Patriot Evlvr Review: Evolving Your Workflow

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Conclusion

Patriot's Evlvr bridges the gap between the ultra-performance (and price) Samsung X5 and "standard" USB SSDs. Patriot's pricing undercuts other devices with similar specs so the drive is a comparative value, but it is still a pricey storage device that has a few quirks you should be aware of before you press the buy button.

You'll need to use the supplied cable and a true Thunderbolt 3 port. We tried using a USB Type C cable we had in the lab, but it didn’t work with the Evlvr. We also tried using the drive in a USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C port, but we were greeted with a “Thunderbolt device functionality might be limited” popup notification and the Evlvr didn’t show up in Windows Explorer or disk management.

The Evlvr also has a relatively short two-year warranty. If you're looking for a longer warranty period, the MyDigitalSSD PVX appears to be the same drive with a darker finish and a five-year warranty. It also doesn’t have a listed endurance rating, but it does cost a bit more.

The Evlvr's read/write speeds of 1.6/1GB/s are nothing to sneeze at. The drive even surpassed Samsung’s X5 during our photo transfer test, which is great news for photographers weighing if high-performance TB3 devices are worth the extra bucks over mid-range drives.

Overall, the Evlvr offers plenty of performance for most users. Iif you do a lot of video work, it might be worth stepping up to the Samsung X5, which is twice as fast in some workloads, but the Evlvr offers a great mix of price and performance for most users.

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Sean Webster
Sean Webster
Storage Reviewer

Sean is a Contributing Editor at Tom’s Hardware US, covering storage hardware.

3 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Brian_R170
    Would be nice to see a review of external Thunderbolt3/PCIe-M.2 enclosures to see how they compare in performance and price to the turn-key solutions.
    Reply
  • WyomingKnott
    Now we know how well it works on a Mac or Macbook Pro. Can you benchmark it for USB 3 gen whatever, or is this for now very special-purpose hardware?
    Reply
  • seanwebster
    21325124 said:
    Now we know how well it works on a Mac or Macbook Pro. Can you benchmark it for USB 3 gen whatever, or is this for now very special-purpose hardware?
    Test's were on an Intel-based Windows system with an ASRock Thunderbolt 3 AIC. It isn’t compatible with USB Type C ports. Instead, it will only work with true TB3 ports.

    As per the review:
    "You'll need to use the supplied cable and a true Thunderbolt 3 port. We tried using a USB Type C cable we had in the lab, but it didn’t work with the Evlvr. We also tried using the drive in a USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C port, but we were greeted with a “Thunderbolt device functionality might be limited” popup notification and the Evlvr didn’t show up in Windows Explorer or disk management."
    Reply