[HN Gopher] The Framework Laptop is now shipping ___________________________________________________________________ The Framework Laptop is now shipping Author : ahaferburg Score : 1312 points Date : 2021-07-23 01:56 UTC (21 hours ago) (HTM) web link (frame.work) (TXT) w3m dump (frame.work) | throwhands77 wrote: | Something creepy about the hands in the animations. They look | like man hands but they have nail polish and are somewhat | feminine looking. I'm more confused and focused on them than the | laptop. | kybernetikos wrote: | This looks really great, with some good choices for my kind of | use - 3:2 screen, 1080 webcam, better than normal travel on the | keys, and being able to easily upgrade memory and storage is a | big deal. | | The reviews seem to be finding concerns with thermals while | battery life and overall performance seems pretty so-so. | | I expect that battery life and performance could be improved | through upgrading in the future, but it seems like thermals might | be a difficult problem to fix. | tinus_hn wrote: | Interesting that that is a good choice, a webcam and a screen | that can't display its images. | stickyricky wrote: | Have you sent out review units to any YouTubers? | loufe wrote: | In another comment thread someone mentioned LTT already | released their review on their own platform, I think called | Floatplane, which comes before their Youtube release. | nrp wrote: | Yes, but we'll have to let them make their own review | announcements. | bubblethink wrote: | What type of wifi cards do these use ? Is it the cnvi type, which | I think are semi-soldered ? Or is it the regular pcie type one ? | | Also, would like to see this reviewed by someone from the linux | community (e.g., phoronix). | nrp wrote: | We use M.2 2230 WiFi cards, with both PCI-e and CNVi routed to | the socket. For the pre-built systems, we install an AX201 | card. For DIY Edition, we offer AX210 or you can bring your own | card. | throwhands77 wrote: | nice things very nice things about this laptop | octos4murai wrote: | Somehow this is the first I'm hearing of this, and yet I have | never hit buy so quick. | | Even if, heaven forbid, this company is no longer around in five | years when I need new parts, just the ability to upgrade RAM, | SSD, etc is so valuable. | twoslide wrote: | If enough people buy, then the supply of parts could be | independent of the company itself, as third-party manufacturers | would probably see an opportunity. | nrp wrote: | Absolutely. We see the health of the ecosystem as a positive | end state for us, regardless of whether we're selling the | most modules or third parties are. We're standing up a | marketplace to help foster that. | MichaelMoser123 wrote: | the keyboard looks very fragile, like that of a macbook. For me | these tend to develop problems after a years use. I am not very | fond of this type of keyboards. The old thinkpads used to have a | solid keyboard, but that was once upon a time. | naktinis wrote: | Very excited to see modular and repairable tech in production! | Just wanted to make a top-level comment in support of a | trackpoint option. Given modular design and the Marketplace it | could make sense to have a simple drop-in replacement for the | keyboard module that would potentially lure many hardcore | Thinkpad fans. | pkulak wrote: | Bit of an Escher thing going on here: | | https://images.prismic.io/frameworkmarketplace/cca31de3-3b75... | CivBase wrote: | Between this and the Steam Deck, there sure is a lot of new | techcoming out that I wish I had a good excuse to buy. | victor9000 wrote: | This device is seriously the answer to all my laptop problems. I | really like the form factor of the XPS 13, but now I'm stuck with | the complete inability to upgrade RAM. In what universe is that | normal? Then I accidentally nuked the USB-C ports on the left | side when it got wet, and now I'm left with a single port for | everything, including charging. What!? Why? I tore the entire | thing apart and there's just no way to replace anything besides | the SSD drive, everything else is soldered on. I'm in Batch 1 and | can't wait to get my full purchase email. I seriously see this as | an investment. I'll pay full price for a laptop once more, and | then every other incident like this will just be parts and labor | to get things back to square one. | thaeli wrote: | How long do you plan to keep your laptop? For my "carry with | me" laptop, I just plan to replace it every four years and buy | four years of accidental damage coverage. I break the ports or | the screen, Dell comes out the next day and replaces it. For | the machine I use to do my job, that's a great thing to have. | | I can see the advantage of fully serviceable if you're on more | of a 7-to-10 year cycle, but then you have parts availability. | I trust that Dell will still have service parts four years from | now. I don't really have any reason to trust that this company | will still exist four years from now, let alone still make a | full line of upgrades. | | (Ironically, I've found that an old, out-of-warranty Dell is | actually affordable to do major component repair on - because | there are cheap screens, keyboards, even motherboards readily | available. That sweet spot where a bunch of business machines | are coming off-lease is when you can get a new screen for $35.) | riedel wrote: | Give me a keyboard with a trackpoint and I will give up | thinkpads for the exact same reason. | wnolens wrote: | Not integrated into laptop, but since 99% of my laptop time | is spent docked, i'm using | https://ultimatehackingkeyboard.com/ | zzzeek wrote: | XPS13 here also, I love everything about it except my fingers | have totally chewed through the keyboard and the keys are all | popping off all the time now. you can't get replacement keys, | I've tried ordering from those scammy places and what they send | you is not exactly the right fit. | | broken keyboards / trackpads is why i keep having to throw out | laptops and get new ones. so I am very interested in this | laptop if they are actually going to make working keyboards / | keys / trackpad replacements available. | nrp wrote: | Yes! We've designed the keyboard, the touchpad, and the full | input cover to be replaceable modules. We've published guides | for these: https://guides.frame.work/c/Framework_Laptop | | We'll be making the replacement modules themselves available | later this summer. | Naracion wrote: | I am also very excited about this, but the Verge review says | the build quality isn't great. We'll see I guess. | | I just hope that they release the next gen motherboard when it | launches. Intel 12th gen, DDR5 RAM. I'm waiting for that big | generational jump before making a purchase, and I really hope I | can get a Framework. | intricatedetail wrote: | Soldering is not a problem. Your average tech should be able to | rework most of the things, maybe except BGA stuff. Problem is | no access to spare parts. | neop1x wrote: | Almost everything is BGA now, including RAM and data flash | chips. Just bios flash chips are still often (not always) | SOIC. | | BGA soldering is possible with more expensive IR or | convection-based stations and a bit of skill too. | | But yes, parts are often not available at all or from | unreliable sources with dubious quality. | audunw wrote: | You better get used to it. RAM is going to move closer and | closer to the CPU for speed and power reduction. And every | major laptop manufacturer will move that way to compete. | Especially now that the M1 Mac has shown what's possible when | every part of the system is optimized for low power. | | What we can hope for is that SSD acts more like RAM. Maybe it | could have a decent sized RAM chip that the OS can dedicate as | cache for virtual memory. There's a chance that at least some | hardware manufacturers will continue to allow for replaceable | SSDs. | emodendroket wrote: | Yeah, I'm really curious where they go from here because it | seems like the lesson is that modularity has a major | performance penalty. | ribit wrote: | Once you get to a certain stage, yes, modularity becomes | very expensive. I do believe that things like SSDs or WiFi | cards should be modular, because there is no reason for | them not to, but RAM? We are moving towards high-bandwidth | on-package RAM, why would I want to sacrifice 100Gbps of | performance and 5+ hours of battery life -- not to mention | also paying more -- just to have an option of upgrading the | RAM some time down the line? | emodendroket wrote: | Right, and then even if you can upgrade the RAM, the | machine may not even be compatible with the best RAM down | the line anyway. It's hard to imagine another drop-in | upgrade that will be as big as putting SSDs in old | machines was. | ribit wrote: | > In what universe is that normal? | | In a universe where you want high-performance energy efficient | RAM. Premium ultracompact laptops have long moved to LPDDR | which is both faster and consumes significantly less energy | than regular modular DDR. And LPDDR does not come in DIMMs. And | then you have Apple who are using custom package technology | with custom RAM chips to cut down RAM power consumption to | under one watt active, delivering close to 20 hours battery. | You simply can't have this with socketed RAM. Modularity is not | a free lunch, as much as some people like to pretend. | michalf6 wrote: | I would really prefer that a laptop was just a tiny bit | thicker to fit a 100WH battery to compensate for that. My | T480 gets 12-16 hours with normal use, I imagine it could | easily hit 20 with current processors. | ddalex wrote: | > a 100WH battery | | a hand grenade typically releases 250kJ, or about 70Wh | | you're asking for the equivalent of 1.5 grenades in your | lap :) | michalf6 wrote: | Is it any worse than having 0.75 of a hand grenade on | your lap? If it starts to smoke, you throw it away all | the same. Besides, this capacity is standard in larger | laptops, but not in smaller ones for some strange reason. | hnbad wrote: | > If it starts to smoke, you throw it away all the same. | | No. If it starts to smoke, you commit & push --force, | then you throw it away. | KMnO4 wrote: | You can save a couple seconds with git-fire. | | https://github.com/qw3rtman/git-fire | franga2000 wrote: | 1.5 hand granades worth of LOW VOLTAGE ELECTRIC energy | released into A CIRCUIT over A DAY or more and protected | by multiple safety cut-off circuits with thermal and | other sensors. | | vs | | A grenade releasing that as KINETIC energy into YOUR FACE | over the span of LESS THAN A MILLISECOND and protected by | a spring and a keychain ring. | | Even if a lithium battery of that size experienced a | critical failure right in your lap, you'd get away with a | few scars and some serious but treatable burns. And I've | only heard of one commercial product in the last 15 years | that had serial critical battery failures... | [deleted] | littlestymaar wrote: | A chocolate tablet typically stores 4000kJ of energy. Yes | that's 15 hand grenades, what are we waiting for: ban | chocolate tablets now! | | And don't get me started on flour, not only it stores a | ton of energy (50 grenades per kg) but it's also highly | explosive! [1] | | [1]: (only with the right air to flour ratio of course, | but accident happen every once in a while: | https://www.grupa-wolff.com/a-tragic-flour-explosion/) | ddalex wrote: | The chocolate bar doesn't start a violent fire if | pierced. If it would we could power our laptops with | chocolate :) | | The flour conditions of exploding are far more difficult | to achieve than a LiIon battery conditions - orders of | magnitude difference. | [deleted] | amichal wrote: | True, but not that hard. I had some "dangerous | experiments for kids" book back in the day and by far the | most fun thing in it was aerosolizing flour with a straw | to get the right mixture near your Bunsen burner for your | own glorious short lived fireball. | littlestymaar wrote: | > The chocolate bar doesn't start a violent fire if | pierced. If it would we could power our laptops with | chocolate :) | | Neither does a NiMH battery. There's no link between | vulnerability to external damage and ability to power a | laptop. | | In fact, there's no fundamental reason why we couldn't | run our laptop on chocolate[1], just that it's very far | away from current technology. | | [1]: http://large.stanford.edu/courses/2014/ph240/ho2/ | WesolyKubeczek wrote: | It's just that modern laptops run on Li-ion batteries. | IncRnd wrote: | In a world, somewhere, Flowers and Lions power laptops. | chrismorgan wrote: | Airlines tend to cap lithium-ion batteries at 100Wh, so | it's quite common for laptops and power banks to go to or | just shy of that. | https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2019/11/apple- | introduces-16-i... speaks of a 100Wh battery. My latest | laptop has about a 90Wh battery. | | Hopefully your laptop and hand grenade have radically | different power discharge profiles. | ddalex wrote: | > Hopefully your laptop and hand grenade have radically | different power discharge profiles | | Li battery fires are not unheard of, unfortunately, so | the profiles may start to resemble sometimes. | littlestymaar wrote: | Lithium batteries burn, quite quickly but it still takes | a few seconds, that can be pretty dangerous indeed but | that's several orders of magnitude slower than a grenade. | grenoire wrote: | The hand grenade is arguably better at releasing that | energy at an instant. | r9 wrote: | There's a subtle difference. One is designed to release | that energy in a fraction of a second in a frangible | metal casing, the other is designed to release it over a | number of hours. Yes, batteries can go wrong, just like | any tech, but comparing them to hand grenades is just | ludicrous. | d110af5ccf wrote: | > comparing them to hand grenades is just ludicrous | | Next, let's calculate the energy input required to heat a | small cup of coffee and compare that to a hand grenade. | (Hint: The coffee wins easily.) I wonder how many hand | grenade equivalents a 10 minute lukewarm shower equates | to? | ljm wrote: | In some universe there's an internal combustion shower | powered entirely by an operator ripping out pull rings | with their teeth and throwing armed grenades into a | heating chamber. | | Preferably yelling 'fire in the hole!' each time. | fulafel wrote: | To keep your peace of mind, refrain from looking up the | energy content of a pizza! | rsynnott wrote: | High-end 15" laptops already have 100Wh batteries, and | 100Wh is the practical maximum. So abandoning LPDDR would | lead to a reduction in battery life on the high end, which | probably isn't going to fly. | midasuni wrote: | > isn't going to fly. | | Literally - 100Wh batteries are maximum you can take on | planes | rsynnott wrote: | I promise that was an unintentional pun. But yeah, that's | the limiting factor. | baybal2 wrote: | In US, on non international flights, you can take 160wh | ones if they are replaceable. | | Strangely, the rule comes from ICAO. | | Some countries too follow the 160wh standard, but most | airlines simply don't bother enforcing anything, but the | lowest common denominator. | goodpoint wrote: | > In a universe where you want high-performance energy | efficient RAM | | You are cherry-picking an example that fits only a specific | category of laptops. | | Even so, CPU and RAM could be bundled together into a | socketed cartridge that is easy to upgrade. | | The real reason is all about planned obsolescence and profit | margins. | nrp wrote: | We believe that socketing memory is a good tradeoff to enable | greater longevity through memory upgrades, and also a more | useful upgrade path by being able to keep your memory during | certain mainboard upgrades. | | In the DDR5 timeframe, there is less of a power delta as well | between DDR5 and LPDDR5. | intricatedetail wrote: | The problem is not that the chip is soldered, but that you | can't buy it. Soldering BGA is not that difficult. | carlhjerpe wrote: | I would have to leave it to a professional, I can barely | solder connectors on my RC car power packs | tomxor wrote: | > In a universe where you want high-performance energy | efficient RAM [.....] You simply can't have this with | socketed RAM. | | You make it sound like a prerequisite. I'm pretty sure the | reason LPDDR is Low Power is _not_ due to (currently) being | unavailable in socketed modules - that would seem to be a | side-effect of the original target market (smart phones). | | They are just some BGA packages, I see no reason they | couldn't be soldered onto a board with a socket. If you scan | through the features that make LPDDR LP, they have nothing to | do with sockets, or anything affecting sockets: lower | operating voltage, more power states, partial refreshing etc: | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LPDDR | baybal2 wrote: | Yes, as I wrote somewhere below, LPDDR4 signal is actually | more robust than DDR4 signal, and LPDDR4 controllers have | more features to fix degraded signals. | | DDR5 has more roots in the LPDDR4 than in the regular DDR4. | wayoutthere wrote: | There's no technical reason not to (I'm no EE but I'm sure | it could be done somehow), but there's no demand for | removable memory. The entire consumer PC market is already | a rounding error for the semiconductor industry, and the | enthusiast market that would be interested in this is a | very small portion of that market. | | Like it or not, repairable/upgradable laptops are a thing | of the past. There's just not component support or | sufficient market demand to make