Corsair MP700 Elite 2000GB

The Corsair MP700 Elite is a mainstream PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD built around the Phison PS5031-E31T controller. It uses a DRAM-less design with Host Memory Buffer (HMB) for address mapping and Kioxia 218-layer BiCS8 3D TLC NAND. The PS5031-E31T is a 7nm, 4-channel controller designed to deliver Gen5 bandwidth with lower power draw and reduced thermal output compared to earlier E26-based drives. It runs cooler and can operate without active fan cooling, though a passive heatsink is required to maintain peak throughput. The lack of onboard DRAM can limit sustained random write performance under heavy workstation loads, but the drive can saturate a 10 GB/s interface in burst workloads.

Key Specifications

• Interface: PCIe 5.0 x4 (NVMe 2.0)
• Controller: Phison PS5031-E31T (7nm, 4-Channel, ARM Cortex-R5)
• NAND Flash: Kioxia BiCS8 218-Layer 3D TLC
• DRAM Cache: None (HMB - Host Memory Buffer support)
• Sequential Read: 10,000 MB/s
• Sequential Write: 8,500 MB/s
• Endurance: 1,200 TBW
• Encryption: AES 256-bit support

Hardware Alternatives

• Phison E31T reference platform: first retail implementations of this controller/NAND design; other mainstream Gen5 drives are expected to use the same platform.
• Sabrent and Inland: brands expected to offer drives using the same Controller/NAND combination and similar performance profiles.
• Corsair MP700 PRO SE 2000GB: uses the Phison E26 with onboard DRAM for higher sustained write performance and higher peak bandwidth, at the cost of greater power and thermal demands.
• Crucial T700 2000GB: uses the Phison E26 with onboard DRAM, offering higher theoretical maximums and better sustained heavy-write performance.
• Western Digital WD_BLACK SN850X 2000GB: a PCIe 4.0 drive with comparable thermal efficiency and strong random I/O performance; performs similarly in random 4K operations due to the MP700 Elite's DRAM-less design.
• Samsung 990 PRO 2000GB: a PCIe 4.0 competitor noted for thermal efficiency and random I/O performance, comparable to the MP700 Elite in random workloads.