I love how all the highest rated “Amazon’s Choice” items for a USB-C Hub all have Q&A feedback saying the HDMI port doesn’t work, but the reviews saying the same thing get scrubbed
How do we even find reliable dongles/hubs these days
Buy them from the manufacturer themselves. Anker, Monoprice etc. Or places like B&H, Adorama, Best Buy, at least you get good customer service if it doesn't work.
Is there a resource / someone’s Medium who will break down all of the legit manufacturers? I’m aware of some for RPi like Jeff Geerling has great microSD card reviews
Btw I went with Anker because it had the least reported issues from Amazon (after extensive filtering on my part)
Don't use Amazon? Or pre/post-pandemic, go to a store and try the product or talk to a human about it?
I haven't had any issues buying from web shops anywhere in the EU and with physical stores the owner is (if nothing else) invested in the property and will probably sell you decent stuff. Never had a used product sold as new, untrustworthy reviews (beyond that most individual reviews are not representative of the true population), or other such problems that I read about Amazon on HN. Of course, you need to know what features or specs you're looking for or you'll still get, say, painfully slow sd cards for nearly the same price as the faster ones, but that's not necessarily a quality issue: the product doesn't falsely advertise being fast.
Living in Germany now, Amazon is a very dominant player here and, not speaking German that well yet, it's a bit harder to find other shops that sell a random item. Amazon is an easy first stop but they make it super hard to do comparative research (sort by price does not sort by price, no useful filters, inconsistent or missing product info, etc.) and so I usually do end up putting it in google/ddg instead and finding an alternative store to buy from, or get something second-hand (within reason). Or just go over to one of three computer stores that are within walking distance from home or work. That's how I'd find reliable dongles/hubs these days...
> Amazon is an easy first stop but they make it super hard to do comparative research (sort by price does not sort by price, no useful filters, inconsistent or missing product info, etc.) and so I usually do end up putting it in google/ddg instead and finding an alternative store to buy from, or get something second-hand (within reason).
Since you're in Germany you might want to take a look at aggregators like Geizhals or Idealo. Geizhals in particular enables the user to narrow down product searches by a very complete property/attribute filter. Once you found some products that meet your requirements, both services will show you were they are sold. You will notice that Amazon rarely has the best price and the quality/accuracy of their product listings, descriptions, etc. is downright terrible.
Amazon still features fast, reliable fulfilling, but so do some other shops. Bottom line is that you have lots of choices in Germany.
The problem in America was RadioShack (before went out of business) as a brick and mortar store was also rebranding crappy wired products that would go out too.
I find it strange that a braided-cable charger from places like Target will go out before the Apple manufactured one
There are probably a few regional stores like Fry’s that have good electronics though, but their numbers are dwindling
How do we even find reliable dongles/hubs these days