Patriot Ignite 480GB SSD Review

TweakTown's Rating: 90%

The Bottom Line

Patriot's Ignite 480GB is one of the best low-cost 512GB capacity class drives available today. Prices will shrink further in the HDD replacement class, but for now, the Ignite is a solid choice for desktops.

Introduction & Specifications, Pricing and Availability

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Patriot recently released a third new consumer SSD, the Ignite series. The Blaze and Torch models, both also new, satisfy Patriot's HDD replacement and low-cost tiers. The Ignite series, built around Phison's 8-core S10 controller, puts Patriot in the performance market as well.

We talked about the new Phison S10 controller in limited detail in the Corsair Neutron XT preview a few months back. When we first wrote about the S10, many features were missing, like DEVSLP for increased notebook battery life and firmware focused on delivering consistent performance under heavy extended workloads. When we saw the first Ignite advertisement in the Fry's weekly circular, we hoped the advanced features were ready, but found that wasn't the case. Still, the 960GB model advertised at Fry's for $390 intrigued us, even if the feature set is premature.

Specifications, Pricing and Availability

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At the time of writing, Patriot only lists two capacity sizes for the Ignite series: the 480GB model we're testing today and a large 960GB model we hope to test in the future. Patriot lists both models with up to 560 MB/s sequential read and 545 MB/s sequential write speeds. Although not shown on this specifications list, another page on Patriot's website shows random performance at 80,000 IOPS read and 75,000 IOPS write.

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The Phison S10 controller is one of the first to market with LDCP error correction technology. This allows the controller to work with a wide span of flash, from high endurance MLC to low-cost TLC with very low endurance ratings.

Patriot chose to use Micron 16nm MLC flash for the Ignite 480GB we're testing today. The choice led to Patriot's ability to sell the Ignite products for such a low cost. As we mentioned in the introduction, the 960GB model sells for a low as $390 with a mail-in-rebate (now $379.99 at Newegg). We found the Ignite 480GB at Newegg for $199.99.

Patriot backs the Ignite products with a three-year warranty. Inside we found the SSD and a paper manual.

PRICING: You can find the Patriot Ignite 480GB for sale below. The prices listed are valid at the time of writing but can change at any time. Click the link to see the very latest pricing for the best deal.

United States: The Patriot Ignite 480GB retails for $189.99 at Amazon.

Australia: Find other tech and computer products like this over at PLE Computer's website.

Canada: The Patriot Ignite 480GB retails for CDN$379.94 at Amazon Canada.

Patriot Ignite 480GB SSD

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Here we get our first look at the Ignite 480GB SSD. The case is a standard Phison design with a Patriot label front and back.

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The label on the back shows the capacity size, model number and serial number.

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Inside we found a Phison three fourths size PCB with the Phison S10 controller in the middle.

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There are eight NAND flash packages on the PCB, four on each side.

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Phison's new PS3110 is also known as the S10 and features a quad-core design.

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The 480GB Ignite we're testing today has 512MB of DRAM. The 960GB model has 1024MB of DRAM. This RAM is used to cache page table data.

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Patriot used third-party packaged Micron 16nm MLC flash in the Ignite SSDs.

Test System Setup and Initial Performance

Desktop Test System

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Lenovo T440 - Notebook Power Testing with DEVSLP and Windows 8.1 Pro

Nearly all of the performance tests run on the desktop system but we use a Lenovo T440 to run the power tests. The T440 is the latest addition to our client SSD test lab and allows us to test the notebook battery life offered by an SSD with advanced features like DEVSLP enabled.

Initial Performance Evaluation - 4-Corner and then Some Tests

Sequential Read

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Sequential Write

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Sequential 80% Read 20% Write

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Random Read

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Random Write

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Random 80% Read 20% Write

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The Phison S10 controller exhibits very good sequential performance, but the random write performance with incompressible data is lower than we expected to find with the Ignite. The S10 controller reads compressible and incompressible data at different rates. In this test, we use full random data so the S10 compressible advantage is disabled. The mixed workload sequential test shows decent performance, but the random mixed workload test leaves a lot to be desired.

