I have essentially returned to the office 4/5 days. But I have on occasion forgot to pack my Magsafe charger, from the home office. Fortunately, given the amazing battery life of the M1s, I haven’t had a major issue yet, but would prefer to get a back-up option.
Buying another Magsafe 3 charger is not currently an option > see below.
I am therefore looking at charging via the USB-C port. The largest power-adapter I can find readily, is a 65W charger – supposedly with “fast-charge”. I acknowledge that I would also need to invest in a decent USB-C to USB-C cable, or 65W will translate into 20W, or whatever an “inferior” cable is able to manage.
That issue aside though – what is the consensus on 3rd party options via USB-C? Am I correct in my assumption that since 3rd-party options, those that are well-rated in charging “other” laptops via USB-C, are becoming increasingly popular – then charging via USB-C as opposed to Magsafe should be OK?
In other words, because there are increasingly more vendors/options for charging laptops via USB-C, then well-rated chargers that do this are likely to be less problematic when compared to those 3rd-party options (with a smaller market) that offer alternatives to Magsafe 3?
If so – then going to take the plunge on a well-rated (and cheaper) 65W USB-C charger, to leave at home for the 1 day of the week I am here, and use the Apple Magsafe 3 from work, for the other 4/5 days…
Stock constraints:
Down these parts, incredibly, there is a stock-shortage of Magsafe 3(?) chargers. As in, the new-gen chargers for the 14" and 16" MBPs.
And when I say “stock-shortage”, what I actually mean is that there is no stock. None. Zip. Not via any of the official Apple resellers, or various 3rd party options. To be clear, they have the options to order locally online, but all are on back-order, with no ETA. And they have (to date) never been available in-store, either.
(Was actually told by one of the in-store techies that some new MBP owners had lost/damaged the Magsafe charger that came with their new MBPs, and were now left with zero options via Magsafe – at least, until such time that stock-constraints ease up.) Fun times.