I realise that travel adapters have existed since the dawn of time, but this one takes the biscuit. It's pass through, it has integral support for dozens of countries, it has four USB ports for gadget charging, and yet is only a few cubic inches. Amazing. If you're a regular traveller then this is one way to save space in your kit bag with an all-in-one gadget.

The chunky control and the four USB ports impress at first glance - what on earth is this and how does it work?

Once unboxed, it all becomes clear - the main slider (which has to be depressed slightly before it moves, for safety reasons) pops out either European-standard mains pins:

...or UK-style pins:

...or USA-style pins. The first via a spring mechanism, the latter two by using the movement of the slider itself to push out the relevant pins. And, when the Euro pins are popped back, it's almost a perfect cube and incredibly neat!

But there's more. On the cube's top face is a universal mains (female) socket, so that's where you plug your mains appliance. But while this is going on, the four USB ports can output a maximum of 3.5A (up to 2.4A maximum on the left hand 'smart' socket, which tries to supply current intelligently rather than rely on your phone/tablet managing charging):

The possibilities from all this are almost endless. You can be almost anywhere in the world and one of the three plug styles will fit the wall sockets, while your (e.g.) laptop charges out of the top using your normal charging cables. And while up to four phones and other devices charge happily from the bank of four USB sockets.

The innovation here is in the compactness and lack of reliance on parts that snap off and on again (which will get lost or break) - and I was seriously impressed. What a neat solution.

I should declare that Veho sent this across for me to use freely (it's normally £30) and it just made my main go-anywhere kit case.