+1 on this one: well built, optimized for small signal reception (TV dongles are not) therefore lower noise etc. bias tee for active antennas, metal case. Still at a good price. I have two of them and never regretted the purchase.
One day I'l probably get a HackRF or something similar, although I'm still good with the rtl-sdr.com dongles. If they made a small one with enclosed upconverter to be put in my laptop bag to be carried when I take a trip in the mountains I'd get one immediately. I've tried one of those no-name Chinese little boxes with HF and V-U inputs but performance is inferior compared to the above dongle.
Are there any cheap upconverters that will make use of its insane bandwidth? I'd like being able to receive down to the HF but the Pluto doesn't go below 325MHz.
My advice would be the same. These units are mostly built on the same parts, the big difference is build quality (metal dongle vs plastic) and what antenna comes bundled (antenna quality/size matters a lot for anything beyond just tinkering).
It's more than just build-quality. The actual RF design is very different. The RTL-SDR V3 dongle was purpose built to be an SDR device. Most of the generic plastic dongles were designed to watch broadcast television.