The PatriotMemory Inferno 100GB SSD (part number: PI100GS25SSDR) costs around $332 (after $30 mail-in rebate). Obviously this is a very high price for 100 GB of storage compared to HDDs. The product is backed by a generous 5-year warranty.

Below you see the retail package of the drive:

The SSD is packaged into a plastic shield. What else will you find at the retail package? A manual with quick installation tips and a 3.5" bracket with included screws for installing the drive to your a desktop PC.

On the outside, Patriot shows off a red aluminum finish on the metal casing that gives the drive an impressive look:

The drive is very lightweight at just ~77grams and has the typical 2.5" dimensions.

The Inferno series include a new controller from Sandforce (SF-1222) that promises high reading/writing speeds.

SandForce SF-1200 SSD Processors enable commodity flash memory to reliably operate in cost and power sensitive client computing environments. The SF-1200 is a true single-chip SSD Processor designed for volume manufacturing and outstanding performance. The DuraClass technology delivers world class reliability, endurance, performance and power consumption.

As each generation of flash memory evolves and the silicon geometries shrink - performance, reliability, endurance, and data retention are negatively impacted. DuraWrite technology extends the life of the SSD over conventional controllers, by optimizing writes to the flash memory and delivering a write amplification below 1, without complex DRAM caching requirements.

SSDs are capable of significantly outperforming traditional HDDs, but typical controllers haven't delivered the compelling value necessary for mainstream adoption. SandForce DuraClass technology enables the SSD to maximize both the endurance and performance for the life of the drive fulfilling the promise of high speed flash memory in client computing applications and improving system performance by up to 50% as measured by the SYSmark Benchmark.

The SF-1200 has also built in AES-128 bit encryption controllable by a configurable user password. This feature prevents would-be thieves from extracting data directly from the flash memory should they ever have access to the drive.