the parts removable | anymore. | vimacs2 wrote: | Way overstating your case. PC's might be on the decline | but they are still far far from being a "rounding error | for the semiconductor industry". | | Laptops also make up a major component of that still very | alive market so no, I disagree that there is not enough | market demand for having laptops that can be repaired or | upgraded. It's the industry themselves that have worked | to hamper the right of repair while giving nebulous | pseudo-technical rationalizations for it. | wayoutthere wrote: | Modern laptop motherboards can easily be about the size | of a cell phone. Most of the case is battery and the main | board is a shrinking percentage of the BOM cost. The | entire motherboard is the replaceable component. It's | less "right to repair" than the additional components and | design required to make them repairable are more | expensive than just replacing the whole board. | littlestymaar wrote: | I don't know what kind of cell phone you have, but it's | not an usual one: here is a picture of an open modern | thinkpad https://gearopen.com/wp- | content/uploads/2019/12/internals-15... | wayoutthere wrote: | That's a laptop from 2 years ago; the new M1 MacBooks are | more indicative of where things are headed in the future. | Things like memory and any custom ICs are just going to | be integrated on the same silicon as the CPU in most | cases. | littlestymaar wrote: | Here you go: https://eshop.macsales.com/blog/wp- | content/uploads/2020/11/M... | | Still bigger than a smartphone (it occupies the entire | width of the laptop (when counting the heatsink, 2/3 of | the width otherwise), and around one quarter of the whole | area). | | Also, your original sentence was | | > Modern laptop motherboards can easily be about the size | of a cell phone. | | Here we see that the one and only best laptop in this | regard comes close to the cell-phone-sized motherboard. | That's far from what "modern laptop can _easily_ be" | means. Most laptops sold today have a much bigger | motherboard than this. | | (BTW, as much as I'd like to see non x86 laptops going | mainstream, software compatibility is huge issue for an | ecosystem as diverse as the Windows one (and Roseta 2 | being too much of a coinflip isn't encouraging...), we | might get there at some point, put it's gonna be slow and | painful.) | vimacs2 wrote: | Seems like a deliberate design choice, not some | inevitable consequence of modernity. Why exactly does the | board _need_ to be cell phone sized when the actual form | factor of even a netbook is substantially larger? | dhosek wrote: | To fit more battery. Other than my Mac mini, every | computing device (including watch and phone) I own is | mostly battery inside. | vimacs2 wrote: | Which you could also do by simply making the device a | little thicker and have a battery run the entire width of | the device. Point is past a certain point, thinness | becomes more of a drawback than a benefit, especially | given the trade-offs involved. | ineedasername wrote: | You might want that trade off, but consumers in general | have been leaning towards thinner and lighter for years. | Just look around at complaints about the thickness of | early android watches being too big and chunky. Or the | huge popularity when the first MacBook Air came out. | | Given the option between thicker w/ a bit more battery | life or thinner and lighter, consumers are choosing | thinner and lighter. | nightski wrote: | Of course engineering is always a trade off, and it is | possible to go too far in one direction. But it's not all | or nothing, Apple is the one feeding us that false | dichotomy. | littlestymaar wrote: | Battery is a big part of mobile devices of all kind, but | it's not "mostly battery" for most of those. | | For instance, in a iPhone 11, the battery occupies less | than half of the surface of the phone[1]. On a Macbook | pro, it's about the same.[2] [1] see this ifixit video if | you want to see it by yourself: | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Feyqwf3cYtw&t=161s | | [2] https://guide- | images.cdn.ifixit.com/igi/noPvQ2CLs1jptX2p.hug... You can | see that the motherboard is much, much bigger than a | smartphone. | ineedasername wrote: | It is mostly only a deliberate design choice in the sense | that consumers have leaned towards designs that are | smaller, lighter, and with longer battery lives. | | It doesn't matter that the rest of the form factor is | larger: there's not a lot of empty space in these, so a | larger main board will still mean a larger and heavier | device. | nrp wrote: | ribit and others are correct. While this may have been | possible in the past, at modern memory frequencies and | timings, it's not really plausible to deviate from what the | platforms are designed for: LPDDR being soldered and placed | a specific layout area relative to the CPU, and for | socketed DDR, the sockets being placed in one of a few | placements relative to the CPU, with a little layout wiggle | room. | | Edit: I guess to clarify, the plausibility challenge is | that whether or not it is theoretically possible, the | platform owner (Intel, AMD, etc) or the memory vendors | (Samsung, SK Hynix, Micron) are unlikely to support the | lark. | ribit wrote: | LPDDR is low power because it is a more sophisticated | device with more complex protocol compared to regular DDR, | because it has a higher pinout allowing it to have a more | efficient electrical connection and because the computer | manufacturer can optimize the connection with specific | chips in mind instead of having to support a wide range of | devices. | | I think the number of pins is a practical limitation. | Current DDR DIMMs use 260-280 pins if I remember correctly, | while an average LPDDR4X BGA package is 400 balls or | higher. Apple uses chips with 877 balls. It is definitely | possible to design modular RAM with high-pinout, but would | it be economically feasible? | [deleted] | jdsully wrote: | You can't compare balls on the BGA package to signal | pins. The vast majority of these are for power and | ground. LPDDR4 actually has fewer data lines than DDR4. | rthomas6 wrote: | It is if it's a standard that everyone decides to | support... | ribit wrote: | That's the thing, who is everyone? Such technology would | only be relevant to premium-level ultraportable | notebooks. Desktops, gaming laptops as well as budget | laptops would stick with the cheaper and more ubiquitous | DDR. Smartphones and tables will continue to solder RAM | on due to space constraints. Apple (who is the driving | force in this market segment) won't be interested since | they are going fully custom and I doubt that an LGA | socket will work with their on-package custom-build wide | RAM interfaces. So in the end we are left with things | like Dell XPS 13, MS Surface and few others. These are | all popular and impactful brands, but they are just a | drop in the bucket compared to the total PC sales. And I | doubt that technology reserved to only selected premium | laptops is going to be cheap. | [deleted] | Brakenshire wrote: | If LPDDR is faster won't desktops and gaming laptops also | want it? | | One possible other compromise could be soldered LPDDR | RAM, but with a DIMM expansion slot for DDR as well. I | wonder whether the DDR could be switched off and the | baseline power draw eliminated if the RAM usage was below | needing it. | baybal2 wrote: | > If LPDDR is faster won't desktops and gaming laptops | also want it? | | The desktop version of LPDDR4 is there, it's just called | DDR5. | eropple wrote: | So I will preface this with that I'm not an expert. But | as I understand it, multicore systems are already | frequently NUMA, but to a degree that most stuff (I am | eliding categories of code here, but you get the idea) | don't have to _really_ care. From my understanding of how | all this works, the difference of speed and bandwidth for | LPDDR versus DDR seems like risking significant | complexity for an expandability that few people would use | and in turn cause an everything-or-nothing problem, where | either high-performance code is written assuming anybody | might have this, or nobody assumes it and you get a pile | of stalls. | InitialLastName wrote: | You can fit FAR more signals on the bottom of a chip and | in a multi-layer PCB than you can on any socket you might | think of. There is a practical limit to how small the | pitch of the pins on a socket can be if it's going to be | field-replaceable; at high pin counts, the length of the | socket itself becomes a driving factor. | | As an example, even moving away from edge-connectors | (which are just a non-starter for 800+ pins) Samtec's | highest-density high-speed connector, the NovaRay line | [0] advertises 224 signals per square inch, so an 800 pin | module would require 4 square inches of connector space | alone, not to mention making the system PCB assembly | thicker and compromising on speed, power and thermals. | | [0] https://www.samtec.com/connectors/high-speed-board- | to-board/... | kaibee wrote: | So design it like a CPU socket? Laptops usually don't | have socketed CPUs because they also need to mount a | heatsink, but RAM doesn't have that issue. | InitialLastName wrote: | So an FM2 socket (to pick one of the more reliable ones), | which has ~900 pins has a 4.5in^2 area and adds ~.25" in | thickness, while reducing the maximum speed you can get | through the chip at the very low voltages necessary to | run LPDDR, which is what I meant by compromising speed | and power. | | Not to mention that socketting parts reduces your | production yield over SMT, increases your assembly cost, | and cuts reliability (it's fine on a desktop because you | almost never move your desktop, and there's usually a big | thermal assembly bolted on top). | ant6n wrote: | Pentium m used to be socketed, pretty reliable, and | available for thin laptops. I'm not trying to dismiss the | difficulty, just saying they could perhaps be overcome | InitialLastName wrote: | Hardware engineering is ever thus: Difficulties can | always be overcome, but every cost adds 5x that cost to | the MSRP. | PicassoCTs wrote: | We have cpus with lots of pins, nobody is stopping ram | from switching to a cpu socket layout.. | emteycz wrote: | Laptop CPU is onboard for the same reasons RAM is. This | is not about the amount of pins, it's about power | requirements for signal clarity. | mumblemumble wrote: | I've never done anything beyond amateur electronics, so | sorry if I'm way off base here, but it at least seems | intuitively plausible to me that soldering the components | to the board allows them to work reliably at lower power. | With a pin and socket connection, you've got to try and be | at least reasonably resistant to corrosion or other sources | of less-than-perfect connection. | | That said, I don't know that RAM chips are the hill I want | to die on, anyway. Could we get to a better place if we | dispensed with the whole, "just the one big motherboard," | design, and looked to the old backplane-style physical | layouts? Then you could have a module that contains the CPU | and RAM and suchlike all in a single package, and move | other things that may not want to be quite as tightly | integrated off to another package. | mikepurvis wrote: | Up until relatively recently, a lot of laptops and even | phones would put the connectors on separate PCBs | connected by a ribbon, so that damaging those wouldn't | mean a $500 motherboard replacement. | | I definitely remember ordering a replacement headphone | socket board for an old MacBook and just putting it in | myself, and I've done similar with, eg, the connector | port board on a PS4 controller. | | But I guess this is one of the hazards of Apple having | their AppleCare programme-- they can do the math and | calculate that saving a dollar on the cost of making and | mounting and connecting that extra component still makes | them money even if they have to eat the occasional full | motherboard in the first three years of ownership. | ribit wrote: | If I am not mistaken the ports on recent Apple machines | are on a separate, easily replaceable board. | sgerenser wrote: | Doesn't appear to be the case on the 16" MBP: https://www | .ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+16-Inch+2019+Tea... | davweb wrote: | Looking at this photo from that page it appears that they | are: https://guide- | images.cdn.ifixit.com/igi/uavG2A3vFrVmwv6J.hug... | | You can see the ports still in place after the | motherboard has been removed. | sgerenser wrote: | Interesting, didn't notice that. It looked like the logic | board went all the way to the edges. | mikepurvis wrote: | Seems like this stuff maybe comes and goes-- like here's | a repair guide for a 2010-vintage MBP which definitely | shows all the connectors being right on the logic board: | | https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/MacBook+Pro+15-Inch+Logic+Bo | ard... | hkt wrote: | This sounds conspicuously like an Intel NUC, I think? | neycoda wrote: | I love the idea of needing to replace the laptop to upgrade | RAM. /sarc | lostlogin wrote: | I find this to be less of an issue than the noise it | generates. If you maximise ram at purchase, the limitations | of a laptop seem to be battery and storage more than | anything else. A 8 year old MacBook is just fine for a lot | of usage, except for the dead battery and limited storage. | Having these easily repairable would make my life a lot | easier - this laptop looks great. | goodpoint wrote: | > Modularity is not a free lunch | | Hold on. This is true for excessive modularity. | | Yet, most of the time, lack of modularity (e.g. bundling) | creates lock-in reducing customer's choice and ultimately | increasing prices. | | When PCs became standardized ( | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_PC_compatible ) prices | dropped incredibly. | [deleted] | xondono wrote: | Modularity is a great feature, but modularity is a mobility | killer. | | Modular laptops, phones, etc.. will be always penalized in | terms of either performance or battery life for a given size. | specialist wrote: | Please forgive the hi-jack... | | FWIW, the book Design Rules: The Power of Modularity | systematically explores the tradeoffs. | | https://www.amazon.com/Design-Rules-Vol-Power- | Modularity/dp/... | | Written by two economists, it's the only prescriptive | definition of architecture that I've managed to find. | Influenced me deeply. | wolverine876 wrote: | So why are you holding back on us? :) What are the main | trade-offs? | specialist wrote: | Heh. Just what you'd guess. Interfaces allow separation | of concerns, parallel dev efforts, competition. | Integration allows optimization, at greater risk. | | Their core contribution is modeling the options with net | present value (NPV) to remove the guess work. | | -- | | Tangentially... | | They also explain the dependency structure matrix (DSM), | a tool for modeling and visualizing architectures. | | One big takeaway for me was their explanation of | "complexity catastrophe". The crossover point when the | cost of change exceeds the benefit. A metaphor superior | to most interpretations of "technical debt", IMHO. | | So when you have a DSM, these kinds of problems pop out, | can't be ignored. | franga2000 wrote: | So just...put LPDDR on a DIMM? Or some other kind of | removable slot?? I see no technical reason you couldn't. | | Or, instead of soldering chips, make little LGA slots for the | individual chips. I can't imagine the tiny added resistance | from an extra millimeter of wire and pin surface contact | would impact much of anything and even if it does, I'd rather | take that than have no options when the next Windows update | makes my machine a paperweight (obviously exaggerating, but | it's getting there). | pclmulqdq wrote: | The reason is signal integrity. Running a high speed signal | (never mind a bus of 64+ of them) through a connector is | hard and takes a lot of power because the connector can | seriously degrade the signals. LPDDR can be low power | because it doesn't have a "memory stick" abstraction, just | memory chips and controllers. It's not the resistance that | kills the signal, it's the inductance and the impedance | mismatching. | jackcviers3 wrote: | 1 watt vs 2 Watts. Stop shilling. | vbernat wrote: | For something running at 5-6W while idle, this is not a | small difference. | bserge wrote: | LPDDR3 DIMMs exist. I assume everyone is talking about | LPDDR4, which seems to use 0.1V less. | | But the majority of people couldn't give a toss about how | much of their laptop ends up in a landfill. They're using | paper/glass straws, you see. | | Perhaps electronics landfills should be local again. | pclmulqdq wrote: | I think you're referring to DDR3L DIMMs, which are just a | down-volted version of DDR3. LPDDR has never had DIMMs | because of signal integrity issues. They take power to | resolve. | nspattak wrote: | Can you please point us to some technical report or something | where they document the energy saving of moving from dimm | slots to soldered ram/ssd ? | franga2000 wrote: | I don't think you'll find any. The way I understand it, the | savings come from the new LP variant of DDR chips and | nobody ever bothered to put them on DIMMs. | | And even if the DIMM design (it's more than just a slot) | doesn't make sense anymore, we could easily make a new | "dumb" memory slot standard that would allow us to swap out | the chips directly - like we have for CPUs. | foldr wrote: | > we could easily make a new "dumb" memory slot standard | that would allow us to swap out the chips directly - like | we have for CPUs. | | You could, but it would take up a lot of space, given the | higher pin count, and would most likely increase power | consumption. | ribit wrote: | Unfortunately, I am not aware of any document like that. | There are some papers comparing everything efficiency of | different types of RAM, and there is of course indirect | evidence of premium notebooks having significantly improved | the battery life after moving to LPDDR. | formerly_proven wrote: | LPDDR does many, many things to reduce power consumption | (the current version even does DVFS, which I think is a | first for main memory; graphics cards have been doing | interface DFS for a long time, but a high end graphics | card will burn around 30-70 W in the memory chips, and | uses extremely high speed PHYs running at around 20 | GBit/s _per pin_ in the current generation). | | The only thing that really changes between DIMM and | soldered on is a somewhat increased trace length. That | accounts only for a very small increase in power. | foldr wrote: | > That accounts only for a very small increase in power. | | What are you basing this statement on? | formerly_proven wrote: | PHY is only part of the DRAM chip, and trace length is | only a part of what determines energy per bit, so | increasing trace length by x % wouldn't increase overall | power by x %, but a fraction of that. Thinking about it, | there is a bigger problem than just energy/bit scaling; | since LPDDR switches dynamically between high-speed and | lower speed modes, the high speed mode is likely not used | a lot. However, the low speed modes rely on being able to | turn the termination off, which saves significant amounts | of power. A socket may make that difficult to achieve, | and if you have to run with ODT in the, I'm assuming, | mostly-used low power mode, you might end up with a | significant increase in power. | ribit wrote: | By the way, check out reviews of the Framework Laptop for a | first-hand illustration of this effect. They seem to be | getting 40-50% lower battery runtimes than laptops with | comparable specs. That's example the problem -- of you | design for modularity, you have to leave some optimizations | on the table. | nrp wrote: | The battery impact for us at this point is likely more a | factor of additional firmware and driver tuning that we | need to do. We've tested to 10-11 hours in MobileMark | 2018, but have actually seen video playback runtime | (which should be a lighter load) drop below that due to | some audio driver issues that we're working through. | | There is certainly some impact to using DDR4 instead of | LPDDR4, but we believe it is still the better choice for | most consumers by allowing for greater product longevity | at lower cost. | michaelmrose wrote: | That doesn't in any way tease out the effects of sockets | it seems impossible that that doubles power usage. | formerly_proven wrote: | Doubtful, the Framework laptop is pretty much like any | other USB-C-based laptop, except that it reserves some | space inside the chassis so that the adapter dongles are | flush with the case. | Const-me wrote: | RAM energy efficiency is not important because very small | fraction of the energy consumed by other components. | | It only somewhat matters for power consumption in sleep mode | when the RAM is the only component being powered, but at | least on Windows that's solvable with a fast SSD and | hibernation. | ribit wrote: | RAM energy efficiency is extremely important because it is | a significant part of the baseline power consumption. | Power-hungry components like CPU and GPU can be run in the | lowest power state most of the time, so it really comes | down to RAM and the display. If you have a 60Wh battery and | want to get 15 hours battery life, you need to get your | idle power consumption under 4 watts. So even 0.5 watt in | baseline RAM consumption makes a huge difference. | magicalhippo wrote: | I recall underclocking the RAM on my video card a few | years ago when in desktop mode. Reduced the heat in the | PC case by several degrees. | Const-me wrote: | Performance difference between system RAM and VRAM is an | order of magnitude. Specifically, DDR4-3200 peaks at 25.6 | GB/second per channel, modern high-end GPUs peak at | 500-900 GB/second depending on the GPU model. | | VRAM consumes substantial power to deliver that | performance. On many GPUs, VRAM chips are actively | cooled. System RAM doesn't even need passive heatsinks, | uses too little electricity to care. | formerly_proven wrote: | GPUs do use fairly fine-grained dynamic frequency scaling | on their memory chips for precisely this reason: having a | top-end GPU run at around 15-20 W under light loads | simply wouldn't be possible otherwise. | andresgottlieb wrote: | Why is it that you can't have this with socketed RAM? Is | there a physical limitation? | raxxorrax wrote: | I have absolutely no idea, but I guess the bus to the | processor and other periphery could indeed be a weak point | because of EM-interference. We have absolutely crazy data | rates here and therefore very high frequency signals so | proximity between components might indeed matter. | | That said, manufacturers have huge ambition to not allow | for modular design. | Aeolun wrote: | I imagine you may have some difficulty getting the pins to | make contact if they're too small. | franga2000 wrote: | Modern CPUs are an order of magnitude more complex and | usually built on a smaller process, yet we have no | trouble putting them on intermediary PCBs to spread out | contacts and allow larger pins. I see no reason we | couldn't make LGA sockets for DRAM chips in the same way. | bserge wrote: | Yeah... sadly CPUs in laptops have been soldered for a | while now. | | The same CPUs that have a socket equivalent for desktops. | It's a travesty. | ribit wrote: | The beauty and success of DIMM modules is that they are a | simple slide-in to install technology. It's easy to | operate, cheap, robust, and it is very space efficient. | Imagine RAM modules in an LGA socket instead... how much | space would it require? How robust would it be? What will | be the price? I am quite sure all of these issues can be | solved, but is it worth it? Let's be honest, users who | are interested in having upgradeable RAM in their | ultraportable laptop are such a small minority that the | practical interest in developing modular low-powered RAM | is close to zero. | formerly_proven wrote: | The practical interest might be close to zero because in | the past memory upgrades a number of years down the road | were one of the most common upgrades and added tremendous | value and another few years of life. Similarly many older | laptops got a second life by being upgraded to SSDs. | Accidents like that, which prevent sales of new units, | can't happen if storage and memory are soldered on. | | I don't think this is the driver of these decisions per | se, but it is undeniably a bonus for the manufacturer; | non-upgradable devices become obsolete faster, | necessitating new replacements. | codedokode wrote: | Also even when RAM was replaceable, many manufacturers | put low limits on its size, I guess for the same purpose. | Stratoscope wrote: | I don't know about other brands, but for ThinkPads (both | in the IBM and Lenovo eras), there was often a stated | maximum RAM that was based only on the capacity of | SODIMMs available at the time of manufacture. | | But it wasn't an artificial limitation. In practice, once | larger capacity memory became available with the same | technology and form factor, it would work fine. I have | upgraded several ThinkPads with memory beyond what the | original datasheets said was possible. | baybal2 wrote: | Not much. LPDDR4 signalling is actually more robust than | that of regular DDR. | | It's not physically impossible to make DIMMs with LPDDR4, | just nobody really wanted to come with a standard. | ribit wrote: | As far as I understand, a number of things make a | difference: | | - Socketed RAM is limited by the number of pins, DDR SO- | DIMM for example has 2-3x fewer pins than your average | LPDDR4X module. Having more pins helps running the chips on | lower power as it was explained to me by an engineer | (something to do with grounding and lower voltage, I am not | really sure how it works but I trust the guy) | | - Socketed RAM is a least common denominator, there will | inevitably be some variance between different modules, | which leaves you with less possibilities for optimizing the | electrical connection | | - Current LPDDR is much more sophisticated than regular | DDR, the protocol is different etc. So you can't just stick | LPDDR chips on a DDR SO-DIMM and expect it to work | | I am sure one could design a modular system based on LPDDR, | but the question is whether such system would be feasible. | It would be limited to premium laptops only (as modular | system would take too much space in a smartphone), it would | probably need a higher pinout (which would mean a complex | mounting bracket of some sort) and it would require laptop | manufacturers to agree on a certain standard. | | There are other considerations as well, especially if one | wants to break the current performance boundaries. For | example, Intel has announced that they will integrate HBM | with their upcoming Xeons. How do you intend to make that | socketable, that's 2048-bit memory bus. Or consider Apple's | new in-house SoCs. By mounting RAM directly onto the | package substrate they can potentially deliver high- | bandwidth RAM in an energy efficient package without | increasing the cost and the complexity of the mainboard. | E.g. their upcoming hardware is widely expected to use | 256-bit RAM, something that has so far been reserved for | workstations. As you make the interface wider and wider, | modularity becomes more and more expensive. Why don't GPU's | offer modular RAM for example? | codedokode wrote: | RAM could be packed together with a CPU on a replaceable | board. | [deleted] | emilfihlman wrote: | >You simply can't have this with socketed RAM. | | [Citation needed], there is no real electrical engineering | reason why you couldn't. | jackcviers3 wrote: | 1 watt active is low. But so is 2 for dimm ddr3 [1]. They | switched to make upgrading more difficult. | | "Typical Power Consumption of PC Components - Power Draw in | Watts" https://www.buildcomputers.net/power-consumption-of- | pc-compo... | eropple wrote: | You've repeated this in a few places in this thread with | this same sort of conspiratorial air, but when you are | talking about south of 10W total consumption (sometimes | south of 6W!), a watt is a very significant amount and has | a very large impact on overall battery life. | howinteresting wrote: | Then make the CPU+RAM user-replaceable. | | Where there's a will there's a way. The problem is there's no | will. | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | _> but now I'm stuck with the complete inability to upgrade | RAM. In what universe is that normal?_ | | Apple's? And Dell's? And Lenovo's? And every other electronics | manufacturare who benefits form planned obsolescence and | selling more hardware. | the_biot wrote: | What a bunch of nonsense. These are tiny laptops, and every | bit of space inside is used. Soldering on RAM chips is an | obvious optimization to make the laptop thinner. What were | you expecting, a DIMM slot that's taller than the actual | laptop body? | plater wrote: | For the very thinnest of laptops it's probably difficult | without soldering the chips on board, but many users would | prefer a slightly thicker laptop where you can replace the | RAM, SSD etc. I have never had a laptop where the thickness | has been an issue and I have done a fair share of traveling | while working in sales. | | It's like a thoughtless race to make the thinnest laptop as | if that is something that is useful. I bit like the | megapixel race a few years ago. "We do it because it's | difficult, but we can" kind of thing. | | And then we have the aluminum body used on higher end | laptops. Is that really better than high-end well designed | plastic? When using my wife's Macbook Air M1 I suffer from | the razor sharp edges while typing. (Maybe not related to | it's thinness or aluminum body, but a big design issue). | Has anyone noticed on the Macbook Air M1 the small | vibrations it causes in the hands/palms when you slide them | over the palmrest ever so slightly? Extremely annoying. | kaszanka wrote: | I bet these "small vibrations" are due to some kind of | coupling between the mains and the case. Dunno, not an | electrical engineer. See if it still happens on battery | power. | plater wrote: | No, it's nothing electrical. It's all mechanical. It's | the surface which is slightly striped or bubbly or | whatever and when sliding the hand or finger lightly over | it, it generates a vibrating feeling. It might be less | now after some months of use. Maybe the small cracks are | filled with finger fat or something :). | | The sharp edges are still there though. | nebula8804 wrote: | Are you sure? I've also had this vibrating issue and for | me 100% it was some sort of grounding issue with the | power. Have you tried testing it when the ac adapter is | disconnected? Its sort of feels like a very low amperage | electrocution whenever you rest your hand on the | laptop(if you know what getting electrocuted feels like) | nrp wrote: | That is likely correct. Lenovo has an article about it | here: https://support.lenovo.com/us/en/solutions/ht505170 | -informat... | | We actually use a 3-prong AC cable to prevent this from | occurring. | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | _> What a bunch of nonsense. These are tiny laptops, and | every bit of space inside is used. Soldering on RAM chips | is an obvious optimization to make the laptop thinner._ | | _THIS_ is nonsense. Dell, HP, Lenovo, even Fujitsu-Siemens | have been making thin laptops with upgradable RAM for years | now (XPS, X1 Carbon and LIFEBOOK series come to mind). Just | recently they abandoned this and moved to soldering | everything. The Framework Laptop also has upgradable | everything and it 's not super thick now, is it? | | Sure, if you want to set a world record for thinness just | because, then sure, soldering everything saves you a couple | of mm but it's not why they do it in most cases, but to | force planned obsolescence. | morganvachon wrote: | > Dell, HP, Lenovo, even Fujitsu-Siemens have been making | thin laptops with upgradable RAM for years now (XPS, _X1 | Carbon_... | | You're just throwing names out there without even knowing | what you're talking about. The very first generation X1 | Carbon came with soldered RAM and no upgrade path, and | that hasn't changed yet. I know this because I've owned | several generations of that laptop. I just checked | Wikipedia to back up my memory before posting and yes, | every X1 Carbon has had soldered RAM going all the way | back to the first generation with Ivy Bridge. | | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThinkPad_X1_series#X1_Carbo | n | oldandboring wrote: | A better example would probably be the Lenovo T-series. | Recent models eg. T490s have soldered RAM, but if you go | back to eg. T460s there were DIMM sockets for upgrading, | and the laptop was quite thin. But, that was 5 years ago | already. | Multicomp wrote: | I too am dismayed by how older models of thin laptops | lost DIMM sockets for increasingly diminishing amounts of | thickness removed. | | I ended up going with the below because I wanted a 360 | degree touchscreen Ryzen laptop that I could upgrade the | HD and RAM...and I felt like I was searching for a needle | in a haystack. Shame on you Dell for never offering Ryzen | in your convertibles. Shame on you HP for soldering RAM | in your new Elitebook line. | | https://www.notebookcheck.net/HP- | ProBook-x360-435-G7-laptop-... | vimacs2 wrote: | I would point out though that while he might have been | wrong on the X1 Carbon, you still have not really | dismantled the key argument - that you don't need to | embrace soldered RAM to get laptops that are _thin | enough_. At a certain point, you 're just going to end up | with an experience that is objectively worse since | keyboards start having more and more give the thinner you | make them (not to mention far worse feel). | | I'd make the trade off for more mm of thickness anyway. | least wrote: | > I'd make the trade off for more mm of thickness anyway. | | That's great, then you can buy this modular laptop or one | of many laptops that still has user upgradeable ram. | Turns out you don't have to make this compromise if you | don't want to and people that do can also make their own | choice! | vimacs2 wrote: | Ah yes, the "free market" argument. Remind me of how that | one went with the headphone jack. Seems I have less and | less choices in that department these days, especially at | the flagship tier - despite it objectively being a worse | device for it with almost no positives except saving a | little bit of cost for the manufacturer. I do not accept | the arguments on it being necessary for water resistance | or providing much saving of internal storage either - | since we have devices that demonstrate how these claims | are bunk. | | My point is that maybe there needs to be an organised | pushback against this instead of pretending like | customers have perfect knowledge of the drawbacks and | benefits associated with a particular design decision and | are not at all affected by marketing. | least wrote: | The free market is allowing a company like this one to | exist because they're banking on there