The Kingston KC2000 is a new high-performance PCI Express NVMe SSD released by a leader in the storage space, and at times the drive exceeds the expectations set by the manufacturer itself. As one of the earlier commercially available NVMe SSDs based on 96-layer 3D TLC NAND, it aims to bring the cost of speedy NVMe drives into the mainstream. It mostly succeeds, just bested on 4K write tests by all-stars in the space such as the Samsung SSD 970 EVO and the WD Black NVMe SSD, and in sequential writes by the Editors' Choice ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro. It's a fine M.2 drive pick, especially for the security-conscious, and market-price changes may well bolster its appeal.
An Industry in Flux
To ladle out the SSD-term soup: The Kingston KC2000 is an M.2 96-layer 3D TLC NVMe PCI Express x4 SSD. (To make sense of these acronyms, head on over to our SSD dejargonizer.) This 80mm-long (Type-2280) SSD has entered the market during a very interesting time for storage devices as a whole. NVMe drives, once reserved for only the poshest of buyers, have been plummeting in price over the past year, in part due to an oversupply of the NAND chips used in their manufacture (32 and 64-layer NAND chips, specifically).
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In preparation for the arrival of 96-layer chips, companies like ADATA have been slashing prices for older SSDs, like our most recent NVMe-based Editors' Choice drive, the 64-layer ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro ($86.60 at Amazon) . A drive that used to cost more than 30 cents per gigabyte in 2018 is now hanging around 15 cents per gigabyte, making even 2.5-inch-form-factor Serial ATA drives look pricey by comparison.
The rise of 96-layer NAND production processes will drive prices down even further, which is likely why the KC2000 is debuting at just 20 cents per gigabyte. (It's at a $201.50 MSRP for the 1TB version we tested.) The KC2000 prices will fluctuate up to 25 cents per gigabyte if you opt for the 120GB version, though it bears mentioning that the whole "the smaller you go on capacity, the more expensive per gig that it gets" rule of thumb isn't unique to Kingston, by any means.
This pricing structure puts the KC2000 right in the middle of its two most significant competitors, the Samsung SSD 970 EVO (street price at 23 cents per gigabyte) and the XPG SX8200 Pro (15 cents per gigabyte).
With the advancements that come with the move from 64-layer to 96-layer NAND, durability ratings don't seem to have changed all that much. The drive is rated by Kingston trivially lower in endurance than Kingston's last NVMe SSD release, the Kingston A1000. The A1000 was rated for 600 terabytes written (TBW, a measure of drive longevity) in its 960GB version. The KC2000 is also rated at 600TBW, but for the 1TB version.
This puts the KC2000 right in line with the Samsung SSD 970 EVO, which means it's on par among mainstream M.2 SSDs. (In contrast, the pricier, enthusiast-grade Samsung SSD 970 Pro is rated for twice that.) The KC2000 still lags slightly behind the SX8200 Pro, though, with its 640TBW rating. All three drives match up on warranty duration, however, with Kingston, Samsung, and ADATA each protecting its models for a period of five years from purchase.
It bears mentioning that unlike either of those drives, Kingston has included 256-bit AES encryption on the KC2000, along with support for Opal 2.0, hardware-based self-encryption technology that ensures the drive meets the on-drive data-privacy requirements set out in the GDPR. Both of these features can be mediated through Kingston's SSD Manager software, which is adequate, if not outstanding, in terms of the number of options and configuration settings available to control how your drive behaves.
Benchmark Testing: No SSD Slouch
Kingston rates the KC2000 at 3,200MBps for peak sequential reads, and 2,200MBps peak writes. In our benchmark runs, the drive was able to keep up with (and even modestly exceed) those rates.
First up is PCMark 8's Storage test, which simulates everyday disk accesses in tasks such as editing photos and web browsing...
It's rare we ever see much deviation in this test—for the kinds of tasks PCMark 8 Storage simulates, the differences among late-model PCI Express SSDs are scant—and in the case of the KC2000 the results were no different. Moving right along!
The Crystal DiskMark 6.0 sequential tests simulate best-case, straight-line transfers of large files; in contrast, the 4K (or "random read/write") tests simulate typical processes involved in program/game loads or bootup sequences. First, let's look at the sequential ones...
On the sequential-read tests, the Kingston KC2000 is close to the top spot among all the NVMe drives we've tested in the past two years, bested in the subset shown here only by the Samsung SSD 970 EVO, by roughly 100MBps. This success is short-lived, though. The drive scores lower than many of the other PCI Express x4 SSDs we've tested on sequential-write speeds, but in most cases by amounts that would only be visible in benchmarks, imperceptible to the naked eye during daily use.
The Crystal DiskMark 4K results are where things get a little more interesting...
While the KC2000 beats the XPG SX8200 Pro in 4K write speeds, it falls a little back on 4K reads, arguably the more important of the two for gamers or anyone who installs their OS on the drive. The Samsung SSD 970 EVO tops them both here decisively on writes.
Last up is a series of file and folder transfers performed in AS-SSD, an SSD-specific benchmarking utility. These tests involve copying three distinct, large files or folders from one location on the test drive to another.
The AS-SSD transfer-test results prove a reasonably good showing for the KC2000 against the Samsung and WD drives, but the ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro takes the top podium spot across all three of AS-SSD's subtests.
Making a Case for KC
The Kingston KC2000 is a fast NVMe SSD with a competitive durability rating, a long warranty, and strong encryption features. But like most M.2 NVMe drives we've reviewed in the past few months, up against the Editors' Choice ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro, it's a step behind if all you look at is speed-to-price ratio.
If the Editors' Choice ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro ($86.60 at Amazon) didn't exist, the Kingston KC2000 would be vying for the award as a value contender against the Samsung SSD 970 EVO and the WD Black NVMe SSD. It is almost as fast as both of those fine drives in most practical benchmarks, and it bests them on pricing at this writing while packing encryption features neither can match.
For more general use, the XPG SX8200 Pro is a great pick: cheaper, a bit faster, equally as durable. But if encryption is a key sticking point for your data, don't ignore this Kingston drive. It has its own certain talents, and if you need them, it's otherwise right up there.
The Kingston KC2000 is a no-doubt-fast PCI Express NVMe SSD with robust security features. The speed-to-value calculus favors a few other 3D TLC and QLC drives, but it remains a strong competitor.
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