Remembered to post after seeing the deal for the 29W version
(https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/407320)
I thought it was the genuine Apple one so I went to JB to price match and they did, maybe you could get lucky too? Only realised it wasn’t genuine after seeing the comments on this post.
errrghhhh… was waiting to see if there was an offer on these and finally bought one 2 weeks ago…
You got a pricematch from JB? Whoever gave you that price mustn't have been looking very closely - that's not a genuine Apple adaptor. Under specs it says, "Brand: Generic".
Oh wow whoops you’re right… but yeah I got a price match so I did get a genuine apple for the same price
The item linked shows it's a "generic" brand, usual price is $89! I'd be careful if you were thinking this was Apple genuine.
Why do apple products need genuine chargers?
People aren't as picky with chargers for other products.
You don’t need genuine chargers, but you do want quality, not dodgy ones made just to look like genuine ones. Especially ones that you plug into the mains.
This one isn't a $10 one off ebay though. It's not far off the price of a genuine one.
Cant vouch for the quality of this product though.
@Circly: How do you know that this generic brand sold for $79 isn't a cheap $10 one from eBay.
A genuine charger from a reputation brand gives the customer a certain guarantee of quality that this charger wouldn't.
and use for charging $2000+ laptop, there are some tear downs on the internet showing what is inside an apple charger and "generic Chinese" chargers for the 12W chargers … big difference in design, so reasonable to assume apple didn't cut corner on their bigger chargers.
Genuine isn’t essential, but I did have a cheap eBay charger blow up once (smoke and everything, got so hot it melted its plastic casing) so after that, I’m a lot more careful about buying things that plug into mains power
If the photo shows the actual power supply, then you really need to think about how much cost cutting the generic charger made. It's much smaller than the genuine one (based on the photo).
It is possible to do a cheap and nasty step down transformer, and your laptops will still use it (except the voltage / current noise will be high). With USB-C, the device (laptop), cable and the charger communicate with each other to decide the voltage to use. It's bad value for money @$79. High current and voltage, is it worth saving $30 on a "second charger"? It is not like iPad Pro where Apple include a slow charger.
EDIT: It is not an Apple original 87W charger.
This will also fast charge (with an Apple original Lightning to Type C cable) your iPhone 8/X/XS and newer iPad at 15W+. So pretty handy to have a spare one.You also need to have a USB C to C cable with Emarker chip that allows 5A to go over 60W charging power.