Satechi Aluminum USB 3.0 Hub & Card Reader
More ports for your Mac
Having ports on the back of your Mac desktop makes it look good, but it’s not the most convenient thing. This hub borrows the styling of Apple’s Magic Trackpad and Keyboard (although, slightly awkwardly, the last generation of these devices, rather than the current style), and gives you three USB 3.0 ports, an SD card reader, and a microSD card reader, with a single USB Type-A cable that connects to your Mac. The idea is to save you having to fumble behind your Mac to plug things in.
Mostly, it works great. With two drives connected through it, data rates were almost exactly the same as with the drives connected to the Mac directly. It also pushes through enough power to charge an iPad.
However, if you connect too many of your devices at once, you may overload its power capabilities – our two drives stopped transferring once we connected the iPad! (Your Mac will warn you if this is the case.)
We’d have liked a fourth USB slot over the microSD reader ourselves, but it’s still great.