“Gaming” SSD disguised as a productivity model

The Kingston Fury Renegade is still one of the best performing SSDs on the market, and one of the best performing we’ve tested at Go4it so far. While those models are aimed at gamers, Kingston sells a “twin” product, about the same performance, but dedicated to productivity systems. It’s called the Kingston KC3000 and offers mostly identical specs to the Renegade, with the only major differences being the sticker on the outside and the packaging they come in.

The Kingston KC3000 comes in a simple blister pack

While the Fury Renegade models come in bulkier cardboard packages, the Kingston KC3000 comes in a simple SD card-like blister. This is not so important to the product itself, but it allows the company to deliver more units with the same effort, suggesting that this is more of a mass product. Apart from the fact that you need a pair of scissors to open the case, the SSD inside is mostly identical.

Kingston does not ship the KC3000 with a motherboard mount screw, nor a heatsink of any kind. The black sticker indicating the model of this SSD is the only distinguishing thing we can see. Of course, we are talking about a 2280 format SSD, the most popular size on the market, compatible with most PCs, laptops and even PlayStation 5 gaming consoles. But be careful, even if this SSD can be installed and used in PlayStation 5, Sony recommends a heatsink for SSD to ensure a high level of performance while running games. Thus, you will need to purchase a separate radiator for this model.

In that situation, I’d rather go for a model that comes with a factory-installed heatsink like the Fury Renegade Heatsink, or one with a bundled heatsink.

The specifications are almost identical to those of the Fury Renegade models

Comparing the spec lists between the KC3000 and the Fury Renegade, I noticed very little real difference between the two. Both use the same Phison E18 controller, the same types of 3D TLC NAND memories, and come in the same storage options: 500 GB and 1, 2 or 4 TB. It just so happens that we have available for testing the same capacity that we had in the case of the Fury Renegade, the 2 TB, so we can directly compare the performances.

Kingston says the KC3000 models have a maximum read speed of 7GB/s, while the Renegade models have 7.3GB.. In terms of operations per second they are identical, but the KC3000 has lower total write limits during use:

• KC3000 512GB – 400TBW
• KC3000 1024GB – 800TBW
• KC3000 2048GB – 1.6PBW
• KC3000 4096GB – 3.2PBW

Fortunately, all models are recommended for 1,800,000 hours, that is 205 years of non-stop operation. By this time, SSDs will probably be ancient technology and everything will be stored directly in the brain, perhaps with the help of technologies that companies like Neuralink are developing. Kingston promises a 5-year warranty on these models or until they reach their write limit. I don’t think there will be many who will manage to write 1.6 PB of data to this SSD in the next 5 years.

The performance of the Kingston KC3000 is exactly what all signs suggest: top notch

I installed the SSD on an ASUS ROG X670E Crosshair Hero motherboard, which is exclusively equipped with M.2 slots with four PCI-Express (x4) buses. Also, all SSDs installed on the motherboard benefit from cooling from a huge heatsink, equipped with thermal pads on both sides. Being an SSD with chips on both sides, this ensures optimal cooling.

Basically, in tests, the KC3000 performs identically to the Kingston Fury Renegade of the same size, even surpassing the specifications listed on the official website and on the packaging it comes in. Although the “promised” top speed is 7,000MB/s read, in reality the SSD hits 7.3GB/s, just like the Renegade and hits 7GB write too. Thus, I suspect there are two versions of the KC3000 on the market. Some that are exactly the same SSDs as the Renegade, but with different stickers, which mention a different model (and probably a firmware renaming), and others with a promised maximum read speed of 7,000 MB/s. This strategy is more economical in terms of manufacturing costs, being able to sell higher volumes of a product that is in high demand without waiting behind a single production line.

The advantage for customers is that they can get a slightly better performing SSD for the same price. And even if you get one with the “standard” speed, it’s still one of the fastest PCI-Express 4.0 SSDs on the market.

The cooling provided by the heatsink on the motherboard ensures completely stable performance even under intense long-term stress, with speeds very consistent between tests in the ATTO benchmark.

Benchmarks

• CrystalDiskMark SEQ1M Q8T1 – Read: 7.388 MB/s / Write: 7.084 MB/s
• CrystalDiskMark SEQ1M Q1T1 – Read: 3.803 MB/s / Write: 5.99 MB/s
• Atto Disk Benchmark – Read: 6,44 GB/s / Write: 6,82 GB/s
• AS SSD Benchmark – Read: 6.204 MB/s / Write: 6.078 MB/s

ConCluSIonS

The Kingston KC3000 is a top SSD that I find completely interchangeable with the Fury Renegade models on the market. So if you want to buy a KC3000 or a Fury Renegade and only one of them is in stock, you can choose any of these models without fear. They are largely identical in terms of performance. But I repeat: if you need an SSD for the PlayStation 5, the Renegade model with a factory-installed heatsink is probably the best choice. If you can’t find that model, you can use a 3rd party heatsink that you buy separately alongside the “standard” KC3000 or Renegade, but the costs will also increase a bit.