Glossary
TLC NAND
Triple-Level Cell flash memory — stores 3 bits per cell. The mainstream choice for SSDs: balances cost, speed, and endurance.
NAND flash trades off bits-per-cell against speed and endurance. SLC stores 1 bit (fastest, longest-lived, most expensive), MLC 2, TLC 3, QLC 4.
Why TLC is the sweet spot
- Endurance of 600–1,500 P/E cycles per cell — translates to 600–1,200 TBW on a 1 TB consumer drive.
- Strong sustained write performance with a modest SLC cache.
- Cost per gigabyte close to QLC.
How to spot it
Manufacturers don't always advertise the cell type. Datasheet TBW figures give it away — TLC drives at 1 TB typically rate 600 TBW+, QLC drives 400 TBW or less.
In comparisons
Two identically-priced 1 TB SSDs can differ markedly: TLC will sustain 1.5+ GB/s writes indefinitely, QLC drops to 100–200 MB/s after the SLC cache fills. For boot drives, either is fine; for sustained workloads, prefer TLC.
Where this matters
Categories that use tlc nand
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