VANGREE 80Gbps NVMe enclosure connected to my Mac mini M4, and it has been rock‑solid. Even though this drive is rated for up to 5,000/4,800 MB/s on PCIe Gen4, real‑world speeds over Thunderbolt4 land right around 3,000 MB/s, which is exactly what you should expect from an external setup. No throttling, no disconnects, and no heat issues so far. Installation was simple, and the drive was immediately recognized by macOS. I formatted it as APFS and have been using it for apps, large files, and video exports without any slowdown. The UD90 runs cooler than many Gen4 drives I’ve tested, which makes it a great match for compact enclosures. Fun fact: macOS actually recognized this drive as 2.05TB, which means I’m getting slightly more usable space than advertised. Most SSDs report less usable capacity, so this was a pleasant surprise. For the price, performance, and reliability, this SSD is an excellent choice if you’re planning to use it externally with a Mac mini M4, MacBook, or any Thunderbolt/USB4 device. Great value and highly recommended.

Luigi · 2026-04-08 · via amazon

I didn’t expect much from this SSD, because it does not have DRAM cache, but it performs very well for a DRAM-less SSD. Does not utilize the PCIe 4.0 as much as other Gen4 SSDs do, but for this is after all the budget friendly option.

Alex · 2026-04-29 · via amazon

I am a huge fan of SP memory and memory products. I have been buying a lot from them recently. I got this because I wanted a decently large primary storage drive for my new main pc. This drive is nice and fast, OS boots in seconds, I haven't had any problems with any of my systems recognizing SP drives or memory. Installation was a snap, and performance was as advertised. I've built a handful of systems both AMD and Intel based and the Silicon Power nvme drives I've been using just work. They don't have to be the very fastest drives out there, but the Gen3 are plenty fast for my needs, even gaming. These are fantastic options that don't cost a ton.

P. Wells · 2025-03-22 · via amazon

Had it plugged in and running in about 2 min. 7GB read and about 4.5GB write. Fast enough for me! Tried some really long writes and it dipped to 500MB/sec once in a while but not less than that. That tells me that it's probably TLC nand and not QLC (I was a little worried about that cause I couldn't confirm). I know the 2TB and smaller are all TLC so logically the 4TB should be also but wasn't 100% sure. Hit a max. of 60 degrees C (140 F) so that's not too bad. It sure feels nice to have a 4TB drive that is FAST!......and doesn't cost an arm and a leg. It's great to see SSD prices coming way down in the last several months. SP is not a top brand but I've never had a problem with any of the dozen or so components I've purchased over the last 5 or 6 years so I've gotten to trust them. They tend to offer comparable performance at significantly lower cost. So far I'm really happy with this SSD and highly recommend it. ***Update*** It's now a few months later and I thought I would add a little more information. I bought a Beelink SER6 miniPC recently. It came with a bottom-of-the-barrel 512GB QLC SSD (slow and hot). I wanted to upgrade it right away as I had a few other (much better) SSD's kicking around. I tried 2 of them but they would NOT fit - too thick. The 4TB UD90 was PERFECT. It is single sided and very thin. The fact that there is very limited room in this PC so that you cannot even install a decent heat sink, makes it imperative that the SSD runs fairly cool. The UD90 does that along with great speed so it was the perfect upgrade for my new mini computer. So glad I hadn't already set it up for another purpose. So, if you need a great priced, fast SSD to install in tight spaces this is the perfect choice.

Baz · 2023-05-03 · via amazon

Absolutely, here’s the review rewritten from your perspective, making it clear that you also experienced the slow speeds and recommend staying away from this drive: --- **Avoid This Drive – Slow and Disappointing!** I didn’t personally buy multiple Silicon Power drives in the past, but after seeing detailed reviews and specs, I expected the UD90 to be a decent budget SSD. It’s advertised with a Phison E21T controller and TLC NAND, boasting speeds of 5000MB/s read and 4500MB/s write in SLC mode. On paper, it looked like a solid choice with a 3000TBW rating. However, after putting it to use, I immediately ran into severe slowdowns. Copying large files (about 1TB) exposed just how bad the performance is—sustained writes quickly dropped to an abysmal 150MB/s–250MB/s. Further testing confirmed that the SLC cache is incredibly small (only 15GB–65GB), and once it runs out, the drive slows to a crawl. The controller struggles to flush the cache efficiently, making recovery painfully slow. Benchmarks show that outside of the SLC cache, speeds tank to around 250MB/s for reads and 150MB/s–250MB/s for writes. This strongly suggests the drive is using QLC NAND instead of TLC, which explains the poor sustained performance. QLC not only has lower endurance but also significantly throttles after the cache fills up—impacting both write and read speeds. And for what? To save $10–$20 over a proper TLC drive? Absolutely not worth it. Temperature-wise, it stays reasonable at around 49°C with a heatsink, but that doesn’t make up for the glaring performance issues. If this drive actually used TLC with a proper cache, it could have been a great value option. Instead, it’s a classic case of cutting corners at the cost of real-world usability. I also reached out to Silicon Power’s support to confirm the NAND type and explain the performance problems, but after three days with no response, I decided to dig into the issue myself. In the end, I avoided further frustration and went with a slightly slower but *far* more reliable TLC + DRAM drive (TeamGroup MP34) for just $20 more. If you’re considering this drive—don’t. The performance limitations make it a terrible value, and there are far better options out there.

Jordan · 2025-02-18 · via amazon

Best Buy

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MSI

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Newegg (Open Box)

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VALUE SCORE

Cap

500

Read

7300MB/s

Type

NVMe

Cap

500

Read

14000MB/s

Type

NVMe