Although SSD drives are getting cheap and cheap, portability is the most obvious advantage of USB Pen drives. Kingston DataTraveler Exodia seems as an affordable USB drive for daily data travel needs. Unbeatable price label makes it very attractive, but, what about speed performance? We have tested and reviewed Kingston Exodia 32GB USB Flash Drive in detail.
By Metin KARAL – Review Editor
We research, test, and if applicable, rate the products that We used. We know the importance of Trusted Reviews. We only make money if you purchase a product through our links.
Pros
- Very Cheap!
- Good Read Speed
- Easy of Use
Cons
- Poor Write Speed
- Poor USB 2.0 Performance
Kingston DataTraveler Exodia Features
For a long time, I have been using many Kingston memory drive, including DataTraveler series. They are actually robust and reliable pen drives. Kingston DataTraveler Exodia is replacement for DataTraveler G4 series. Shape and and features are similar with G4, with small enhancements. It has 4 different capacity model with different keyring loop color. Protective cap helps protecting the interface when it is not used. It has USB 3.2 Interface combability which is capable of 10 Gbit/s transfer rate in theory. But real life measurements are lesser than transfer rate. Keep reading for real life tests…
| Capacity | 32/64/128/256 GB | |
| Compability | USB 2.0 and UP | |
| USB Interface | USB 3.2 Gen 1, Type-A | |
| Weight | 11 gr | |
| Dimensions (LxWxH) | 6.73 x 2.1 x 1.01 cm | |
| Protective Cap | Yes | |
| Keyring Loop | Yes | |
| Made in | Taiwan | |
| Comply with FCC Standards | Yes | |
Test System
We have tested Kingston Exodia with our Asus FX506LH model Gaming notebook. It has both USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 Interfaces. For this reason, We have also tested USB 2.0 and 3.0 performance of Kingston Exodia. All tests are done under Windows 11 Pro system.
| Brand | ASUS | |
| Model | FX506LH | |
| CPU | Intel i5-10300H | |
| Graphics | Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 | |
| RAM | 8 GB DDR4 | |
| Storage | 512GB M.2 PCIe SSD | |
| OS | Windows 11 | |
Test System 2
In order to see performance of Exodia in other platforms, We have tested it with a different rig. This test system is a PC. We did not made all test but only FAT32 test in order to give a rough comparison idea.
| Brand | MSI | |
| Board Model | MSI H510M-A PRO | |
| CPU | Intel Core i5 11400F | |
| Graphics | MSI GEFORCE RTX 3060 VENTUS 2X OC | |
| RAM | 16 GB DDR4 | |
| Storage | Samsung 500GB 970 EVO PLUS NVMe | |
| OS | Windows 11 | |
How We Test It?
We tested Kingston Exodia 32GB with CrystalDiskMark disk benchmarks software. Used latest 8.0.4 version. All tests are done 5 times with 1GB test file (default values).
- In order to see different file system performance, We repeated same test with FAT32, NTFS and ExFAT.
- In order to see performance differences, We repeated same tests with different Allocation unit size (AUS)
- In order to see USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 interface performance differences, We repeated FAT32 tests with both USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 Interfaces.
- Formatted flash disk before each test.
Kingston Datatraveler Exodia Speed Test
Test-1 : FAT32 with 16 Kb AUS at USB 3.0 Interface
FAT32 File system with 16 KB Allocation Unit Size (AUS) performed best performance with Kingston Exodia. This is not a surprise. FAT32 is one of the most supported file system, even for non-Windows operating systems. Bad thing with FAT32 is 4GB maximum file size limit. If you are frequently using +4GB files, forget FAT32!
[Read]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 93.105 MB/s [ 88.8 IOPS] < 89038.61 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 86.602 MB/s [ 82.6 IOPS] < 12069.74 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 2.275 MB/s [ 555.4 IOPS] < 57125.97 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 2.232 MB/s [ 544.9 IOPS] < 1827.49 us>
[Write]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 14.869 MB/s [ 14.2 IOPS] <511550.25 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 14.453 MB/s [ 13.8 IOPS] < 71491.99 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 1.186 MB/s [ 289.6 IOPS] <108249.21 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 1.144 MB/s [ 279.3 IOPS] < 3516.72 us>Test-1/b : FAT32 with 16 Kb AUS at USB 3.0 Interface at MSI Test PC
With our 2. test system We get similar (actually a bit better) sequential read/write results. Our second PC test system is better than original notebook test system in terms of CPU, RAM and NVMe speeds. For this reason, it is not a surprise to see a bit better results. Actually RND4K test results are very impressive, due to better CPU and RAM.
Test-2 : FAT32 with 16 Kb AUS at USB 2.0 Interface
With our ASUS FX506LH notebook (which have both USB 2.0 and 3.0 interfaces) We tested and compared Kingston Exodia’s performance results for USB 2.0 and 3.0 interfaces. Result was not a surprise! Exodia performed almost 3x times better at USB 3.0 interface (93.1 MB/s vs 31.8 MB/s). Interestingly, write speeds are very similar for both interface.
