Kingston MobileLite G4 USB 3.0 Card Reader Review
MobileLite G4 Performance and Conclusion
We used the SanDisk Extreme Pro UHS-II 32GB Memory Card (review) to try out the MobileLite G4 memory card reader. This card is rated at up to 280MB/s and is the fastest SD card that we have in our arsenal to test with. In the image above you can see that the MobileLite G4 is thin enough to be used on the rear I/O panel of a desktop motherboard without impacting the USB port directly below it. The previous generation MobileLite G2 and G3 drives would block this port. The bad news is that the ports directly to the left and right of the reader are still blocked.
CrystalDiskMark 3.0.3 x64
CrystalDiskMark is a small benchmark utility for drives and enables rapid measurement of sequential and random read/write speeds. Note that CDM only supports Native Command Queuing (NCQ) with a queue depth of 32 (as noted) for the last listed benchmark score. This can skew some results in favor of controllers that also do not support NCQ.
Benchmark Results: After running the CrystalDiskMark storage test with the default settings (incompressible data) we found some pretty big differences between the MobileLite G4 that supports UHS-II cards and the Mobile Lite G3 that doesn’t officially support the newer UHS-II SD memory cards. We went from getting 45MB/s read and 43MB/s write on the MobileLite G3 to 246MB/s read and 209MB/s write on the MobileLite G4! We were also shocked to find that the Kingston MobileLite G4 that costs just $10.36 shipped was just slightly faster than the SanDisk Extreme Pro UHS-II SD Reader/Writer (SDDR-329) that runs $42.00 shipped. We went into the ASUS USB 3.0 Boost utility and enabled turbo mode on the MobileLite G4 and was able to improve performance up to 251MB/s read and 213MB/s write, which is pretty damn impressive.
Final Thoughts & Conclusions
The Kingston MobileLite G4 was found to be priced right and it also performs well against competing memory card readers that are meant to be mobile. The best part about this reader is that it supports both UHS-I and UHS-II SD cards, which is a first for any MobileLite reader by Kingston. The design and build quality were found to both be top notch and we are glad that Kingston moved away from the sliders used on the previous generations.
When it comes to performance the Kingston MobileLite G4 shocked us by beating out the SanDisk Extreme Pro UHS-II Reader (SDDR-329) that costs four times as much. The MobileLite G4 was also found to be easier to use since it didn’t have the funky slider that is hard to operate at times, has a microSD slot and is backed by an identical 2-year warranty. This is the fastest SD card reader that we have and when we have many GB’s of images to move around this is now our reader of choice. At $10.36 shipped it is hard to find a reason not to recommend the Kingston MobileLite G4!
The largest number of complaints on the Kingston MobileLite series is that USB ports are blocked. Indeed we found side ports are blocked due to the width of the MobileLite G4, but that shouldn’t be an issue for mobile users that need something on the road that they can use with their Ultrabook or notebook for a short period of time. The other complaints are that is doesn’t have an activity light on it. Neither of those issues were found to be reasons not to recommend the MobileLite G4!
Legit Bottom Line: The Kingston MobileLite G4 is the fastest UHS-II supported SD card reader that we have tested to date and you can’t beat the retail price!