I'm amazed at how cheap this thing was, yet it does what any CAC reader would do. Out of the bag, it seems to have worked on a few sites. I was able to access MyPay with no problems, and I tried the AKO website because other people had mentioned it on reviews here, that worked as well. The one thing I cared for most however, did not work. I tried to get onto the Air Force portal and it kept giving me CAC errors. Through some patience with militarycac.com (which ultimately did nothing for me) and the suggested websites from the AF portal error, I was able to get it working. Now I can access all my military email and sites from the comfort of my home. Definitely worth every penny and would recommend to others.
The cord is about 3-4ft long. The reader itself is not very sturdy, if you tried you could probably break it with ease. I imagine that if you dropped it and stepped on it by accident it would break too, but you're not that clumsy are you? All in all, good product.