being enough | people that care about this sort of thing to buy into | their device rather than buying from a well established | brand. That assumption will be put to the test very soon | and advocates for this sort of device have a great | opportunity to do so. The bitter reality though is that | there might be a market large enough to sustain a company | like this, but it won't make any big waves in the | industry as a whole. Because people generally don't care. | | > Seems I have less and less choices in that department | these days, especially at the flagship tier | | You're making a conscious decision about what sort of | compromises you're willing to make with regards to your | devices, just as everyone else is that buys electronic | devices. There are plenty of phones with headphone jacks | that have premium hardware specs. Sure, Apple doesn't | have it. Samsung doesn't. But plenty of other | manufacturers do, and people aren't buying them. Sony's | top of the line smart phones have a headphone jack. LG's | Vx0 line had headphone jacks and a fancy DAC built into | them. ASUS's RoG phones have a headphone jack too. | There's plenty of choice if it's actually that important | to you. Buy those devices and hope that you can convince | enough other people that the feature is as important to | them as it is to you. | | You don't need to shit on other people's choices nor | assume that they aren't informed about the choices they | make to want for the things that you do. | goodpoint wrote: | > The free market is allowing a company like this one to | exist | | The "free market" is controlled by a very small set of | conglomerates. | | They get caught red handed deploying anticompetitive | strategies every other week. | least wrote: | Yet this product is still coming to market despite that. | morganvachon wrote: | I wasn't trying to dismantle an argument, just pointing | out that the parent had no clue what they were talking | about, and a little research would make for a stronger | position to argue from (and save some embarrassment). | | I actually prefer laptops with upgradeable components and | I'm definitely weighing replacing my two aging Thinkpad | laptops (running OpenBSD and Void Linux respectively) | with the Framework Laptop. I had briefly considered a M1 | MacBook Air but I already have a M1 Mac mini and I try to | stay diverse between form factors. The specs on the | Framework are fantastic; even the i5 is a powerhouse, | comparable to i7 desktops from just two years ago[1]. | With the modular bays I could easily have Void on the | main storage and OpenBSD on a module and choose between | the two. I already have compatible RAM and M.2 storage | laying about so the DIY SKU is a no-brainer. | | As for keyboards I'm right there with you; the higher | travel on the Framework's keyboard is another selling | point in my opinion. | | [1] | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-i7-8700-vs- | Intel-... | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | Sorry, I got the X1 carbon wrong from a list of 3 laptops | off the top of my head. I must have been thinking of | another Lenovo and mixed them up. | | What I don't understand is why you felt the need to get | aggressive and diss me in 2 different posts saying I have | no clue what I'm talking about or that I'm making stuff | up and calling for my embarrassment, only for a small | mistake, when you could have made the same arguments | without the personal dissing. | | I feel like being kind to others, even if they're wrong, | goes a longer way in productive discussions. I definitely | will not be replying to you again. Have a good day sir. | vimacs2 wrote: | Now that's what I call a courteous roundhouse kick to the | social nads courtesy of the great Chuck Norris. | raffraffraff wrote: | Who's got the balls to disagree with Chuck Norris? | | I would usually go for a smaller, lighter laptop (13"). | But within that form factor, given choice over trade | offs, I would put performance last (any modern system | will usually do), size and weight somewhere in the | middle, battery life and repairability at the top. | tootie wrote: | I bought a few Acer's for my kids and upgrades were still | really easy. I actually bought extra RAM and an SSD and had | my daughter install them and it wasn't difficult. | victor9000 wrote: | Common? Yes. Normal? No. RAM is sold by the stick in any | configuration you can imagine, yet these products are | designed to prevent the simplest of upgrades. It's like being | told that you need a new car because you want snow tires. | richardwhiuk wrote: | As the comment above states, LPDRR RAM is apparently not | sold in DIMM form. | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | _> RAM is sold by the stick in any configuration you can | imagine, yet these products are designed to prevent the | simplest of upgrades._ | | Of course, but most consumers outside of tech enthusiasts | have no idea which stuff in their laptop is upgradable, | even when it is, so they just buy a new device whenever | they want to upgrade, because that's how they've been | conditioned by the industry. | | _> It's like being told that you need a new car because | you want snow tires._ | | Let's not give Tesla any ideas now. Joking aside, your | comparison is not apples to apples. You can't easily | upgrade the engine of your car from a four cylinder to a V8 | if you need more power down the line, can you? Come to | think of it, even upgrading the multimedia unit is a hassle | in modern cars as each unit is locked to its production | vehicle. On this note, when do we go after car | manufacturers for this anti-consumer practice? | eptcyka wrote: | There are companies who's livelihood is replacing a 4 | cylinder engine in an MX-5 with an LS V8. | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | Yeah, but we were talking about "user upgradeable" here. | Even my local dealer won't upgrade engines and most car | owners have no idea how to change their oil or a tyre, | let alone perform engine transplants. | | One-off custom cars are a different thing same how there | are YouTubers putting headphone jacks in their iPhones or | upgrading the soldered VRAM of their Nvidia graphics | cards. | hnbad wrote: | > most car owners have no idea how to change their [..] | tyre | | Is this a regional thing? In Germany changing a tire is | part of the "theory" classes. It's also fairly | straightforward. | | Changing oil on the other hand is illegal except in | places with special drainage systems (like gas stations) | because of the risk of environmental damage from spills, | so it's not generally something you can do yourself. This | restriction also goes for washing your car I think but | some gas stations have places where you can wash your car | if you don't want to use a car wash. | eptcyka wrote: | Yes, but a lot of car owners _do_ change their own parts, | replacing various filters, adding bolt-on parts, changing | out suspension, tyres and the like. Just because most | people do not do this, doesn 't mean that this is | something that should be forbidden or designed against. | Cars are built to have replaceable parts, why can't | laptops be the same? There are issues with the M1 | equipped macbooks burning through flash due to users | swapping out of the 16 gigabytes of memory that are not | expandable. I don't want hardware designers to be | legislated out of being able to do interesting things | with packaging, like with what AMD is trying to do with | integrating memory chips vertically on top of their SoCs, | but I would appreciate if there was less hardware turned | into e-waste due to a single formerly-user-replaceable | chip failing or being deprecated. | | Likewise, I'd also like to see less e-waste due to | software deprecation (looking at you, Pixel 3). | sz4kerto wrote: | Cars don't need to be very small. Repairability depends | on modularity, modularity requires compromises about | size. | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | _> Just because most people do not do this, doesn't mean | that this is something that should be forbidden or | designed against._ | | And where did I say that reparability must be forbidden? | | I was saying hat operations like transplanting a more | powerful engine into your car is rare and difficult | nowadays since grandparent made a reference to cars being | easier to upgrade than laptops when that's not always | true. | eptcyka wrote: | Cars are still easier to work on than laptops in relative | terms of how many parts are user replaceable relative to | the total amount of parts. Regardless, changing the | engine is more similar to swapping out the whole | motherboard and CPU. Not something the majority of | enthusiasts would ever do, but there are some boutique | shops that transolant modern hardware into X60 thinkpad | chassis. | | Anyway, swapping an LS into a modern miata is pretty | simple and it integrates well due to everything being | CANBUS compatible, after a sufficient amount of adapters | is applied. | victor9000 wrote: | >but most consumers outside of tech enthusiasts have no | idea which stuff in their laptop is upgradeable | | That goes for everything though, most people don't know | how a car works, yet you can replace every single | component. The same goes for desktop computers and | household appliances. | | This has been the norm across many technical devices that | have become part of everyday life. How many regular users | know how a radio works? The point is that regardless of | how technical they are, these devices have remained | repairable by anyone who is so inclined. | | The movement to proprietize basic maintenance on the part | of manufacturers is purely profit driven, and is carried | out at the expense of consumers, the environment, and | overall innovation. | Delk wrote: | You're not wrong, but there are a couple of things here | that rub the me wrong way. | | > Of course, but most consumers outside of tech | enthusiasts have no idea which stuff in their laptop is | upgradable, even when it is, so they just buy a new | device whenever they want to upgrade, because that's how | they've been conditioned by the industry. | | While that's true, that doesn't mean it _should_ be that | way. Having everyone buy a new device whenever they need | to upgrade makes business sense for device vendors but | IMO we definitely shouldn 't encourage regularly tossing | out good hardware. Not with the ecological costs of new | electronics. | | We don't need to turn everyone into a tech enthusiast or | a computer service person. But if part replacements and | upgrades were possible and people knew about it, a local | shop or someone else could do the job for them. | | > Come to think of it, even upgrading the multimedia unit | is a hassle in modern cars as each unit is locked to its | production vehicle. | | The original comparison to cars might have been | unfortunate (as usual), and you may be right that things | aren't that different with cars. But again, things being | in a certain way with cars doesn't mean that's how they | should be with other devices. Or with cars, necessarily, | but I don't know much about those so I'm not going to | argue about that. | amelius wrote: | "Make a system that even morons can use, and only morons | will use it." | tpush wrote: | That's both condescending and evidently not true at all. | Aeolun wrote: | Relatively speaking I guess it is true? If your system is | so hard to use that only power users consider it, you'll | only have power users, but those represent less than 1% | of the population. | | If you make it simpler, you'll get all 100% of users, but | now 99% of them are evidently less capable of using the | system. | Google234 wrote: | Tires are more like the plastic rubber things on the bottom | of the laptop. What you want is to upgrade the engine. | spijdar wrote: | Does the analogy really work, though? Is RAM more akin to | tires or some other component like the fuel tank? | | I'd argue existence of interchangeable commodity components | in computing has been very _abnormal_ and because of the | direction the "computer market" is going, I'm not sure how | much longer it'll persist. | | For now, it's still most profitable for the manufacturers | and OEMs to source cheap interchangeable parts from many | sources. If the industry consolidates even more, though, it | may be more profitable to vertically integrate. That was | the way before the PC clone market. Hopefully not, but | we'll see. | hughrr wrote: | Realistically 99% of the corporate and consumer laptops I have | been party to are built to order with the right amount of RAM | in and never upgraded. Those of us who actually upgrade are an | insignificant minority at this point or pulling them out of the | ex corp recycling lifecycle. | | Another point is stuff that is soldered in is a lot more | reliable as a whole. Amazing how many old machines can be | resurrected by reseating the RAM. | | Really I'm on the fence. I'm sitting here on a 16Gb M1 MBA | also. | | Now what I really want to see is replaceable USB-C ports. Those | have a massive repair and replacement risk over the normal | lifetime of a laptop. Lenovo / Dell etc solder them directly to | the motherboard. One bad knock and the whole thing goes in the | trash. At least Apple stick them on a daughterboard. | Delk wrote: | Maybe it's because I'm often looking at business-oriented | laptops as a consumer, but I usually find the RAM and storage | to be on the low side compared to the CPU specs. | | I don't need a top-of-the-line i7 CPU (the improvement when | going from e.g. an i5 usually isn't enough to really matter), | and the premium you pay isn't negligible. On the other hand, | the lower-end models that don't splurge on an i7 and come | with a mid-range CPU such as an i5 instead still often have | only 8 GB of RAM. That's definitely not future-proof or even | present-proof for a laptop that otherwise has mid-range specs | in terms of performance. | | It seems ridiculous that you have to either pay for a top-of- | the-line model or be stuck with sub-par RAM for the entire | lifetime of the device. | | Corporations will of course happily buy the higher-end model | for their developers, so this probably isn't a problem in an | actual corporate environment. | dsr_ wrote: | The approach Qualcomm has taken in their flagship ARM | processors is probably correct for laptops as well as | phones. | | There are four low-power single thread cores. They do grunt | work at high efficiency but low capability. | | There are three medium-power single thread cores. They suck | up more electricity when in use but can get tasks that the | user cares about accomplished, and sleep all the time that | the phone is not running the UI. | | Then there is one high-power single thread core, which is | just a turbo-speed variant of the medium cores. That's the | one that wakes up for user interaction. | | Of course, if you can scale power-consumption and computing | together, you would just make an 8-core high-power chip and | sleep and throttle on demand -- or, in-between, Apple's M1, | which has four low and four high cores. | schmorptron wrote: | There are somewhat reliable rumors that intel are doing | exactly this big.LITTLE config in the near future. [0] | https://wccftech.com/intels-alder-lake-platform-will- | introdu... | piyh wrote: | The reviews on those Intel heterogenous cores were | terrible in both battery life and performance. Intel | gonna Intel. | schmorptron wrote: | Maybe they're looking to start on a clean slate with | their RISC-V investments then, they're late to the ARM | game and will never catch up to apple or probably even | qualcomm, their x86 designs are slowly and surely | dropping off, and they'd have to make massive strides to | change that. | nIHOPp6MQw0f5ut wrote: | It isn't a rumor. Intel announced it at CES. | | https://www.techradar.com/news/intel-teases-alder-lake- | cpus-... | nrp wrote: | This was definitely a driver for us. We want to let | consumers buy exactly the machine they need in the near | term (CPU, memory, and storage), and be able to upgrade | just the parts that they need to later. | emodendroket wrote: | Supporting tons of slightly different configurations is an | impediment to efficient operations though. There's some | logic to doing things that way. | thow-01187 wrote: | Unfortunately, more often than not, the logic behind it | is market segmentation, not technical or operational | efficiency | emodendroket wrote: | I'm not sure which is the main thing and which is the | pleasant side effect but I have to imagine both | considerations enter their minds. | davidy123 wrote: | I don't see why that's the case for Lenovo though (which | I'm most familiar with - Thinkpads), since you have to | order online. They could do batches of different | configurations, it might add a small delay for particular | configurations, but that would be ok. What they do now, | mostly limiting larger RAM/storage configs to top end | CPUs, seems like an upsell (though at least their storage | is usually replaceable, and aftermarket offers better | price/choice, though the spare small capacity device is a | waste). | | In Apple's case, it simply seems like an upsell. They | must have enough volume to sell lower spec, large storage | capacity Macbook Airs at stores, or online. | hughrr wrote: | Most people buy low end machines from Apple. They just | keep volume handy. Although recently when I went to Apple | store they had no stock at all here in the UK of | anything. Literally emptied out. | davidy123 wrote: | Yes, but how much does it cost Apple to put a