Introduction
We have a new internal SSD storage kit review for you today branded under ADATA’s XPG storage line of products. The XPG ATOM 30 KIT is a kit that contains two SSDs, one in the M.2 form factor and the other is a 2.5” form factor. One is an NVME PCIe Gen3 SSD and the other is a SATA SSD. At first, this may sound like an odd pairing, but there is a purpose to this combination. First, the pricing, which is enticing, you can find this kit online for just $124.99 right now, which is a really nice price for 1TB plus 250GB of SSD storage.
If you are not familiar with ADATA and XPG know that XPG was established by ADATA with the aim of providing high-performance products to gamers and enthusiasts. XPG stands for XTREME PERFORMANCE GEAR. All XPG hardware has to adhere to the ADATA A+ testing methodology which ensures stability and reliability.
The entire line of ADATA branded SSDs are located here. The entire line of XPG branded SSDs are located here. Straight from that page, you will locate the kit we are reviewing today, which is the ATOM 30 KIT model number AATO-30KIT-250G1TCI. As far as kits go this is the only kit with two SSDs combined that ADATA/XPG offers. It contains an ADATA branded 250GB SU670 Ultimate 2.5” SATA SSD, which doesn’t seem to be listed on ADATA’s website separately. It also includes an XPG branded ATOM 30 1TB M.2 PCIe Gen3 NVME SSD.
Why two SSDs?
Upgrade two at once. It’s for upgrading an older system perhaps, or a pre-built system, or a laptop with a slow mechanical hard drive. Let’s say you have an older system with a spinning hard drive but want something quick, cheap, and easy to upgrade to SSD performance, this kit can provide that for you in two ways.
It can provide you with an M.2 SSD upgrade with 1TB of storage, which is pretty decent. Then, you can also throw in the 2.5” 250GB SSD for extra SSD storage, or, alternatively, a laptop to also upgrade its storage at the same time. It gives you options for an older build. Because the M.2 SSD is PCIe Gen3 it is the perfect fit for older motherboards that don’t support PCIe Gen4.
XPG is looking at this kit as a means for an affordable upgrade option for mainstream gaming that can work on new and old motherboards, or even gaming console systems. Think of this kit as entry-level into breaking into SSD level of performance on your PC if you had older and slower drives. It’s an entry into the SSD storage space, without having to break the bank, is budget-friendly, and gives you two different options in one kit.
XPG ATOM 30
First, let’s talk about the XPG ATOM 30 1TB SSD included. This is an M.2 2280 internal solid state drive 1TB NVME SSD that supports PCIe Gen3 x4 interface in the M.2 2280 form factor. On the SSD it reads M.2 2280 ATOM30KIT 250GB+1TB AATO-30KIT-250G1TCI. The SSD is NVMe 1.3 compliant, but does support NVMe 1.4 host memory buffer, HMB protocol. It uses 3D NAND flash. It has a rated read speed of up to 2,500MB/s and a rated write speed of 2,000MB/s. Its 4K random read/write IOPS (Max) is 180K/200K. Therefore, it does not fully utilize the performance capable from the PCIe Gen3 x4 interface, as far as read/write performance goes this is on the slower side.
It does support SLC Caching and has host memory buffer support and LDPC ECC (LDPC low-density parity-check) as well as AES 256-bit encryption, but it does not have onboard DRAM. This is a DRAM-less SSD to save cost, to make up for that it supports host memory buffer, HMB of the NVMe protocol. The TBW (Terabytes Written) at max capacity is 600TB of data and MTBF is 2M hours. It has a 5-year warranty.
The XPG ATOM 30 SSD is a single-sided SSD, with all 3D NAND flash chips and controller on one single side. This is good news for installing it into a laptop or console. The controller chip onboard is a Realtek RTS5766DL. Pretty much all we could find out is that this is a quad-channel controller that does not support a DRAM cache. The 3D NAND Flash is made by Micron and is a TLC NAND layout.
The ATOM 30 comes with a heatsink, well, rather than a protective plate. It’s just a thin piece of metal that is more of a protector for the hardware, than a heatsink. It adheres quite well to the controller and flash and adds a bit of heat dissipation by spreading it out over an area.
ADATA SU670 Ultimate
The second SSD included is a 250GB SATA III 6Gb/s 2.5” form factor SSD with model number ASU670SS-250G-B. It has a rated read speed of 520MB/s and a rated write speed of 450MB/s. The 4K random read/write IOPS (Max) is 30K/65K. Its read speed is competitive, but the write speed is slow for a SATA SSD. It does support SLC caching and error correction with its 3D NAND Flash-based flash. The TBW (Terabytes Written) at max capacity is 50TB of data and MTBF is 2M hours. It has a 3-year warranty.
When we opened up the SSD, we found a Realtek RTS5735DLQ controller inside and TLC ADATA 3D NAND flash.