A Safe Laptop Charger Adapter Has Never Been More Important

A Safe Laptop Charger is Critically Important to Home, Work & Play

We don’t tend to think about whether we have a safe laptop charger day-to-day – like other things in life we take for granted, they are simply expected to work. This year though, we have been given stark reminders of how companies are always looking to ship the cheapest possible product at the highest possible profit – and laptop chargers and accessories are a commonly affected area.

Take a look at the two examples below of Microsoft and Apple, this year, recalling chargers for laptops that span into millions overall. Below we discuss things to look out for in a good charger and how to make sure you get a good one for your laptop, phone or other device.

Microsoft Recalls 100,000’s of Surface Pro Laptop Adapters

A safe laptop charger has never been more in the spotlight as now. While it’s easy to say we’ve been advocating safety and reliability for a number of years, a number of important recent recalls has really brought the issue home for laptop owners worldwide.

Microsoft recently issued a recall of their new Surface Pro laptop chargers after five cases of electric shock were reported, but possibly even scarier, over 50 cases of electrical fires being started by the charger or charger cables.

As reported by ChannelNomics, this at least affects hundreds of thousands of earlier Surface devices and potentially can reach up tot he millions as well. The recall applies to all Surface Pro, Surface Pro 2 and Surface Pro 3 devices sold before the 15th of July 2015.

Apple Recalls over 10 Years of Laptop Adapters & Phone / Tablet Chargers!

Just a single week later, Apple possibly dropped an even bigger bombshell on the world: they are recalling over 10 years of chargers spanning not only their laptops / MacBooks and MacBook Pros, but iPhones, iPods and iPads as well. A design fault that could result in users not getting a safe laptop charger or adapter for their phone / tablet means that customers have been left at risk of electric shocks.

Take note that for travelers, this also includes Apple world travel adapter kits which include supposedly safe laptop charger adapters for multiple regions. If you currently use one of these, we recommend you get it checked out or replaced immediately.

As you can see from the image above (provided by Apple), the affected chargers have a different visual design compared to the redesigned ones that shipped with some newer products, which show a EUR (or another country code) symbol. You can check this for yourself by looking underneath your power brick to see what the design says. This affects all chargers that are round in shape – there are other square ones which are unaffected. That said, this recall potentially affects tens or possibly hundreds of millions of Apple products, given how many they have sold over the years!

Why Companies Don’t Build Safe Laptop Chargers

This is perhaps a slightly unfair title – companies do try and build safe laptop chargers, but as we have seen with the examples above they can often get it wrong.

It’s normal that most of the profit companies make from consumers are in the products themselves – when you buy a phone, the phone is what makes Apple, Samsung or the company of your choice a lot of their revenue (hardware wise, anyway). The case is the same for a laptop or tablet.

Where companies are able to save money are in accessories such as chargers. Of course there is an obligation to follow safety regulations and make sure these products meet the required standards – but the difference is that most large corporations try and cut corners here by limiting manufacturing costs. They will make the chargers safe, but only to the absolute minimum requirement that they need to adhere to. Why? Because making them more safe and packed full of more features doesn’t make them any extra profit.

A Safe Laptop Charger – Where Imperial Gadgets is Different

Having a reliable and safe laptop charger without spending ridiculous amounts of money on £80+ high street models was how Imperial Gadgets came into being in the first place. We don’t sell laptops ourselves, so it’s in our best interest to make sure our charger is the best possible product we can bring to market.

As a result, we don’t pull any punches – we have extra-thick braided cords and there are multiple thin layers of insulating material between the charger surface and internals, ensuring much higher degrees of protection for your charger than typical manufacturer chargers (Apple cables fraying every few months, anybody?).

While it took a while for the new head to appear, we also now support Apple’s latest MagSafe 2 chargers, making sure we are not only compatible but reliable, rugged and safe as well.

We hope this article has highlighted the importance of having a safe charger – naturally, if your old charger is affected by the recall but you are eligible for a free replacement, please make sure you contact Microsoft and Apple respectively and make sure you get sent a safe laptop charger! However, if you’re looking for a safe laptop charger that will withstand wear and tear that you can use either at home, at work or for travelling (it also charges multiple devices via our USB port, so you can charge your phone at the same time!), then please take a moment to consider having a look at our laptop charger store.

Have a great week!