larger | volume in, compared to what they charge the consumer for | that one feature? I have very often seen Apple users | hampered by this, including losing data due to having to | juggle external storage. Upsell. | formerly_proven wrote: | Tell that to European car manufacturers, almost no two | cars are identical. I've heard that some models have more | possible variations than there are v6 addresses. | jarcane wrote: | The Framework's ports are all on user-selectable, replaceable | expansion modules. If one of the USB-C ports dies, you just | unplug it and install a new one. | wffurr wrote: | The expansion modules themselves are USB C dongles designed | to fit flush in the case | | If the internal USB C ports get damaged, presumably the | device can be opened and repaired. | nrp wrote: | It would be extremely difficult to damage the internal | USB-C ports on the mainboard itself. The USB-C Expansion | Cards are what cables would be plugged into and cycled | repeatedly, and our Expansion Card bays also have | mechanical retention features that mean the insertion of | the card itself is always aligned to avoid wear or | damage. | jarcane wrote: | They mention that several other such ports like the audio | and power are easily replaceable so that seems a fair | assumption. The modules are also track-mounted and appear | to lock into place somehow, so it seems unlikely that the | internal connection will suffer the same kind of torture | an external port would. | [deleted] | ttraub wrote: | What happens if the expansion port itself becomes damaged? | Would you need to change out the motherboard? | james_pm wrote: | AKA square, flushmount dongles. | Naracion wrote: | What you're missing is that these ports are actually USB C | dongles. If one of the _original_ USB C ports dies, it's | dead. Ie the hot swap ports basically connect to USB C | ports built into the machine. It's a clever UX hack (which | I'm totally for), but it's not solving the technical issue | here. | | For transparency I actually love the idea behind the | Framework laptop, I've been hyped since January! | lostlogin wrote: | > At least Apple stick them on a daughterboard. | | This is the least Appley thing I've heard recently. Making | everything as small as possible with every single trade off | that entails is their style. I say that as a hardline Mac | user. | dmitryminkovsky wrote: | I'm not advocating for any particular build paradigm but there | are shops, at least in New York and here in Baltimore that will | repair/replace soldered-on parts for you. | raffraffraff wrote: | This reminds me of the day I dropped my new HTC One M8 into | water. I grabbed it out within a second. The screen was still | on and seemed functional, but rather quickly it started | behaving erratically. The little motor that handles vibrate was | constantly running. The device was getting hot. I couldn't | power it off. The battery couldn't be removed. In fact, the | entire case was sealed shut so I couldn't even expose the | internals to dry them out more quickly. I basically had to sit | and watch as it buzzed away and finally died. I swore I would | never again buy a phone that couldn't be opened up. | | My next phone was the Fairphone 2. I replaced the battery a few | times over it's lifetime and upgraded the camera. I bought the | Fairphone 3 as soon as it came out (and I'm still using it | happily). My wife switched to the FP3 shortly afterwards. We | both bought the camera upgrade and spare battery. | Google234 wrote: | New phones are water proof now which is something that | modularity generally doesn't allow. | y7 wrote: | I think phones can be both waterproof and modular. Going by | [1], waterproof gaskets usually come from either glue or | silicone. Glue obviously inhibits modularity, but silicone | gaskets work fine. | | 1: https://www.ifixit.com/News/30845/your-phone-is-never- | waterp... | xondono wrote: | Yeah sure, but that will make your phone significantly | bulkier | sangnoir wrote: | The Galaxy S5 is waterproof, has a rubber gasket over the | charging port _and_ a removable battery but not | "significantly bulkier" compared to all of the current | crop of mid-range/flagship phones - it's actually lighter | than the glass-backed ones | neop1x wrote: | I never had a need for water-proof phone. I am not diving | or bathing with the phone... | Idiot211 wrote: | Sure, but the reason they're nice to have for that one | time that an accident occurs, whether a drink is spilled | or you drop it in the sink or whatever. | | It's a pleasant nice to have if it is waterproof. | input_sh wrote: | That's just splash damage, which doesn't really equal | waterproofing. There are different IP ratings for the | two. Splash damage resistance is significantly cheaper | and you'll find plenty of models that don't claim to be | waterproof, but are still splash resistant. In other | words, IP52/IP53/IP54 instead of IP63/IP64: | https://www.dsmt.com/resources/ip-rating-chart/ | BenjiWiebe wrote: | My Samsung Galaxy S5 is waterproof, yet the back case pops | right off by using a fingernail. Replaceable battery, too. | benhurmarcel wrote: | I think Fairphone goes too far towards maintainability at the | expense of other aspects. I don't get a lot more value in | being able to replace the camera in 10s compared to 20 | minutes. | sydd wrote: | Its great, but I really don't understand why they cannot ship | outside like 2 countries (?). Its always such a let down to see | a company in 2021 that doesn't offer worldwide shipping, and | sells its products just in the usual 2-3 countries (USA, | Canada, maybe UK). | | At least give some FAQ with reasons or ETA when you will be | shipping outside the US | heywherelogingo wrote: | Have to manufacture different keyboard layouts for one. That | layout in the pics looks unpleasant to my UK eyes. | nrp wrote: | We have an ISO layout for UK English and other languages | tooled and in testing. There are an enormous number of | hurdles to shipping in each new country, across currency, | language, customs, fulfillment, support, certifications, | compliance, taxes, duties, business registrations, and | more. We're working through them as we go, but as a startup | we had to focus and pick a couple of countries to launch in | first (the US and Canada). | Karsteski wrote: | They are working on EU right now. I imagine it's quite | difficult for a startup to get licensing and shipping | logistics done for multiple countries, and since NA is their | biggest and easiest to target market, that's usually where | they start. | | I understand your frustration. I'm from the Caribbean, we get | nothing, ever :`) | cconcepts wrote: | I hope you guys slay the market and are able to keep up with the | demand that is coming at you. | | I hope this is the Tesla moment for the consumer electronics | industry where the incumbents are forced, through the hubris yet | popularity of an upstart, to start innovating again and doing | what is good for humanity rather than peddling incrementally | changed products each year that are designed to become obsolete | within an ever-shortening timeframe because....it appears to be | good for the bottom line. | | Good on you | rchaud wrote: | 'Tesla moment' is right. They put all-electric cars in the | public's consciousness. And then they went into the luxury auto | business of charging and arm and a leg for repairs and parts. | drstewart wrote: | The reality is that this will be a niche product that gets | almost no mainstream adoption outside of a small tech bubble, | like the Fairphone. | 908B64B197 wrote: | I wish enterprise buyers or institutional buyers considered | it. | | Make sense to buy a fleet of these since they can be pretty | easily repaired/cannibalized for parts. | erikpukinskis wrote: | No, it very well could become a popular product. | | Repairability won't be enough to get it there. But whatever | company culture forms around this repairability thing could | lead them to design a killer feature that Apple and Microsoft | would never think of. | | And repairability might be a moat for some feature like that. | | It's not inevitable, most new electronics companies don't hit | it big. But don't write them off before they start! | | They're in the right place: they pulled together a group of | contributors with a different way of thinking, a product is | on the market, getting good reviews, and a cult following is | behind them. That's exactly where new big ideas come from. | Give them a chance to seek it out. | drstewart wrote: | I definitely support their mission and hope to see them do | well. And you might be right that they form a culture or | feature that proves to be game changing. However, on the | surface, I don't believe modularity is something that the | average consumer cares about enough to have this become | mainstream just on that basis alone. | goodpoint wrote: | A "Tesla moment" might well represent adoption of an | expensive gadget in a small tech bubble. | d--b wrote: | Well, I am not an Apple devotee, and I think that what you say | is generally right. But Apple releasing M1 laptops kind of | changed the game... | Koshkin wrote: | Well, I am not an Apple devotee, either; moreover, my | impression has been that, unlike IBM or Microsoft or Sun, | neither Apple itself nor any of its products have so far made | any impact on my life or work whatsoever. I may well be | wrong, but I am not even sure if anything was much different | had Apple never existed in the first place. | bhupy wrote: | > I am not even sure if anything was much different had | Apple never existed in the first place. | | https://cdn.redmondpie.com/wp- | content/uploads/2019/01/phones... | | https://cdn.osxdaily.com/wp- | content/uploads/2011/08/tablets-... | seanalltogether wrote: | Does the phone you carry in your pocket look more like a | flip-phone, a blackberry, or an iphone? | jarpschop wrote: | You're certainly not an iOS developer. | jensensbutton wrote: | In what way? It is certainly another step forward in terms of | battery life, but it's incremental and doesn't fundamentally | change how people use laptops. Don't really think it changes | the market either. People with Macs will upgrade eventually | and people that don't use Macs now are unlikely to change | because of it. | erikpukinskis wrote: | I think low compute is actually a pretty interesting niche. | By throwing all that compute at people, Apple all but | guarantees the quality of software (VSCode extensions, web | sites, etc) will be garbage. | | I think the next major OS innovation will come from a company | focused on architecture, design, and software efficiency over | computing resources and device size. | blamestross wrote: | I use a sacrificial USBC extension cable for this situation. It | isn't cheap to replace, but it is easier than the USBC hub or | power brick I have may laptop plugged into. | trixie_ wrote: | I like giving people a choice whether they want to buy something | repairable/configurable or not. Minimal government intervention. | Let the market decide. | nrp wrote: | We are fans of proving there is a market for this by building | and selling it ourselves, but there are categories where the | start-up costs for new entrants are impossibly high and the | incumbents are actively opposed to repairability. Even for | notebooks, the capital required is non-trivial. | xpe wrote: | Yes, it is nice when people have many choices. History and | economics show that markets left to their own devices often | give fewer choices than smart combinations of (markets & | oversight). | Dracophoenix wrote: | The PC clones of the 80s and 90s beg to differ. | xpe wrote: | Explain please? Beg to differ with what exactly? | MeinBlutIstBlau wrote: | $1400 for 16gb of ram and less power hungry cpu? I mean I like | what you're doing here, but I might as well buy a Mac at that | point. | gbh444g wrote: | Price for the Pro version? I'd buy so long as it comes with | Ubuntu/Debian. | mateuszf wrote: | Just choose the DIY option | [deleted] | boltzmann_brain wrote: | > Iris Xe Graphics | | but why | pentae wrote: | I really hope Dave2D does a review of this laptop to increase | awareness about it. It's a great concept and they deserve success | noeltock wrote: | I thought this was for MacOS given the similar wallpapers on a | bunch of the mockups. | NileTheGreat wrote: | Do you plan to offer replacement parts for the mechanical | components? | | I would love to purchase an extra clamshell for aesthetic | customizations, like laser engraving, spray coating, repainting, | etc. | nrp wrote: | Yes, absolutely, and we're really looking forward to seeing the | ways people take advantage of that! | zapdrive wrote: | Why such hostility towards accepting crypto as a payment option? | I'm sure you know there are payment processors that convert the | crypto to cash in the bank with minimal effort. | | Your company's statement that you won't accept crypto because it | is "bad for environment" seems more political than | operational/technical. | caeril wrote: | edit: Sorry, I missed that. Thanks. | crollywood wrote: | Windows is not mandatory at all? You can literally combine | whatever you want in the laptop, including the preinstalled | windows or not. Look under the DIY section | 100011_100001 wrote: | If you go to the DIY section you can choose to not get an OS. | AdmiralAsshat wrote: | Submitted this yesterday, didn't get much traction though. | | Gizmodo's review was mixed. | | https://gizmodo.com/i-wanted-to-love-framework-s-modular-lap... | eplanit wrote: | That review is indeed lukewarm, but lists not one specific | gripe as to anything wrong or not working. It's really a | worthless review. | octos4murai wrote: | I just read the review. The specific gripes they had are: (1) | subpar battery life, (2) middling performance compared to | others with the same CPU/RAM configuration, (3) loud fan | noise akin to a gaming laptop, and (4) uncomfortably high | temperatures on load. | dnadler wrote: | I'm pretty excited about this laptop, but that review does | list some specific complaints. Here's a couple lines from the | conclusion of the review: | | > The Framework laptop offers an awkward port selection to | make way for its expansion slots, and it doesn't have the | best battery life. It's also concerning that the computer | runs so hot. | culopatin wrote: | This review sounds overly negative. I don't have much interest | in either party but it mentions the laptop got to 106f and said | "too hot to touch". Well, that's only 41c. If 41c was too hot | to touch, some fevers would burn your skin. | | Then it mentions that the fn keys area was at 96f. That's body | temp. A phone taken out of a pocket will probably be around the | same temp and we are not complaining it's too hot. | | Little details like that make me think they had some kind of | negative bias towards the device and it is not clear why. | | I am not defending the device since I haven't used it, but that | review reads like "yeah whatever I guess I'll review it, but if | it's not perfect I'll trash it". | | I guess we'll have to wait for these first batches to go out to | see what problems are actually a nuisance | junar wrote: | The temperature of your hands is cooler than your core | temperature: about 33 degrees Celsius (91 degrees | Fahrenheit). Obviously comfort is subjective, but I think the | difference is large enough for some to feel uncomfortable. | Especially when comparing against other things in a room, | which tend to be much cooler compared to the body. | | https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Rob-A-B- | Oostendorp/publ... | decremental wrote: | Is it legal to sell something that looks almost indistinguishable | from a MacBook? | | These responses to anyone pointing out how similar the design is | are so disingenuous. Very strange! | kevinherron wrote: | Huawei and others have been doing it for years. Google the | "Matebook". | Ancapistani wrote: | I have a Matebook D, and I wouldn't say it's any more of a | clone of a MacBook than any other manufacturer. | | Check out HP's current line up. They seem to come in two | flavors: "MacBook clone" and "MacBook clone, but in black". | | https://www.hp.com/us- | en/shop/slp/optane/2-in-1-laptops?jump... | 8note wrote: | I don't think I could distinguish it from any laptop. | | Do MacBooks come with a windows key? | dylan604 wrote: | Um, this thing has actual buttons, so clearly not a rip off of | a MacBook. It also has what appears to be a dedicated power | button. Also, this thing is user repairable. That's clearly not | copied from Apple. | | Edit: so not a dedicated power button, but an integrated finger | print reader. uh-oh, case is getting weaker ;-) | ben-schaaf wrote: | > To make device security convenient, we also built a Windows | Hello-compatible fingerprint reader into the power button | | It's both a dedicated power button and a finger print reader. | chipotle_coyote wrote: | So, uh, like a MacBook? | | (For the record I'm not bothered by the similarities; I | honestly think that if you go minimalist with your design | language you kind of converge on this look. I would offer | the gentlest of criticisms, though, in the way the up and | down arrow keys are half-height but the left and right are | full. That's another trend Apple started and it is bad. | Ironically, Apple's current laptops are moving away from it | again!) | dylan604 wrote: | Actually, my 2019 Macbook has all 4 arrow keys half- | height, but the left/right keys are bottom aligned with | the down key rather than .keys { vertical-align: center; | } I try my best to never use those keys. | chipotle_coyote