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The vast majority of our reviews come from verified purchases. Reviews from customers may include My Best Buy members, employees, and Tech Insider Network members (as tagged). Select reviewers may receive discounted products, promotional considerations or entries into drawings for honest, helpful reviews.

• Rated 4 out of 5 stars

  Great Steering Wheel with PC Compatibility Problem

  • Tech Insider Network Member

  Pros: Resistance and feedback of wheel Pedal feel App settings On wheel settings Cons: Setup Mounting Written setup instructions Compatibility with games Mounting: This is where I had a lot of problems. The assembly and mounting instructions are all pictures and they are not clear as to what you are supposed to do. I ended up looking at YouTube to find out how to do all of this. The bracket to attach the wheel to the table/desk/etc. is a separate piece that does not mount to the wheel so you must make sure you don’t lose it. It clamps the wheel to the desk by pressing the plate of the wheel against the desk. I had a hard time trying to figure it out. I assumed that the bracket mounted permanently to the wheel what the screw holes on it, but no, it is a separate piece. Now I must keep track of it. Also, the bracket does not open very far so you really must have a thinner desk. It does mount very deep so you must have a desk with a narrow vertically, but steep horizontally to make it fit. The pedals also have rubber feet on them, so they do slip on the bare floor. Wiring is typical with a cable between the wheel and pedals, a power cable going to the wheel, and a USB-A cable going to the computer or Xbox. I think that is generally the same with all wheels. Setup: This was a pain also. First off, you must set it to either PC or Xbox mode when you start. I was using this on PC. Setting this was not obvious. I knew I had to do it to communicate but doing it required research on the internet. Installing the app which you need did go smoothly as well as updating the firmware, although it took a long time. Games: Having the wheel communicate with the games did not go smoothly. I tried it with a bunch of games and although I was able to select it in the game, I could not get the wheel to control the game. I tried a bunch and the only one that worked was Forza Horizon 5. Now this may not be the case with Xbox, but it was on PC. I will spend more time on this but at least I can use it with Forza which is my favorite racing game anyway. Settings: There are plenty of settings to keep you busy trying to get everything the way you want it. The nice thing is that you can change the settings both using the app or using the screen on the wheel itself. Speaking of the screen, it is beautiful and well designed for setting up everything and getting feedback. You can also use the app for updating the firmware. Feel: Now, as I said, I was only able to get this to work with Forza Horizon 5 so I can only comment on how it feels with that game. At all default settings, the resistance of the wheel when driving is perfect. It allows you to steer when you need to but also provides enough resistance to keep the wheel straight. The feedback is also perfect and really works well with Forza, especially when on the road, off the road and hitting something. All feeling different. The pedals are typical. Brake provides more resistance than the accelerator. Both feel nice although they are more vertical than I would like making them a little hard to use. I’m not sure if there is a way to adjust them to make them lower. The wheel is direct drive, and I think that may be why it feels as nice as it does. Who knows but it does, and I think direct drive wheels in general work better and last longer. Settings available: Wheel rotation Brake deadzone Brake sensitivity Throttle deadzone Throttle sensitivity K -Drive Strength K-Drive Surface K-Drive tuning K-Drive Center Spring K-Drive Damping Creating and selecting profiles RMD Indicator Units (MPH or KM/H) Set colors on buttons and around the wheelbase Calibrate wheel center point Pedal calibration mode Screen brightness Screen dimming timeout Reset to factory settings Update firmware So how do I feel about this? Well, I love the feel of the wheel and pedals (although I wish the pedals were lower). The resistance and feedback are excellent. The screen is nice. Unfortunately, I was only able to get it to work with Forza for unknown reasons, so this will require tinkering, hopefully. As much as I would like to give this 5 stars, because of this, I can’t.