[Read]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 31.821 MB/s [ 30.3 IOPS] <132495.06 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 31.666 MB/s [ 30.2 IOPS] < 32988.66 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 2.940 MB/s [ 717.8 IOPS] < 44248.85 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 2.681 MB/s [ 654.5 IOPS] < 1520.71 us>
[Write]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 12.161 MB/s [ 11.6 IOPS] <647260.33 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 11.108 MB/s [ 10.6 IOPS] < 91463.85 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 1.210 MB/s [ 295.4 IOPS] <106252.85 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 1.182 MB/s [ 288.6 IOPS] < 3453.51 us>Test-3 : exFAT with 16 Kb AUS at USB 3.0 Interface
exFAT is extended version of FAT32 file system at Microsoft ecosystem. It has improvements over FAT32. The biggest improvement is file size limitation. You can store files at exFAT, that are bigger than 4GB. We have tested Kingston Exodia with exFAT. Results are very similar to FAT32, as expected. Most modern operating systems support exFAT. For this reason it is safe to format your USB drive with exFAT.
[Read]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 92.363 MB/s [ 88.1 IOPS] < 89715.47 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 88.800 MB/s [ 84.7 IOPS] < 11755.66 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 2.262 MB/s [ 552.2 IOPS] < 57541.99 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 2.210 MB/s [ 539.6 IOPS] < 1845.50 us>
[Write]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 14.659 MB/s [ 14.0 IOPS] <530001.99 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 14.049 MB/s [ 13.4 IOPS] < 71857.10 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 1.216 MB/s [ 296.9 IOPS] <106549.84 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 1.092 MB/s [ 266.6 IOPS] < 3736.74 us>Test-3 : NTFS with 16 Kb AUS at USB 3.0 Interface
NTFS is Microsoft’s favorite file system, with high security and sharing abilities (mostly for internal disk drives). On the other hand, if you are using a external USB disk drive, usually that abilities are useless. Most people just want to copy and go quickly with a USB drive. In addition, NTFS performed worst performance. If you don’t have specific reason to use NTFS, it is not a good idea to use NTFS with Kingston Exodia.
[Read]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 69.987 MB/s [ 66.7 IOPS] <118188.64 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 64.823 MB/s [ 61.8 IOPS] < 16144.92 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 2.250 MB/s [ 549.3 IOPS] < 57819.24 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 2.330 MB/s [ 568.8 IOPS] < 1751.11 us>
[Write]
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 8, T= 1): 14.015 MB/s [ 13.4 IOPS] <542124.25 us>
SEQ 1MiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 14.223 MB/s [ 13.6 IOPS] < 73620.97 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 32, T= 1): 1.216 MB/s [ 296.9 IOPS] <105963.17 us>
RND 4KiB (Q= 1, T= 1): 1.079 MB/s [ 263.4 IOPS] < 3782.82 us>Extra Test : FAT32 with 64 Kb AUS at USB 3.0 Interface
Compare Datatraveler Exodia Speed Test Results
In this Kingston Exodia review, We tested Kingston Datatraveler Exodia speed with different File System, different Allocation Unit Size and USB interface speeds.
First of all, We saw that FAT32 is the fastest file system for Kingston Exodia. Another advantage of FAT32, it is supported by most modern operating systems, including Linux. Bad thing with FAT32 is 4GB maximum file size limitation. If your files are smaller than 4GB, go with FAT32 at Kingston Exodia.
If your files are larger than 4GB (like big 4K movies) exFAT might be good choice for you. It is little bit slower than FAT32 (93MB/s vs 92MB/s ) but it supports large files. 1 MB/s difference might be ignored for big file support.
Interestingly NTFS performed worst performance. NTFS is a gorgeous file system mostly for internal disk drives with enhanced security. On the other hand, for most people, they are useless. Most people use USB pen drives just for carrying files, easily.
In short; What We see after Kingston Datatraveler Exodia speed test is that, there is a huge difference between USB 3.0 read speeds and USB 2.0 read speeds (93/31 MB/s). Using a USB 3.0 port obviously makes difference for file read speed. But not for write speed! Write speeds are very near. This shows us that, Kingston used average quality chips in Exodia USB drives. If you are using heavy write operations, Kingston Exodia series is not a good choice.
Kingston Exodia Review Summary
To be honest, Kingston Exodia is not the fastest USB pen drive. I have seen some poor performance user reviews at Reddit and Amazon reviews. This might due to old and low performance HDD based PC/Notebooks. Our test system has a NVMe storage and that influence overall performance. If you have a decent computer, probably you will get similar performance.
Kingston datatraveler exodia speed (read speed around 90 MB/s) is good (at least enough!) but Kingston datatraveler exodia write speed (14 MB/s) is below average for a USB 3.0 drive. Kingston datatraveler exodia speed looks like a quality USB 2.0 pen drive! But it has a unbeatable price tag! Currently, 32GB version is around $5 and this is awesome! If you are looking for a cheap and average performance pen drive, Kingston Exoida is definitely good choice. Its cover case gives confidence, and keyring loop is very convenient for carrying.
In short, Kingston Exodia USB pen drive has a perfect price and enough transfer speeds for most daily needs. On the other hand, If you need very high write speeds to transfer very large files, Kingston Exodia is not a good choice.
Kingston Datatraveler Exodia Review
Our Verdict
Kingston DataTraveler Exodia is an affordable USB drive for daily use. Around $5 price label makes it very affordable, for most daily use. You may get around 90 Mbyte/s read speeds and 14 Mbyte/s write speeds. If you are planning to use that pen drive for heavy write operations, search for something else!
Where to Buy?
Buy From Amazon
Alternatively, buy From Producer, KINGSTON
Written by Metin Karal
Metin Karal is a Computer Engineer and He is interested in reviewing products that He used or liked. He also likes programming in C#. Currently, He is developing a really challenging memory game, PairMem which is available at Official Microsoft Store for free download.