This research treats a design for reconfigurable robotic systems with large variations in configurations. To evaluate system adaptability, we define the configuration space to be the set of all feasible configuration variations of the robotic system. We define the volume of the configuration space expressed in terms of physical structures to be a measure of system reconfigurability and the volume of the configuration space expressed in terms of Denevit-Hartenberg notation to be a measure of system adaptability. We develop an evaluation method to determine the architecture of reconfigurable robotic systems with high adaptability. A case study is presented to demonstrate that a reconfigurable robotic system with high reconfigurability may not have high adaptability. Finally, we describe how to achieve task-oriented configuration design of reconfigurable robotic systems.