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  Posted 2 months ago by Dalton

• Rated 4 out of 5 stars

  Solid Wheel at a Good Price

  • Tech Insider Network Member
  • Top 100 Contributor

  "So then... I put him in the wall." - Me recounting my latest race to my wife whose eyes glazed over thirty minutes prior. The Turtle Beach VelocityOne Race KD3 is my first racing wheel. I have always wanted one but have never taken the plunge before. As a result, I cannot really compare this wheel with others. I also used the racing wheel on PC. So, I cannot really talk about how this wheel performs on X-Box game consoles. What I can say is that this wheel is a lot of fun. It feels well made. Feedback in games that have supported it feels great. Telemetry data displayed on the steering wheel adds to immersion (when it works.) I have some quibbles with software compatibility (something I gather is standard when dealing with PC gaming wheels), and with Bluetooth app support that feels lacking at this point. All minor quibbles to be sure. Without any basis to compare, I can say with 100% confidence that this is a good racing wheel. Or, at the very least, that I enjoyed it. Setup: Turtle Beach makes setup straight forward. There are lines designed to guide the user to attach the wheel to the base. The base has extra USB-C porta built-in to function as a hub for connecting other accessories such as the included pedals. Experience: Users will need the VelocityOne Tuner app. This really is not optional as the VelocityOne Tuner app has firmware updates for the wheel and enables a sub-PC app for telemetry data in programs that support it. Out of the box, there were at least two firmware updates in my experience. I clamped the steering wheel to my desk. No fancy driving rig in my house, yet. I took full advantage of the clamping system, and it worked, mostly. Unfortunately, it was impossible for me to get it fully stationary. No matter how tight I tried to get the clamp, this wheel will move a bit. That could be a combination of the surface of my desk combined with the foam pad used for the clamp. On the plus side, the clamp does not damage the desk, but on the downside, it was difficult for me to keep the wheel as tight as I wanted. Still, that could just be my desk. I tried two other desks and neither worked. Either the desk had a keyboard tray in the way or framing kept me from mounting the wheel. I will take slightly loose as that was my best option. The pedal system has textured grips, but if you are gaming on carpet, you will need something to brace the pedals against as they moved all over the place in my testing. Once everything was plugged in and the machine and the racing games were up and running, I discovered the entire experience was not as “plug-and-play” as I was hoping. The problem is every racing game is going to require additional configuration. I spent most of my time on Forza Horizon 5 and Forsa Motorsport. I had to map buttons, pedals, and the wheel for every game. The experience was particularly buggy with Horizon 5. Once mapped, force feedback worked on the games I tried, and the wheel performed well. Your mileage may vary. But from what I can tell, this is a common experience with racing wheels in general. I wish the experience was true plug and play with button mapping. If an XBOX or PlayStation controller works with assigned buttons automatically, why is a racing wheel any different? Which gets me to “telemetry.” Telemetry allows your game to send data to an external device. It could be to a spreadsheet or in this case data out to the wheel in the form of speedometer and gear data. On the KD3 telemetry data looks cool. It adds to the immersion, but it does not work with every game and even on the games where it does work, there is extra setup involved. Turtle Beach has information on how to set up telemetry in supported apps on their website, but you will need to refer to Turtle Beach for instructions. Unfortunately, Horizon 5 did not support telemetry with the KD3, but Forza Motorsport did. Once in a game with everything running as needed and all the mild settings in games tweaked to my preference, the wheel is fun. It is. There is a decent level of force feedback. The wheel fights you in your races, but man is it a blast. I must talk a bit about the buttons and button placement. The XBOX buttons on the side of the steering column seem out of place to me. I would have preferred those buttons on the wheel itself. Also, the buttons on the wheel, specifically the direction buttons on the left side, felt squishy to me. It was hard to get a press that felt quite right. Occasionally, button presses did not register. The KD3 supports a Bluetooth app on the phone, but I do not think that feature is ready for primetime. As app functionality was incredibly limited and really did nothing more than tell me firmware version of the wheel. Regarding apps, VelocityOne app for Windows allows you to tweak settings for profiles, but I could never get my lighting profiles to stick. Now, I could manually toggle the lighting with the wheel itself, but I could not get changes made in the VelocityOne app to stick to the device. The wheel has a solid build. The racing wheel itself feels good in my hands. The foot pedals have adjustable tension and, once I had them locked into place, they work well. The fact that I can swap out the included wheel with a formula one style option down the road is a nice touch. The extra USB-C ports make this feel like an expandable option that can really grow to meet the needs of the user. I wish there were a clutch pedal included with the other two pedals. But I cannot Conclusion: I have had fun with this wheel. This is a gateway drug I never knew I needed. But I wish the software experience were better. I wish application compatibility was better. I am not sure how many of those software problems are within Turtle Beach’s control, but Forza Horizon 5 is one of the most popular racing systems on XBOX and PC and it should work without complication. The VelocityOne Tuner should work without hiccups. I should be able to make lighting adjustments in app and have them stick to the wheel. Still…. I am having fun.