wrote: | That was the first one that switched back, I think. | Personally, I prefer that design to the full-height | left/right and half-height up/down keys, because it's | just easier for me to find the right arrows that way. | (I'd prefer full height on all of them, but I recognize a | laptop keyboard is space-constrained, at least if it's | 13" or below. The 16" MBP has less excuse.) | unpixer wrote: | I don't really care so much about half-height left and | right keys versus full-height ones, but I've discovered | that what I really hate is when half-height PgUp and PgDn | keys are on either side of a half-height Up arrow key. | This means I constantly hit PgUp/PgDn with my pinkie when | reaching for Left or Right (and ultimately on my current | machine I had to override this with a keyboard remap). | dylan604 wrote: | It can't be a dedicated anything if you just used the word | "both" implying it does 2 things. | wayneftw wrote: | There's not a whole lot of trade dress to claim on aluminum | rectangles. So that just leaves the logo. | numpad0 wrote: | Apple nailed the "generic laptop" design with MacBook but they | also has their own design language like the iconic fillets. I | guess that's how they draw a line and I guess that's enough for | each sides. | bschwindHN wrote: | > No inverted T arrow keys | | That was a showstopper for me for the older macbooks and still a | showstopper now. It was so bad that Apple walked it back on the | newer designs (though their newer magic keyboards still have this | problem for some reason...) | rplnt wrote: | I've been using MB Pro for almost 4 years now and I still miss- | click those stupid half-keys. It's a no go for me too. | grae_QED wrote: | I wish they had a transparent or even translucent option for the | case. I think that that level of honesty, where a company can | show off the internals of a product with confidence, is very much | missed. | | Plus, considering the complexity of the hardware, it would look | amazing with a transparent case. It'd be almost like swiss watch. | mromanuk wrote: | OMG, when the first picture on the website appeared, I thought it | was a Mac. Isn't it too look alike? I mean maybe they get sued or | something, which would be sad, because I love the design and the | idea | [deleted] | techrat wrote: | 3:2 screen, windows key, fingerprint reader, non touchbar row, | no gap in keyboard above the left and right arrow keys, much | wider filet below the touchpad, no "Macbook" text below the | screen, no speaker grilles to the left and right of the | keyboard, enter key and backslash key appear 'merged' (common | for iso supporting layouts)... | | ...and you thought it was a Mac? | xzlzx wrote: | It clearly looks like a mac. Let's get real. | [deleted] | throwawaycuriou wrote: | Petty but I'd like the ability to replace that Windows meta key. | Rd6n6 wrote: | Louis Rossman looking at screenshots and speculating: | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMZp8ErTTuk | nrp wrote: | We've since announced that we're making full schematics and | assembly drawings available to independent repair shops who get | Framework hardware in. We actually chatted with Louis a couple | of times to get his feedback on the plan. | nrp wrote: | Framework Founder here! I am happy to answer any questions on the | product. | baybal2 wrote: | What is the webcam module used? What's the cost for them? | nrp wrote: | We have a deep dive on the webcam here: | https://frame.work/blog/1080p-webcam | rosege wrote: | How do you feel about competition from the M1 processor? I can | see when its more widely available a fair amount of ppl might | want to move from x64. | heavyset_go wrote: | How is Linux support? | nrp wrote: | Pretty good already. I mentioned in another comment that | Fedora 34 respins as of this week have full support for the | Framework Laptop built in. On Ubuntu 21.04, everything works | out of the box except the fingerprint reader, which requires | a newer libfprint. | throwawaycuriou wrote: | How's Manjaro/Arch support looking? | heavyset_go wrote: | Awesome, are you planning to participate in LVFS[1]? I see | there's an entry for Framework, but no firmware uploaded | yet. | | [1] https://fwupd.org/ | psankar wrote: | Please make full sized keys for up and down arrows, with the | arrow keys in an inverted T shape. Group function keys in | groups of four. | | Also provide Mac style keyboard if possible with a command key. | I use mac keyboard because it is safer on wrists and thumbs. | | All the best. | occoder wrote: | Yes please! I second all these requests! | | Full-size arrow keys: by adding another column of keys to the | right side of the keyboard. That way you get dedicated | Home/End/PageUp/PageDown keys as well. See [1]. | | Grouping function keys: also put a wider gap between Esc and | F1, F12 and Delete. | | Mac keyboard: that'd be nice! How compatible are they to | hackintosh BTW? | | [1] https://img.business.com/o/aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuYnVzaW5lc3NuZX | dzZ... | culopatin wrote: | Hackintosh on this thing would be the ultimate hackbook. | Same display ratio (not sure if resolution is exactly the | same though), pretty much same form factor, and you can | upgrade the ram. While they support intel at least. | torgian wrote: | This looks like a very cool laptop! What material is it made | out of? | | Do you have information about how the pci-e lanes are routed? | I'm wondering because it would be interesting to see how EGPUs | perform with this laptop. | | Do you have plans to release different types of key caps ( such | as U-shaped keys? ) | nrp wrote: | The housing is made of 50% post-consumer recycled aluminum. | The plastic parts are on average 30% post-consumer recycled | plastic. | | There's some more information about the PCI-e lanes here: | https://community.frame.work/t/iommu-groups-for- | thunderbolt-... | | We don't currently have plans for other keycap geometries, | but we do have a range of different languages in progress. | torgian wrote: | Thank you. Good to see some of the parts are recycled | components too. | creese wrote: | Can the USB4 expansion card transmit data at 40Gbps? Do you | have any plans for Thunderbolt 4? | nrp wrote: | The USB-C Expansion Card is purely passive passthrough | designed to minimize signal loss and voltage drop, so it | depends on the capabilities of the specific mainboard. The | current mainboard does support 40Gbps through that card. For | Thunderbolt, we can't state anything yet until we complete | certifications. | akavel wrote: | Is there a chance you might produce a fanless configuration? | Since I first bought a fanless machine, I'm a total sucker for | them and just stopped considering fanless computers for home | use anymore (100% confirmed by my later buying choices). I'm | happy to notice that the fan seems to be on the mainboard in | your DIY Build video, so at a first glance it looks not | impossible; but I also understand there's more to that, in | overall heat transport and airways design/considerations, | that's why I'm still asking and really interested to know the | answer! | nrp wrote: | You can technically unplug the fan, but with a U-series CPU, | it will just be throttling most of the time. A lower- | power/lower-performance mainboard without a fan is something | we could technically do in the future if there is customer | demand for it. | 2muchcoffeeman wrote: | What support like outside the US? | nrp wrote: | We're currently shipping to the US and Canada. We're working | on adding additional countries, and making sure we can offer | proper support in addition to being able to ship the product | there. | silon42 wrote: | Yes, for Europe you need keyboard with ISO layout (upside | down Enter + extra key). | nrp wrote: | Definitely. We have ISO keyboards tooled up and are | finalizing the artwork for different languages for it. | dorfsmay wrote: | Any chance for a keyboard with a trackpoint and its 3 buttons | in the future? | | A lot of us, addicted to the trackpoint, are not liking some | directions Lenovo have taken in the recent years. | michalf6 wrote: | +1, trackpoint is keeping me vendor-locked to Lenovo. It's | just too useful for text editing to pass up. And it must have | 3 buttons, middle button is essential for scrolling. | eikenberry wrote: | +1, please consider offering this. A track point and 3 real | buttons are so much nicer than a trackpad. At least to some | of us. ThinkPads success seems to indicate there are a lot of | us. | trulyme wrote: | As a counterpoint, I love ThinkPads but never understood | the appeal of the track point. I don't mind it being there | of course, but it is not a reason to prefer one laptop to | another, and definitely not the reason I like ThinkPads. | kk6mrp wrote: | I normally don't ever use it however I discovered in some | areas I work it is necessary. Attempting to use the | trackpad results in the cursor jumping around the screen | and the only thing I can figure is that there is | electrical interference messing with it. | nrp wrote: | A touchpad with buttons is something that we have explored, | and is in theory a replacement module we can create. | Inserting a track point would be much more challenging from | a cost and engineering feasibility standpoint. We may have | underestimated the level of interest around track point... | VeloMoto wrote: | As someone with experience looking into touchpad hardware | are there any options that compare to the features and | functionality of a mac? | | As a predominantly windows based user every time I use a | mac touchpad I'm blown away the fluidity and features | like the psuedo-click. I've been eagerly awaiting windows | compatible hardware of the same quality and | functionality. | silon42 wrote: | 2 buttons + trackpoint in the middle would be a viable | alternative IMO. | ghosty141 wrote: | Trackpoints are still very beloved in the thinkpad-scene | and among (for the lack of a better word) "nerds". | | This community is not represented on youtube etc. so I | guess that's why we don't hear about the interest in | trackspoints that much. | JoshTriplett wrote: | At the moment, there are exactly two things stopping me | from jumping on this: | | 1) 3 buttons at the top of the mousepad, ideally | contoured to be comfortable and easily differentiated. | | 2) A 3+ year warranty, rather than just 1 year. | | The screen and the high-end internals are really grabbing | me. | elric wrote: | Their warranty is utterly ridiculous. Even the EU | mandates 2+years for all consumer electronics. | | I'm not expecting Next Business On Site warranty from a | new company (though that would be nice...), but an option | for at least 3 years is the very minimum for me. | nrp wrote: | We'll certainly be complying with EU warranty | requirements before we start selling there. | | For longer warranties in general, that is something we | would like to do. We're giving ourselves some time in | market in order to price it appropriately, but since our | product is easy to repair, we believe our costs for | supporting warranties will be lower than it would be for | less repairable products. | JoshTriplett wrote: | > We're giving ourselves some time in market in order to | price it appropriately, but since our product is easy to | repair, we believe our costs for supporting warranties | will be lower than it would be for less repairable | products. | | Absolutely. In particular, I wouldn't expect an "at-home | service" warranty this early in the life of your company, | for such an easily repaired laptop. Rather, I'd expect a | warranty in which you cross-ship a replacement part, | provide instructions to replace it, and say "just put the | old part back in the box we shipped you the replacement | in and drop it in your outgoing mail". | Nrbelex wrote: | Joining the chorus of those asking for a trackpoint | equivalent and a larger gamut screen option. Love what | you're doing and would buy today if those two issues were | addressed. | JoshTriplett wrote: | With or without a trackpoint, I'd _really_ love to have | buttons above the trackpad. I can 't stand tap-to-click, and | I feel much more comfortable on a laptop with buttons. | | Everything else about this laptop looks _great_ , especially | the 3:2 screen aspect ratio. | mike_ivanov wrote: | Full size arrow keys, please. | varjag wrote: | Just wanted to say: great job! Am generally skeptical of | modular consumer designs but this looks very tidy. As another | hardware developer really appreciate the thought that went into | this. | 0x0EB0DA10 wrote: | Really love this product and the concept! I'd love if you guys | would build a touchscreen tablet too, although at this point | I'm probably asking too much. The tablet landscape ain't pretty | with much of its electronic component were destined to landfill | instead of being reusable like this. | nrp wrote: | A 13.5" laptop is our first, but certainly not last category. | Just about every category in consumer electronics is missing | a product like this, with rare exceptions like desktop PCs | and what Fairphone is doing in the smartphone space. | justicezyx wrote: | How does this compare to Mac nook m1 and air? | ben-schaaf wrote: | If you want to repair or change anything on an M1 macbook | you'd need to desolder components off the motherboard and | then also own a spare M1 macbook for donor parts because you | can't buy them separately. | rvz wrote: | > If you want to repair or change anything on an M1 macbook | you'd need to desolder components off the motherboard | | Exactly. Good luck to anyone upgrading the RAM or storage | on that thing yourself. It is beyond risky to do this [0] | (The article title is also misleading and ignores the | extreme risk). | | I don't think that [0] is remotely an option to the end | user. | | [0] https://9to5mac.com/2021/04/06/m1-mac-ssd-and-ram- | upgrade/ | peterburkimsher wrote: | Which battery controller are you using? I've had trouble | replacing the cells on my MacBook Pro 2014 Retina 15" A1398. | | If it's a TI BQ20Z451, will you keep the default unseal code? | nrp wrote: | It's a TI BQ40Z50-R3. I would strongly recommend doing a pack | replacement rather than cell replacements for a Framework | Laptop Battery. We'll be making replacement battery packs | readily available at a price point that hopefully makes it | the clear choice. | ant6n wrote: | The question is whether it will be possible to get a | replacement battery five years from now (at a reasonable | price point). | peterburkimsher wrote: | Exactly. Apple even have third-party batteries in their | supply chain (installed by an AASP), the printing of the | warnings on the cells and the PCB date code look very | suspiciously shanzhai. Yet Apple Support were able to | confirm that the order number is real and the part came | from them. They charged me $600 for it too. It'd better | be reliable, unlike the $100 third-party one that idles | at 12V, and a voltage spike when waking from sleep killed | my logic board. | nrp wrote: | What helps us keep replacement parts available is that | we'll be continuing to build new Framework Laptops with | form-factor-compatible modules for the foreseeable | future. That means we will still be manufacturing new | batteries compatible with original Framework Laptops for | many years. | viraptor wrote: | We're almost all thinking it, so... are you trying to get sued | by Apple, or what's the reason for 1:1 copy of the design? | | Edit: To be clear, I'm not just trying to dunk on the idea. | That would be the reason for me not to buy one if it looks like | the vendor can fold because Apple dragged them to court. | mastrsushi wrote: | With all the other OEMs out there that have used the same | exhausted design, do you really think Apple is going to go | after some start up? | | It has chiclet keys and a black bezel sure, but nothing about | this screams carbon copied MacBook anymore than contemporary | ultra book. | | We're pretty much in the modern equivalent of beige boxes and | CRTs. Consumer computers aren't very interesting to begin | with. This one is a laptop that lets you swap out parts, | that's pretty unique. | viraptor wrote: | Maybe Apple will go after some startup maybe not. As a | customer why would I risk not having access to replacement | parts because they can't be produced/sold anymore? Having a | laptop that looks like Apple design is not a great trade- | off here. | rsynnott wrote: | I mean, I think that ship has sailed... Here's a Samsung | definitely-not-MBP: https://www.samsung.com/hk_en/pc/notebook | -7-np730xbe-k02/NP7... | | And of course there's the suspiciously named Huawei Matebook | Pro. | | If Apple was inclined to sue people for making MBP | lookalikes, it has far more interesting targets to go after. | nrp wrote: | The lead-in photo on that email happens to be at an angle | that doesn't show off the distinguishing features and | functionality. On our website you can readily see just how | different it is from an Apple product: | https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition | wmf wrote: | So many laptops are copying Apple that it's no longer | notable. | viraptor wrote: | Copying elements - sure. But I've never seen one before | where I though - this is an Apple product. | techrat wrote: | If you were confused by the Framework Laptop and thought | it was an Apple Product... | | and I mean this sincerely... | | Get your eyes checked. | everyone wrote: | Also kind of sends the wrong message. Aping the masters of | planned obsolescence and unrepairability. You'd think they | wouldn't want an even passing resemblance to anything apple. | luke2m