Patriot Warp v2 128GB SSD Review

Manufacture Page: Patriot Memory - Patriot Solid State Drives
Part Number: PE128GS25SSDR
TechWiki Info: Warp v2 - TechWiki
Price: Click Here to Compare Prices
Warranty: 2 year



Since our last SSD review centered around the high performance, but ultra expenisve X-25M we felt our next review should be a little different. So today we are going to continue our ongoing foray into Solid State Drives by looking closely at the Patriot Warp V2. This drive comes in a variety of sizes and prices which should suit nearly everyone's needs quite well. Our drive is the 128GB model but the differences in speed and performance between the 32, 64 and 128 models should be minimal at best, so if you are interested in a small, cheap and fast drive for your netbook or notebook these drives may just be right up your alley; or at least that is the design goal of the V2s anyways.

To us this is a laudable design goal, as not everyone will be interested in bleeding edge speeds...or at least the bleeding edge price tag which accompanies the fastest, biggest drives d'jour! To many people, an SSD which costs more than the netbook they will be placing it in seems down right foolish, and we can certainly see their point. Even those desktop users among you will tend to shy away from $600 SSDs and instead look to drives much like the Patriot V2 for your introduction into the realm of these new drives.

Patriot has made quite the name for themselves by doing just this: releasing good products at extremely competitive prices, all while backing it up with an above average warranty. Needless to say, we have high expectations for this drive as it is their second generation model and thus should be tweaked to get the most from its components. the V2 has been on the market for a little while so it is widely available from retailers and e-tailers alike. We have seen the smallest capacity v2 go for less than what we paid for a WD 500 last year! In the case of the 128GB version it goes for about $340 or less.

The biggest issue with Solid State Drives is the dreaded “Stutter” issue. We will be going over exactly what this is, and most importantly find out if this V2 suffers from it. We will of course be putting it through the ringer and running numerous synthetic and real world tests to see how it stacks up against not only the X-25M but also some of the best spindle based drives out there. When the dust settles it is anybody's guess where the Warp V2 will end up, but one thing is for certain: its price speaks volumes about Patriot's hope that the SSD market will be the next big thing.