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  Posted 2 months ago by RedScorpion

• Rated 4 out of 5 stars

  Good Entry-Level Direct Drive Wheel

  • Tech Insider Network Member
  • Top 250 Contributor

  The KD3 from Turtle Beach feels like a good-level option for a direct drive racing wheel. The base doesn’t have the torque of the other choices out there, but the cost is also a lot lower. It feels like a substantial upgrade over the Logitech G923 I was using to be sure and could be a good option for someone trying to get into a higher quality racing on a budget. The KD3 includes the wheel base, a 300mm steering wheel, and a pedal set with brake/gas pedals. The wheel base has a nice compact design and feels solidly built. The Xbox-specific buttons are positioned along the side of the base near where the wheel slides on, which does make them difficult to see so you do have to learn their positions by feel (I have accidentally hit the ‘share’ button many times now). The aluminum pedals have adjustable springs and the brake pedal can also be adjusted to the left or the right. The wheel probably feels like the lowest quality component of this whole setup in terms of its general hard-plastic feel, but it seems durable, the button layout is good, and the magnetic paddle shifters feel great. The wheel base can be directly mounted or attached via the included desk clamp. The desk clamp slides in between the mounting holes and seems to hold the base well, though I went for the direct mounting method on my wheel stand utilizing the 78.4mm x 66mm pattern. I was only able to mount using 2 of the 4 holes on the front of the base, but even with just those attached it felt like a secure fit. The base has a built in angle adjustment via a thumb knob that can be set to either 0, 10, or 20 degrees. The pedals also have a 202.9mm x 185.1mm pattern on the underside for mounting if you don’t plan on using them on the floor. The pedals connect via the included USB-C cable to the back of the wheelbase and there are 3 additional inputs for things like the gear shifter and presumably other accessories that Turtle Beach will introduce. The cable going between the wheels and the pedals was plenty long for my setup, but I feel like the power cable and Xbox/PC USB cable could be longer. I primarily used this with my Xbox Series X and Forza Horizon 5. I downloaded the VelocityOne Tuner app and there was a firmware update available, which took about 20 minutes to download. The Tuner app has a lot of options for setting up profiles, rotation, deadzones, lighting, etc., but I wasn’t able to actually get any of the changes to communicate to my wheel and ended up having to make them via the built-in display and navigation. From what I have read there have been some firmware issues with this and previous Turtle Beach wheels, which is of some concern, but it does look like they are actively working on firmware updates. I’ve never used a direct-drive racing wheel before, but compared to the Logitech G923 that I have been using, the KD3 is a significantly better experience. It provides excellent feedback across a variety of road surfaces and it feels easy to feel out where I am through the wheel. The base is rated for 3.2Nm and in general does a decent job of transmitting a convincing experience. The built-in display can show some telemetry in certain games, but on Xbox the compatible games I saw were F1 2024 and F1 2025. PC has a lot more options available though. The pedals feel good, though I suspect I will need to tinker with the tension on them to get them in a spot where I really like them. Overall besides a couple of nitpicks and an inconsistent software experience. I like the KD3. It feels like a good step up for someone who wants to get a direct drive wheel but doesn’t want to spend $800+ on the other options.

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  Posted 2 months ago by SamG