Why I love my little round Dell USB-C mobile adapter
Barbara Krasnoff is officially the reviews editor for The Verge, but although she has done a great deal of reviewing in her time, she doesn’t tend to do a lot of it in her current position. “I was originally hired here to write and edit to-do articles,” she explains. “Now, I spend most of my time editing, overseeing various projects, and coaxing staffers to write about their favorite stuff.”
Where did you first hear about the Dell mobile adapter?
I didn’t actually hear about it — I saw it at a trade event here in New York City a few years ago. Dell was showing off some of its new products, and one of the accessories was this little puck-looking item with several ports around its periphery. But the neatest thing was that it had its own USB-C connector on a short cable that revealed itself when you spun the base in a clockwise direction. Then, when you spun it counterclockwise, the cable pulled neatly back into the base. It looked both ingenious and useful, and as soon as it was available, I bought one for myself.
My first laptops had lots of ports, but as the computers got thinner, the ports began to disappear. Eventually, most of the laptops I used only had one or two USB-C ports for anything I wanted to physically connect to my device. This little adapter lets me use a variety of different connectors, including some that belong to my older devices.
What do you like about it?
As I mentioned before, it includes a number of different ports, some of which are no longer in use but I prefer to have on hand. The model I have, the DA300, comes with an ethernet port, a USB-C and USB-A port, an HDMI port, a VGA port, and a DisplayPort. There are other, newer models with a different selection of ports.
I also think the whole spin-the-disk-and-the-cable-disappears thing is a lot of fun.
Is there anything about it that you dislike, or that you think could be improved?
A slot for a microSD card would have been handy. And a color other than black might have been nice.
Just FYI: Dell has replaced my model with the DA305, which trades the VGA port for a second USB-A port and switches up the USB from 3.1 to 3.2. Amazon still seems to be carrying the DA300, but I’m not sure how long that’s going to last.
Who would you recommend it to?
There are a lot of good desk-based adapters out there, but this one is great for popping into your backpack just in case you need it.
