It's too bad this thing still uses the "big ugly wall wart" idea. Plus, this one has the added "bonus" of being way too big both horizontally and vertically, like an old power brick for a NES or something. Here's a clue, power adapter manufacturers: Have a normal sized plug with a wire that leads to the transformer brick, that way you can fit more than two things on a frickin 6 slot power bar.
You do get that this is for travellers right? And is meant to be used in a non-permanent setup and that all multi-system/multi-country plugs by their nature are always big, they could have used a wire but the plug would still be huge and all you'd have is more clumsiness. That said they could divorce the big types from the small types of plugs used in various countries and make it so you can keep the the big one that supports the big plugs (UK and such) in the bag when you are in one of the many places were small will work, and then a cable would be an advantage perhaps, although just having a box with usb connectors is still very easy to throw in a bag instead of something where you have to deal with wires.
It still wouldn't hurt to have the different country plugs at the end of a cord. Every laptop power brick I've ever seen (except for Macbook ones that have the brick plug directly into the wall) as well as the PSP power adapter and many others, has a detachable cord that goes into the brick, and can be switched for a similar cord with a different country's wall plug on the end. In fact I bought my PSP overseas and it had a European plug originally, but it was nothing to take a North American one off some other device (an old laptop in my case, IIRC) and put it into the PSP's power brick. That's the kind of thing that these travel USB chargers should do as well, have an interchangeable cord so that the big ass brick with the USB port on it doesn't sit directly at the plug but on the floor beside it.
Well yeah but this is an USB charger with like 5 volt 1 Ampere, which is a tiny thing now that we don't use transformers any more, so you'd have a 'brick' the size of a box of tictacs dangling from the plug that would end up bigger than the device.
Talking of tictacs I saw them while in the supermarket checkout line and was amazed how expensive they've gotten, quite outrageous.
The best things about tictacs are the smell of the inside of box and the very thin sugary coating. Other than that they are a bit meh. And don't get me started on the green and orange ones.
@Wwhat: Kind of funny you should mention tictacs - i've just come back from a one month tour in Ibiza where they had teeny tiny boxes of tictacs (about 1/3 the size of a regular box - maybe 5 tics and 5 tacs) for 25 eurocents (about 20c)
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It's too bad this thing still uses the "big ugly wall wart" idea. Plus, this one has the added "bonus" of being way too big both horizontally and vertically, like an old power brick for a NES or something. Here's a clue, power adapter manufacturers: Have a normal sized plug with a wire that leads to the transformer brick, that way you can fit more than two things on a frickin 6 slot power bar.
You do get that this is for travellers right? And is meant to be used in a non-permanent setup and that all multi-system/multi-country plugs by their nature are always big, they could have used a wire but the plug would still be huge and all you'd have is more clumsiness.
That said they could divorce the big types from the small types of plugs used in various countries and make it so you can keep the the big one that supports the big plugs (UK and such) in the bag when you are in one of the many places were small will work, and then a cable would be an advantage perhaps, although just having a box with usb connectors is still very easy to throw in a bag instead of something where you have to deal with wires.
It still wouldn't hurt to have the different country plugs at the end of a cord. Every laptop power brick I've ever seen (except for Macbook ones that have the brick plug directly into the wall) as well as the PSP power adapter and many others, has a detachable cord that goes into the brick, and can be switched for a similar cord with a different country's wall plug on the end. In fact I bought my PSP overseas and it had a European plug originally, but it was nothing to take a North American one off some other device (an old laptop in my case, IIRC) and put it into the PSP's power brick. That's the kind of thing that these travel USB chargers should do as well, have an interchangeable cord so that the big ass brick with the USB port on it doesn't sit directly at the plug but on the floor beside it.
Well yeah but this is an USB charger with like 5 volt 1 Ampere, which is a tiny thing now that we don't use transformers any more, so you'd have a 'brick' the size of a box of tictacs dangling from the plug that would end up bigger than the device.
Talking of tictacs I saw them while in the supermarket checkout line and was amazed how expensive they've gotten, quite outrageous.
The best things about tictacs are the smell of the inside of box and the very thin sugary coating. Other than that they are a bit meh. And don't get me started on the green and orange ones.
@Wwhat:
Kind of funny you should mention tictacs - i've just come back from a one month tour in Ibiza where they had teeny tiny boxes of tictacs (about 1/3 the size of a regular box - maybe 5 tics and 5 tacs) for 25 eurocents (about 20c)