Benchmarks - Sequential Performance

HD Tune Pro - Sequential Performance

Version and / or Patch Used: 5.50

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The Patriot Ignite 480GB reads 64KB sequential data at a lowest average speed of the drives on the chart. Both the S8 and new S10 products we've tested previously never had an issue with sequential data. Looking back at the sequential read tests on the previous page, we see the 64KB block reads are quite a bit lower than the 128KB reads.

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The sequential write performance with 64KB blocks are very high, one of the highest results on the chart today.

HD Tach - Sequential Write Performance after Random Writes

Version and / or Patch Used: 3.0.4.0

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After a number of sequential and random writes to the Ignite 480GB, we tested the drive with HD Tune Pro with 128KB data. Here we see the average sequential read speed is well shy of the write speed. The write performance only dropped to a very low level in one instance. The write performance did drop to moderate levels in several other instances, though.

Benchmarks - Anvil Storage Utilities

Anvil Storage Utilities

Version and / or Patch Used: RC6

So what is Anvil Storage Utilities? First of all, it's a storage benchmark for SSDs and HDDs where you can check and monitor your performance. The Standard Storage Benchmark performs a series of tests; you can run a full test or just the read or the write test, or you can run a single test, i.e. 4k QD16.

Anvil Storage Utilities is not officially available yet, but we've been playing with the beta for several months now. The author, Anvil on several international forums, has been updating the software steadily and is adding new features every couple of months.

We can use Anvil several different ways to show different aspects for each drive. We've chosen to use this software to show the performance of a drive with two different data sets. The first is with compressible data and the second data set is incompressible data. Several users have requested this data in our SSD reviews.

0-Fill Compressible Data

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Incompressible Data

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Compressible data performance reads are very high with the Patriot Ignite 480GB, but drop off with incompressible data. This is a bit different from the SandForce method where incompressible data writes slow.

Low Queue Depth Read IOPS

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High Queue Depth Read IOPS

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After testing a set of S10 reference products for Phison and the Corsair Neutron XT, we moved this set of tests to a mix of 46% incompressible data. With compressible data the Ignite delivers just over 10K random read IOPS performance at QD1. With the mixed data the random read performance at QD1 drops to just over 7300 IOPS. Performance scales very well, nearly doubling as the queue depth increases.

Low Queue Depth Write IOPS

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High Queue Depth Write IOPS

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The random write performance is very good with both incompressible and compressible data.

Benchmarks - Mixed Read / Write Workloads

Sequential Mixed Read / Write Workloads

In this series of tests, we measure mixed workload performance. We start with 100% read and then add data writes to the mix until we get to 100% writes, in 10% increments. We believe this will be the next major area SSD manufactures will address after performance consistency.

Sequential Mixed Workload Bandwidth

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High mixed workload performance is the next chapter in increasing SSD performance. OCZ made mixed workload performance a priority on Vector 180, but as you can see, Patriot needs to do the same as the Ignite suffers from severe performance loss when the smallest of mix is added.

Sequential 80% Read / 20% Write Bandwidth

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The 80% read and 20% write mix is widely regarded as the consumer storage standard. At this load, the Ignite is actually in the upper tier of all the products on the chart today.

Random Mixed Workload Response Time

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The random 50% read mix with the Ignite is back down again to the lower-end of the scale.

PCMark 8 Consistency Test

Futuremark PCMark 8 Extended - Consistency Test

Version and / or Patch Used: 2.0.228

Heavy Usage Model:

Futuremark's PCMark 8 allows us to wear the test drive down to a reasonable consumer steady state and then watch the drive recover on its own through garbage collection. To do that, the drive gets pushed down to steady state with random writes and then idle time between a number of tests allows the drive to recover.

Precondition Phase:

1. Write to the drive sequentially through up to the reported capacity with random data.

2. Write the drive through a second time (to take care of overprovisioning).

Degradation Phase:

1. Run writes of random size between 8*512 and 2048*512 bytes on random offsets for 10 minutes.

2. Run performance test (one pass only).

3. Repeat 1 and 2 for 8 times, and on each pass increase the duration of random writes by 5 minutes.

Steady state Phase:

1. Run writes of random size between 8*512 and 2048*512 bytes on random offsets for 50 minutes.

2. Run performance test (one pass only).

3. Repeat 1 and 2 for 5 times.

Recovery Phase:

1. Idle for 5 minutes.

2. Run performance test (one pass only).

3. Repeat 1 and 2 for 5 times.

PCMark 8's Consistency test provides a ton of data output that we use to judge a drive's performance. Here we see the three states of performance for the select SSDs, light use, consumer steady state and worst case.

