Transcend Card Reader RDC3 Review

If you’re looking for a professional card reader that you can use for your hobbies and work then you might want to check out Transcend Card Reader RDC3. It’s designed to work with USB-C ports and it is equipped with USB 3.2 Gen 1 Interface for faster transfers.

Why do we need this?

While some notebooks these days now have an SD card reader including the ones on the Macbook Pro M2 Pro, the Transcend Card Reader RDC3 still gives you the flexibility to use SD or microSD card readers on other devices that doesn’t have a card reader like the iPad Pro and also the new iPhone 15 Series.

Design

The Transcend Card Reader RDC3 is ultralight and it’s very portable. It comes with a 40.8 mm x 40.8 mm x 10.4 mm dimensions and it only weighs 17g. It also comes with the reversible USB-C connector already in a short cable which means that if you plug it in to your phone or notebook, it won’t collide or bump with other accessories that are directly plugged to the adjacent USB-C port on the device. For the ports, this one comes with a microSD card slot and also an SD Card slot.

Performance 

We tested the Transcend Card Reader RDC3 using our 32GB SanDisk Extreme Pro 95MB/s SDHC UHS-I Card and also the 64GB SanDisk Ultra MicroSDHC UHS-I Card using CrystalDiskMark. 

CrystalDiskMark with the 32GB SanDisk Extreme Pro 95MB/s SDHC UHS-I Card

CrystalDiskMark with the 64GB SanDisk Ultra MicroSDHC UHS-I Card 

Unsurprisingly, the results that we got were fine and it’s on the same level as promised on the cards. There were not much heating on the card reader as well despite using the card for a while. The speeds were consistent as well even when I tried transferring large files from and to the SD card.

Verdict

If you’re looking for a card reader that you can use for your tablet, notebook, or your smartphone then you might want to consider the Transcend Card Reader RDC3. It’s lightweight, portable, easy to use, and the performance was definitely consistent in our usage.