A big part of being a travel writer and filmmaker is gear, and lugging that gear around the world, which can be really tiring. Certain things like camera’s and memory have gotten smaller of the years thankfully, but others, like Mac or PC laptop chargers have somehow gotten … bigger. They are extremely heavy and cumbersome and a nightmare to deal with, especially if you’re on a plane or any cramped situation.

Personally I use both Macs and PCs these days, but have more and more made the transition back to PCs for various reasons. especially finding that PC laptops are way better than Macs on many levels. One thing that both brands suffer from are huge charging bricks. Part of the reason for this is that laptops need increasingly more power to run, and in order to get the 230 watts needed, you need that power brick to make it happen.

Fortunately the good people over in China have given us a quasi solution. I give you … the smallest laptop charger I’ve ever found:

Gone are the long cords, now with a flip out prong. Gone is the chunky ground peg, no need for that. Simple, easy, and clean power that really works. Lot’s of people are timid about buying from Ali Express and I’m not going to tell you that you shouldn’t, YMMV depending on the item, but let’s face it, it’s no different then Amazon really. The only drawback is that the delivery times take a bit longer considering the distance it travels, but for this price, which is less then replacing the OEM version for my AERO laptop it’s well worth it.

While no matter what charger you have you still will not be able to power this beast on an airplane because it simply draws more power then the standard 100w limit, it definitely cuts down on weight and makes the experience of bringing equipment with you overseas super easy.