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The VP4100 is one of the fastest SSDs on the market and comes with a premium price, but it’s still cheaper than both of Samsung’s 1TB and 2TB SSDs. Patriot’s Viper VP4100 even has significantly higher endurance ratings, too: Neither the Samsung 970 EVO Plus or PRO can top it there. However, Samsung's advantage is that those drives come in single-sided form factors for mobile and small form factor devices, while the VP4100 is strictly for desktop systems with its nearly-impossible-to-remove heatsink. You can’t remove it, so you might as well enjoy the view.
The new PCIe 4.0 interface opens doors to new speed records for file transfers, but it can generate a lot of heat. Patriot designed an edgy-looking and efficient low profile heatsink that is quite the improvement aesthetically over the company’s standard VPN100. Plus, it keeps the device cool regardless of the workload.
While performing multiple simultaneous 100GB transfers, the VP4100’s temperatures remained under 75C with very little airflow in our 25C environment. Although it wasn’t as good as the Corsair Force MP600’s cooling, the trade-off is a smaller overall size and better appearance.
Additionally, we see a similar situation as we've seen in the past with other controller architecture changes. When drive vendors enable a larger write cache, it usually results in slower direct-to-TLC writes. This happens again with the transition from Phison's E12 controller to the E16.
The older Phison E12-powered BPX Pro sustains higher direct-to-TLC write performance once the cache fills, but the trade-off is having a smaller cache to begin with. However, with growing storage demands from higher bit-rate/resolution media, we feel the larger dynamic write cache is better for day-to-day use. It also replenishes very quickly: The drive recovers about 30GB of capacity every minute, and sustained speed is still pretty good.
In addition to media files becoming larger, so are games with high-resolution textures. The newest Call of Duty Modern Warfare requires 175GB of storage, Red Dead Redemption 2’s pre-load weighs in at 110GB, and Final Fantasy XV is up to 155GB. That means just three games can fill a 500GB drive. There is most definitely a need for high capacity drives to store most gamer’s libraries.
At capacities that stretch up to 2TB, the Patriot Viper VP4100 is not only a fast SSD, but unlike the Samsung 970 Pro that maxes out at 1TB and Intel’s Optane 905P that tops out at 1.5TB, the VPN100 is also a spacious SSD that can store plenty of the latest and largest titles, and then load them quickly when needed. If you're searching for a high-end NVMe SSD, be sure to check out Patriot’s Viper VP4100. It’s a fast SSD that’s ready to strike when you are.
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