Storage Bandwidth - All Tests

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With a wide set of drives in our PCMark 8 Advanced test, we see where the Ignite stands in comparison to the other client SSDs on the market today.

Storage Bandwidth - Heavy Load

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In the heavy workload test, the Ignite 480GB sits right in the middle of the other drives.

Storage Bandwidth - Typical Consumer Load

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Moving over to the client workload test, the Ignite sits in the middle still of the performance deviation. Several other drives are much faster, though.

PCMark 8 Consistency Test - Continued

Total Access Time - All Tests

The access time test measures the total latency across all 18 tests. This is one of, if not the most important test we run at this time for consumer SSDs. When your latency is low your computer feels fast, it's just that simple.

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The latency test is one of the most significant we publish and shows a direct correlation between to the user experience.

Total Access Time - Heavy Load

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The Ignite 480GB delivers a steady level of performance in the heavy workload test. We just wish the latency was a little lower.

Total Access Time - Typical Consumer Load

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In client workloads, the Ignite 480GB fairs a little better and manages to outperform more drives, but is still far from the products delivering the lowest latency on the market.

Benchmarks - Notebook Power Testing

Bapco MobileMark 2012 1.5

Version and / or Patch Used: 2012 1.5

MobileMark 2012 1.5 is an application-based benchmark that reflects usage patterns of business users in the areas of office productivity, media creation and media consumption. Unlike benchmarks that only measure battery life, MobileMark 2012 measures battery life and performance simultaneously, showing how well a system design addresses the inherent tradeoffs between performance and power management.

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The Patriot Ignite 480GB delivered 533 minutes in our notebook battery life test. This model doesn't have all of the power saving features enabled, but hopefully Patriot can enable them with a firmware update when available.

Power Limited Performance

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Notebooks reduce power while on battery and also slow system busses along with processor, DRAM and DMI link speeds. In this reduced power state we can measure total system performance. In some cases the system performance drops off sharply because the SSDs don't like operating at lower link speeds. The Patriot Ignite doesn't have this issue.

Final Thoughts

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Patriot has a long history in the SSD market and does really well bringing the latest technology to market, while maintaining a competitive price. In the SandForce era, Patriot routinely had the lowest priced consumer drives at etailers like Newegg. The company spent a short bout fairly quiet on the SSD front, but is now back at full steam with three new products.

Corsair is the only other company with another S10 controller product on the market. Others companies have announced future products, but the Neutron XT is the only direct SSD we can compare prices to. The Patriot Ignite 480GB costs $199.99 at Newegg, the Corsair Neutron XT 480GB is $269.99. That stated, the Neutron XT does show higher random performance per the specifications. We don't have a final revision sample from Corsair to compare though. The Neutron XT preview article was with early silicon and the PCB and firmware have changed since then.

Even though we found other SSDs at Newegg priced lower, the Ignite 480GB is a powerful SSD that is priced in the HDD replacement category, the low-end of the price scale. If the Ignite represents the performance available in the HDD replacement category, then things are looking up. In the 512GB capacity size, this ultra low-cost market drops prices all the way down to $169.99 (Newegg prices), but I'd consider the $200 price point a part of the same group, just at the higher-end of the scale. With that said, the Ignite is one of the better SSDs in that price range.

The only area we lacking for this price is the notebook battery life performance. This is something Phison is working on and when DEVSLP is fully working, we should get a better result. It's up to Patriot to release the firmware update. Let's hope that comes sooner rather than later.

PRICING: You can find the Patriot Ignite 480GB for sale below. The prices listed are valid at the time of writing but can change at any time. Click the link to see the very latest pricing for the best deal.

United States: The Patriot Ignite 480GB retails for $189.99 at Amazon.

Australia: Find other tech and computer products like this over at PLE Computer's website.

Canada: The Patriot Ignite 480GB retails for CDN$379.94 at Amazon Canada.