Although my wife uses my old Titanium PowerBook G4, she’s using the adapter for my Aluminum 12″ PowerBook G4. Although they look different, they’re compatible. The Aluminum one is higher wattage, and has a safety ground and a LED at the PowerBook end of the cable to indicate the charging status. Plus it works; her old power adapter is long since toast.
My wife has recently taped the end of her PowerBook’s power adapter. She also added toothpicks, more tape, and so on. The plug just kept growing. On the weekend, I decided to peel off all the junk to see what she was hiding.
I am not joking: The thing sparks almost continuously. Snap, snap, snap, snap. I unplugged it and hid it away, and went to the local Apple dealer (Simply Computing - highly recommended, even if their website is a bit lame). They’re out of stock on the adapter, and Apple’s apparently back-ordered. But they had a third party adapter, which brings us to the main topic of this post.
Newer’s 65 Watt Power Adapter was about $20 less than Apple’s power adapter at Simply Computing. It lacks a safety ground and a recharge ring light, but has heavier-duty cabling between the adapter and the laptop. And not only does it have sturdier cabling, it has a sturdier PowerBook connector. I don’t think I’m ever going to have to bend the outer ring on the plug back into shape.
I have no serious regrets about this purchase. The only regret I have is that I’ve since found out I can probably get the Apple AC adapter replaced under warranty. But that’s mostly cool with me; it’s good to have spares.