wrote: | Almost every thin and light laptop on the market these days | looks like a macbook replica. And iirc, macs have a 16:10 | display. | nightski wrote: | It's such a tired design. I think the goals of this project | is fantastic but man the macbook is getting ugly. They | really need a refresh. It feels like it has been over a | decade now... | chipotle_coyote wrote: | Serious question: what would you expect/want in a design | refresh? I'm speaking just of the industrial design, not | the number and kinds of ports and such. | | I'm curious because while I've also thought "yeah, these | are increasingly overdue for an updated look," it's hard | in practice for me to think of changes that I'd really | _want._ I 'm typing this on an M1 MacBook Air, and...I'm | not saying it's somehow reached the apex of perfection, | but other than a wider range of colors there's nothing | that immediately comes to mind as an answer to "I wish | the Air had [thing]". Smaller bezels? Maybe, but it's not | like they're a glaring huge problem. A different shape? | Maybe, but again, this is just such a _nice_ one. They | could bring in more of the current iPad /iPhone design | language, especially on the MacBook Pro rather than the | Air, I guess -- which is widely expected for the next | refresh, so you'll probably get your wish in that regard. | nightski wrote: | Honestly just start with colors and/or black like say the | Razer Blade, iPhone, or iMac. | | I have a G14 with anime matrix led display and it's | pretty slick looking (so cool how it lights up) [1]. I | understand it's not as minimalist as a macbook but I've | been blown away by the amount of comments I get on it's | looks. | | It completely goes against Apple's design DNA but maybe | it's just the super minimalist approach itself I am | finding tired. I like spice & variety. | | [1] https://dlcdnimgs.asus.com/websites/global/Products/x | ccq31kw... | chipotle_coyote wrote: | That's fair. I mostly like a minimalist approach, but I'd | like them to find space for just a little more whimsy | than they've had in the last decade -- and I'd definitely | like to see the laptops in more colors than "silver gray" | and "kinda darker silver gray". | Dracophoenix wrote: | If the M1 iMac is an indication of things to come, you | might get your wish. | micromacrofoot wrote: | could be intentional as a dig to apple... they can make a | macbook clone that _is_ repairable and configurable; apple 's | making it difficult intentionally | itwy wrote: | How compatible is it with Linux? Was it tested with specific | distros? | nrp wrote: | We've been testing with Ubuntu 21.04 and Fedora 34. We'll be | releasing guides around both of these soon and other distros | in the future. On Fedora 34 respins that are going live soon, | everything works out of the box, including the fingerprint | reader. On Ubuntu 21.04, everything works out of the box | except the fingerprint reader, which requires manually | upgrading libfprint. | dorfsmay wrote: | What OS/distro does the laptop ship with? | nrp wrote: | The pre-built versions ship with Windows 10. The | Framework Laptop DIY Edition ships without an OS | installed. | vzaliva wrote: | Does this implies I will need to pay Microsoft tax even | if I am planning to run Linux? | nrp wrote: | The Framework Laptop DIY Edition ships without an OS | license of any kind. If you want a pre-built Framework | Laptop, that does include the cost of a Windows license. | The DIY Edition is super easy to set up though: https://g | uides.frame.work/Guide/Framework+Laptop+DIY+Edition... | dorfsmay wrote: | Thanks. | input_sh wrote: | Selecting Windows adds +$139/+$199 to the price (for | Home/Pro versions), so no. | Dracophoenix wrote: | What about Arch, Gentoo, Nix/Guix and *BSDs? | nrp wrote: | We haven't tested those internally, but we hope to see | folks in the community try them! We are absolutely happy | to help anyone who gets stuck, and as we see which | distros are popular we can plan out more official support | for them. | massysett wrote: | Are you considering shipping your own distribution (for | instance a modified Ubuntu or Fedora or whatever) and | guaranteeing compatibility for that, or do you plan only to | issue guides for other distributions? | jeswin wrote: | Taking focus away from the central vision will jeopardize | the company - shipping and maintaining a distro is | laborious; so please don't do this. | | If at all, a script to automatically download/compile | deps will be more than adequate (not necessary). | nrp wrote: | Yes, we would very much like to rely on the great distros | that are already out there for now, working with them as | needed to ensure compatibility (which we have already | done with a handful). | aftergibson wrote: | Yeah the fact that Linux supporter isn't listed makes me | pause on making a purchase, especially when it's from a new | laptop maker. | | Hopefully on release we can get some confirmations about how | well it runs. | nrp wrote: | We'll be posting up step by step installation and use | guides for a few popular distros soon. We sent pre-release | hardware out to developers and maintainers at a few distros | and have been working with them on this. In the meantime, | we also have a Linux sub-forum in our community where we | expect folks will post their experiences with more obscure | distros: https://community.frame.work/c/diy- | edition/linux/91 | aftergibson wrote: | Awesome, that'll go a long way! Thanks. | pabs3 wrote: | The Debian wiki has a section for hardware-specific | install guides, that would be a good place to put one for | installing Debian on the Framework Laptop: | | https://wiki.debian.org/InstallingDebianOn | Frameworkscr wrote: | Very humbly from a full time linux user of 16 years- Id | recommend you avoid their crowd- they are entitled and | toxic. (as perhaps urself have noticed in this threas) | | https://mobile.twitter.com/bgolus/status/1080213166116597 | 760... | | (personally id love to see linux supported well haha, bjt | seriously good luck) | | I wish you guys to succeed. | craftkiller wrote: | 1. Are you able to limit the min/max charge of the battery to | reduce wear / increase longevity? For example, if I'm usually | plugged into an outlet then I would want to limit my max charge | to 80% or 60% since high charge levels degrade the battery | faster, but I wouldn't want to disconnect the charger because | then I'd be pointlessly burning through battery cycles. | | 2. Coreboot: whats the status on that? | | 3. When I violently yank my laptop in any random direction, the | military-grade type-c cables that I forgot were plugged into | all 4 ports on my framework laptop will naturally put | significant strain on the type-c ports on the modules. My | question is: how possible is it that I manage to also damage | the interior usb type-c port on the laptop body? | | 4. What run-time loaded closed source binary blobs are needed | for the full use of the hardware in one of your pre-built | configurations? | | 5. Repair shops can get access to your schematics after signing | some forms (presumably involving a NDA). Can I sign the same | forms to get the same access? | | 6. If you cease to exist, everyone essentially just bought a | bunch of proprietary dongles that are unlikely to be reused due | to their size/shape. This would lead to the exact opposite of | your goals by directly causing e-waste. Why won't that happen? | | 7. Is the fan, in any way, a standard form factor / are there | models from competing brands that would work in that spot? I | don't know how loud your fan is, but if I was unhappy with the | noise from the fan it would be good to know that I could | consider other competing models. | nrp wrote: | 1) We don't have this yet, but it is on our firmware roadmap. | | 2) Also on our (long term) firmware roadmap! | | 3) It would be extremely difficult to damage the internal | USB-C ports from force on the USB-C Expansion Card. You'd | destroy the USB-C Expansion Card first, which is inexpensive | to replace. | | 4) This is a great question, and actually on our list of blog | posts we want to write. I don't have the answer off-hand, but | it shouldn't be different than other recent Intel-based | notebooks. | | 5) Currently we're limited to offering it to repair shops, | but we're looking at ways to expand that in the future. | | 6) For the Expansion Cards, since they are standard USB-C | devices, you can plug them into other USB-C hosts (though as | you note, they are somewhat oddly shaped for that). We've | also released open source CAD and documentation for people to | develop their own Expansion Cards. | | 7) The heatsink and fan is custom to the system by form | factor necessity. | craftkiller wrote: | Thanks! I'm particularly excited about #3 since I am a | forgetful clutz, so having a sacrificial layer that ensures | the ports attached to the mainboard stay safe is going to | be great peace of mind. | bscphil wrote: | From what I can find, the documentation on the screen just says | it covers 100% of the sRGB gamut. That's nice, but do you have | an example of a calibration profile that shows the full gamut | coverage? It would be nice to compare it to Adobe RGB and P3 | gamuts. Is the screen HDR or 10 bit input capable? | lstamour wrote: | Not affiliated with Framework Laptop, but I'll reply anyway. | | It's been my experience that when only sRGB is mentioned, | only sRGB is supported. Adobe RGB is relatively rare these | days, and any amount of P3 or HDR support is common only in | higher end laptops with either very bright backlights or | OLED. You might be interested in a new standard, DisplayHDR, | which commonly focuses on how bright and technically accurate | a screen can be. At this point there are often trade offs | between screen technologies, but OLED tends to produce the | "nicest" picture. https://displayhdr.org/ | | Also, as a correction, as long as you're not performing | colour grading on footage, you don't need 10-bit input or | output for HDR. It helps, obviously, but technically you can | use dithered 8-bit RGB over HDMI 2.0 at 60 fps and still view | HDR content with no perceptible difference between the 8-bit | and 10-bit or 12-bit formats. For example: | https://2020.smpte.org/home/session/325093/perceptually- | dith... | | That said, especially when using a computer, I really like | the way scrolling feels at 120 fps, so I encourage looking | for HDMI 2.1 outputs and inputs for that reason alone. Don't | forget you'll likely also need a new HDMI cable. As an aside, | I've tried adapters from DisplayPort 1.4 to HDMI 2.1 and they | are so far rather unreliable and prone to overheat. | bscphil wrote: | > It's been my experience that when only sRGB is mentioned, | only sRGB is supported. | | I suspect this as well, especially at the price point the | Framework laptop is being offered, but that's why I'm | asking. I feel that manufacturers providing a approximate | gamut coverage plot would be an enormous improvement to the | status quo. | | > any amount of P3 or HDR support is common only in higher | end laptops | | I disagree with this point. The MacBook Air (at $1000) is | advertised to have P3 coverage. That's the exact same price | (for a shipped laptop) as Framework. It also has HDR | support. | | > Also, as a correction, as long as you're not performing | colour grading on footage, you don't need 10-bit input or | output for HDR. | | I'm aware - that's why I asked about HDR and 10 bit support | separately. Worth mentioning that a bunch of cheap panels | only really support 6 bits which then gets dithered, | though. You're right that 8 bits in probably sufficient at | the 400 nits brightness of the Framework screen. | lstamour wrote: | > The MacBook Air (at $1000) is advertised to have P3 | coverage. That's the exact same price (for a shipped | laptop) as Framework. It also has HDR support. | | True. But then it only outputs to one extra display, runs | a chip Apple made from last year and hasn't yet updated, | and the rest of the industry isn't Apple and can't find a | way to sell the same product in an iPad, mid-range | desktop, entry-level all-in-one, entry-level laptop and | entry-level pro laptop while manufacturing in quantity | during the middle of a chip shortage. I mean, some things | only Apple can do. | | The closest comparison I can make to the Air in terms of | price might be the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro for $999 which | has an AMOLED screen, but that's presumably because | Samsung makes their own displays and wants a laptop to | show them off. Everything else about the laptop is low- | to mid-range and you need to pay extra for 16GB of RAM. | Frankly most laptops with fancy displays end up being | like the Dell XPS 9710, they ship with dedicated graphics | cores and cost upwards of 2-3 grand. The exceptions with | nice displays stand out as exceptions. To date, | Microsoft's entire Surface line has yet to go P3 HDR | (iirc) with the exception of the Surface Studio, their | giant (and outdated) all-in-one PC. | | Frankly, if a third-party repairable MacBook Air with | Apple silicon existed, I'd be over the moon, and more so | if Apple came out with an OLED display, but in a way even | OLED panels aren't very repairable as if you get the | tiniest of scratches the entire panel might need to be | tossed, etc. And you might consider repairability from | the perspective of "how inexpensive is it to replace?" If | so, you wouldn't want a part that's only affordable if | you buy in bulk, you'd want a screen that's common and | easy to get instead. Probably 16:9 aspect ratio too. | So... a repairable laptop might not be the laptop to get | if you also want the best of everything... for now, at | least... | nrp wrote: | We use a BOE NE135FBM-N41 panel, which you may be able to | find some profiles on from other notebooks. We haven't gotten | a chance to generate profiles just yet ourselves. | bscphil wrote: | Thanks for the response! | | I did find a review of one laptop that used this panel, and | it looks like it's a designed-to-standard 8 bit panel with | pretty much no coverage beyond sRGB, similar to the panels | Apple was putting in MBPs around 2014 or 2015. Support for | HDR (e.g. PQ) shouldn't be expected. | | For what it's worth I'd be very interested in future | upgrades for the screen quality. I'm fine with the current | density (~200 DPI or so), although I know some have | requested 4K screens. The real selling point would be a 10 | bit panel with ST.2084 HDR support and full coverage for | the P3 gamut. Something in line with base model laptops | from Apple. (Obviously, such an upgrade would carry an | understandable price premium.) | jokoon wrote: | How long are you planning to support spare parts? | Volrath89 wrote: | Please please launch this in non-US countries as well | nrp wrote: | We're currently in Canada too, and we plan to start adding | more countries later this year. | Lorin wrote: | How about jobs? Interested in the senior frontend role, are you | open to Canadian candidates? Do we mention HN in the cover | letter? :) | nrp wrote: | Yes! We're hiring across a bunch of roles in development, | marketing, operations, and more: https://jobs.frame.work | | We don't currently have anyone on the team in Canada, but we | are definitely open to it for the right candidate. Please do | mention HN so we know where people are coming from! | emacsen wrote: | From the web site, the selling point seems to be around this | being a "right to repair" laptop. | | What's a bit unclear to me is that it seems the Framework | Laptop is not be under an Open Source license, unlike the | Pinebook Pro, the Librem 14 or the MNT Reform- the MNT being | the most "user serviceable" as well as most repairable. | | Is your laptop fully open source, or if not, what makes it | special or different from these other products? | matt_heimer wrote: | I'm guessing you haven't worked on many laptops. They aren't | meant to be repaired easily in many cases. Want to upgrade | the RAM, you need to upgrade both sticks. One is on the | bottom side of the motherboard that requires 16 screws be | removed and a pry tool to get the bottom case off. The second | stick is under the keyboard that requires multiple levels of | plastic pieces to be pried off and disconnecting the keyboard | cable which can barely be reached. Want to swap the battery? | That's 16 screws and enough force to break the adhesion that | you are bending the case. Plus the system will complain about | the battery if you buy it from the wrong vendor. | | I like open source. I CARE that I have to trash a thousand | dollar laptop because I can't source a replacement keyboard | when the "S" popped off. | | All examples I gave are real life examples which I've | encountered. | ohthehugemanate wrote: | sure, but the examples he gave are all designed to be easy | to service AFAIK. I only have personal experience with a | Pinebook, but it is fantastic. Just one bottom panel for | most access, and one keyboard to remove for the rest. It is | extremely hacker friendly. | | But it's not a powerhouse CPU like this. A rock64 is no | competition for a current generation Intel I5/7 AFAIK. | fmx wrote: | > I can't source a replacement keyboard when the "S" popped | off. | | > All examples I gave are real life examples which I've | encountered. | | Real life for me, too. The S key on my laptop no longer | works. I took apart the keyboard to clean it one day, put | everything back together, it all worked, except one key - | S. Is there something about that specific key or is this | just a weird coincidence? | koyote wrote: | So this would put the Framework laptop into the same | category as a Thinkpad? | | My old (8 years) Thinkpad has had: a new battery, a new | keyboard (orange juice!), a new screen (upgrade!), new RAM, | new HDD and a new charging plug. | | All of the above were very simple with just a couple of | screws to get the back cover off. No adhesive or force | needed. Even the screen simply clipped off. The manual also | comes with instructions on how to dismantle the laptop for | repairs. | | I sourced the OEM parts from eBay. | | The only thing I was not able to change was the Wifi card. | Apparently it's hard-locked to a specific model in the bios | firmware, which I find a bit odd. | nrp wrote: | It actually would put us in a similar category to | Thinkpads from the 2000's and early 2010's, but with | modern hardware, a thin and light form factor, an | upgradeable mainboard, and customizable ports with | Expansion Cards! | koyote wrote: | Fair point, my newer (late 2010s) Thinkpad has soldered | RAM which is a step in the wrong direction, so this is | definitely an interesting product. | vbernat wrote: | LPDDR4 is always soldered. There are Thinkpad with DDR4 | if you prefer. They are usually heavier, thicker and/or | more expensive (pick two). This includes the X1 Extreme | Gen2 or the T14. | hellbannedguy wrote: | I just love hearing customizable ports. I was starting to | think we (the tinkerers) lost war. | emacsen wrote: | I've noticed that you said you're here to answer all | questions, but then you've been selectively not answering | a lot of questions, like mine, and others who ask | pointed, specific questions rather than mostly fluff. | | I buy lots of "gadgets"- a Pinephone, LibreM phone, a | PiTop, 2 MNT Reform laptops, several OLPC XO-1 laptops- | and that's just my current collection (rather than my | older collection of even more obscure hardware of the | past), but you're not offering much in terms of either | being interesting from a social good perspective, nor | from a purely practical perspective ala my Dell XPS13 and | System 76 Lemur. | | I wish you luck, but based just on your HN interactions, | you're occupying a market niche that doesn't really | interest me- that of people who care a _little_ bit about | self-actualization and repair, but not a lot. | Frameworkscr wrote: | Perhaps because the long term prqfmatism js that they | build a viable business first. | | Thr problem with oss is its fanatics. | | (not associated, fake username) | numpad0 wrote: | > Want to upgrade the RAM, you need to upgrade both sticks. | | No. Single channel configuration is slower, unnoticeably on | laptops, that's it. | | > One is on the bottom side of the motherboard that | requires 16 screws be removed and a pry tool to get the | bottom case off. | | Wrong choice of laptop brand. | | > The second stick is under the keyboard that requires | multiple levels of plastic pieces to be pried off and | disconnecting the keyboard cable which can barely be | reached. Want to swap the battery? That's 16 screws and | enough force to break the adhesion that you are bending the | case. Plus the system will complain about the battery | | Again, wrong choice of laptop brand. Panasonic? Theirs are | good as long as you only repair and don't fiddle with it. | solarengineer wrote: | For me, "open source" with respect to hardware would imply | getting the PCB layouts and other such info that would enable | me to modify the electronics and/or produce my own - like a | software "fork". | | The "right to repair" tells me that I would be able to get | replacement parts from 3rd party suppliers. Once upon a time, | Television units also came with the circuit diagrams that | helped third-party repair shops troubleshoot and fix TV | issues. I am not sure if such circuit diagrams would help | with the kind of wave-soldered multi-layered circuit boards | that we have, but it'd be nice to have, I suppose. | emacsen wrote: | That's a good distinction to draw, and certainly clarifies | things in some ways. The line between the two is somewhat | blurry. | | Back in the day you're talking about, components were often | discreet enough that they could be replaced. Today even | something as simple as a capacitor is often difficult to | replace on a modern circuit board due to a variety of | factors. | | Certainly the large companies (Apple in particular) creates | legal barriers to buying chips and other components. I | think the distinction between availability and open source | will be an interesting one to see how it plays out when | hardware is involved. | culopatin wrote: | Do you have a comparison of battery runtime with each config? | nrp wrote: | We've tested MobileMark 2018 at ~11 hours on the Base config, | dropping to ~10 hours on the Professional config (due to more | DRAM). Runtime will always depend on workload though. | culopatin wrote: | It would be awesome if you could provide a more real life | test like the reviewers you gave the laptop to will do. | Having matching claims on your site vs what the reviewers | say can only help your credibility, which is much needed as | a new product. | | If you put 11hs on your site but the average reviewed time | is 4hs, it's not going to look great. | | I know you guys are super busy launching this and there are | a million things to look at, just sharing my opinion as a | consumer. | | The other thing that would be useful to know is a clear | return and warranty policy. The items I buy from Amazon | without much worry are the ones I know I can return easily, | for a product as new and unknown like yours, I'll probably | stand back if I don't know what the return process works | like. | | Thanks for responding! | oldandboring wrote: | Can you estimate an approximate ship date for Batch 2 pre- | orders? | Aachen wrote: | It says right on top of the DIY configure page for me: batch | 2 August, batch 3 September. | oldandboring wrote: | Yes, I know that. I was hoping to see if he could tell at | this point when they would ship with some specificity, eg. | first week in August, end of August, etc. | rasz wrote: | Great, you "somehow" missed my questions last time around. | | >Every module has a QR code on it that you can scan for step- | by-step instructions, support information, and a link to order | a replacement from the Framework Marketplace | | So its a dealer "repair" where you, the dealer, sell me a | repair without the labour part in a form of black box to | replace? | | What about the schematics? the Board files? Firmware? | | Who is the ODM? Compal? Pegatron? Quanta? Clevo? Wistron? | Inventec? Flextronics? | | Did you pay for fully tailor made design? Who else sells a | laptop with the exact same design (ignoring form factor)? You | dont have a single EE listed on staff. What part of the | electrical design do you own? Do you own any part of it at all? | This sure looks like tweaked Acer Swift 3 SF313-53, same ODM? | | Do you own any part of the firmware that goes into the laptop? | Will you be able to patch it? | | "Great Webcam in a Laptop" Thinkpad X1 tablet 2nd gen uses same | OV2740, isnt exactly known for great camera. Optics and ISP | tuning are the important bits. Can you post a demonstration | video instead of one 1mpix picture of a laptop screen at an | angle? | dylan604 wrote: | Are you trying to start your own company off the back of the | research these guys have done? | | I didn't see anything about this company claiming 100% open | source and private consciousness. I thought that was a | different company that never really did anything because of | issues you've asked about. If I'm wrong in that, please | correct me. Certain chips just couldn't use custom open | firmware, so no device was ever going to be 100% open. | | Just seems your questions might be a bit off target. No | wonder you never got a response "the last time around". | nrp wrote: | Apologies for the miss. There were almost 1000 comments on | the last big thread! | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26263508 | | End users have the ability to order replacement parts for | every part of the laptop, down to the granularity of things | like individual flex cables. We've also released reference | CAD under open source licenses for the Expansion Card system | for people to be able to develop their own | (https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/expansioncards). Our | embedded controller firmware is also open source, and we'll | be posting the repository shortly. Full schematics for the | rest of the system are available to independent repair shops | that get Framework hardware in for repair. | | Our main manufacturing partner is Compal, who makes laptops | for many other large US notebook makers. | | Apart from off the shelf modules like the SSD, RAM, WiFi, and | LCD, the Framework Laptop is entirely custom to us, and we | own all of the design and tooling. We don't have an EE on the | team page, but I am actually an electrical engineer by | training (or at least that's what it says on my degree from | Carnegie Mellon), and our systems lead Kieran is an EE by | background as well. | | We own the embedded controller firmware, which is based on | Chromium EC, and we'll be releasing the source soon. We use a | licensed BIOS that we've customized for this go-around, but | we would like to move to an open BIOS in the future. | | Some of the reviewers have positive comments on their hands- | on experience with the webcam. While it won't be at the level | of a standalone plug-in webcam, it is substantially better | than what is available in other notebooks. | pabs3 wrote: | Have you sent your EC patches back to the upstream Chromium | EC project? | nrp wrote: | I don't believe we have yet, but one challenge is that | chromium-ec as a whole is in the process of migrating to | Zephyr. We'll be needing to move over as well. | dang wrote: | > Great, you "somehow" missed my questions last time around. | | Please don't be a jerk in HN comments. Note this site | guideline: " _Assume good faith._ " | | If you wouldn't mind reviewing | https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking | the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be | grateful. | numpad0 wrote: | > Acer Swift 3 SF313-53 | | Wow, does look almost identical, except renders/photos are | showing _keyboard_ for this laptop removed than _bottom case_ | for Acer version. To be fair they don't seem like a huge | ripoff in terms of price though, only ~$300 which is more of | a simple reality of low volume products. | metaphor wrote: | Had to see for myself[1][2]. Seriously...what are you guys | smoking? | | - topside (primary servicing end) | | ...and then there's: | | - frontside (replaceable bezel, magnetic retention) | | - underside (venting pattern, 6 less securing screws) | | - keyboard layout (escape, arrows, tilde, backslash, left | ctrl, delete) | | - power button (location, fingerprint reader integration) | | - peripheral support (modular af, reconfigurable, select | your charger side) | | - camera, mic (integrated lockout) | | - lid opening extruded cut (narrower span) | | - internals (design for maintainability of the highest | order; so different it's not even worth enumerating) | | - documentation (digital first approach, baked onto every | sub-assembly) | | Wish I could get a closer look at the bezel electronics. | What other details did I miss? | | [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-TFTvjIl4o | | [2] https://www.acer.com/ac/en/US/content/series/swift3 | numpad0 wrote: | Mainboard/logicboard is exactly the same. Left side of | the logicboard in the original Acer design is connected | via a flex cable, which is where modularity daughterboard | goes, which means that that part is custom and probably | just a USB-C. | | The main opening being on topside as opposed to bottom | means the enclosure is custom made. So what. | | Overall it's not something that we are smoking, it's | basic understanding in laptops and modern electronics. | nrp wrote: | Apologies, but I don't see it either. | | The internals of that Acer: https://www.notebookcheck.net | /fileadmin/_processed_/e/0/csm_... | | The internals of the Framework Laptop: https://images.pri | smic.io/frameworkmarketplace/df9863d8-4512... | pikrzyszto wrote: | Are there any plans for ECC memory support? | Teever wrote: | 1. What was the sort of reaction to your unorthodox modular | laptop design from the OEMs who are used to making standard | laptop designs? Do OEMs have a preference for making disposable | products or do you think that they see opportunity in making | more modular machines that users can upgrade piece-meal over | years? | | 2. Is there anything hardware wise that would prevent someone | from making an arm based motherboard for this device, or even a | RISCV based motherboard? | nrp wrote: | From our manufacturing partners, there was definite | skepticism at first, but as we worked together it became | immediately clear that what we had proposed was entirely | doable! For consumer electronics brands, I think their | challenge will be the business model shift that comes from | focusing on longevity instead of short replacement cycles. We | have a counter-positioned business model to that! | | Nope, it is entirely doable from a technical perspective to | build an ARM SoC-based mainboard for the Framework Laptop! I | haven't seen a RISC-V SoC that has the necessary interfaces | for it to work well in a laptop yet, but I strongly suspect | that isn't far away. | ivraatiems wrote: | This is a really interesting product. Is there any hope of | onboard graphics being an option in the future? How upgradable | are the CPUs/motherboards? | nrp wrote: | It's unlikely we'll add discrete graphics in this form | factor, but integrated graphics is actually much better than | it has been in the past (e.g. Overwatch and GTA:V can run at | 60fps), and there is also support for eGPUs. | | We've designed the mainboard to be end-user replaceable for | upgrades, and we'll be developing new ones for future CPU | platforms as we go. | fragileone wrote: | How is the eGPU support? I had to get a 2018 Dell XPS with | 4 PCIe lane Thunderbolt 3 support since the 2017 version | had only 2 PCIe lanes dedicated to TB3. | ivraatiems wrote: | Thanks for the quick answer! Any thought of a larger form- | factor model eventually? | nrp wrote: | There's nothing we can say yet, but we're not done with | our mission! | nrp wrote: | I am out of question-answering time for the day, but will | respond tomorrow to anything new that comes up. Thanks everyone | for the thoughtful questions, interest in what we're building, | and belief in our mission! | BoysenberryPi wrote: | 2 questions: | | 1. Have you sent review copies to any independent review | channels like LTT, Gamers Nexus, etc etc? I've seen the Tested | video but that was in a very controlled environment and I'm | mainly waiting on independent reviews before buying one. | | 2. More of a business question that I'll understand if you | don't want to answer, without sharing any actual numbers, has | the preorder volume been more or less than you expected? | COGlory wrote: | There is an LTT review up on floatplane. Presumably it will | go to YouTube soon. The long short of it is Linus loves it | and purchases his own. | LilBytes wrote: | Is there? I can't see it :-/ Edit: My mistake, look for "A | completely upgradeable laptop?" | nrp wrote: | Yes! We can't pre-announce anyone's reviews, but we have sent | review units out to a few of the big tech review YouTube | channels. | | The pre-order volume has been roughly in line with our | expectations. The one big surprise for us was just how much | more popular the Framework Laptop DIY Edition is than the | pre-built Framework Laptop. We expected some preference from | early adopters, but it's actually multiples of volume. | TimTheTinker wrote: | > The one big surprise for us was just how much more | popular the Framework Laptop DIY Edition is than the pre- | built Framework Laptop. | | I'd suggest the reason is primarily that it's a lot more | configurable -- people can get closer to their ideal | feature set for the least spend (if only by not paying for | Windows if they just want Linux). | thereddaikon wrote: | PC World posted a teardown video last night. It makes working | on any other laptop look like a chore. | peregrine wrote: | Any plans for AMD or ARM processor options? The amd ryzen stuff | has nearly good performance per watt that the M1 does. I really | can't see myself buying another intel processor for at least a | few generations. | nrp wrote: | Noted in other comments, but we have designed the mainboard | to be replaceable and upgradeable by the end user to new CPU | platforms. We haven't announced anything yet, but this is a | core part of the design and architecture of the product. | ChuckNorris89 wrote: | You seem to be misinformed. | | Everyone loves to hate Intel (and rightfully so) but Tiger | Lake has better IPC and implicitly better single threaded | performance than Ryzen. In real world tasks (web browsing, | opening an IDE) it often comes on top of AMD. | | It only loses to AMD in multi threaded benchmarks because of | the lower core count (everyone loves to flex Cinebench scores | online, but I buy my laptop to use, not run benchmarks). | | Also, the iGPU in Tiger Lake is more modern and more powerful | than the outdated Vega iGPU in Ryzen and it also has AV1 | codec hardware decoding unlike Ryzen which is stuck at VP9. | | Add in Thunderbolt support and using Tiger Lake makes perfect | sense for this form factor. Ryzen shines best in gaming | laptops with discrete GPUs. | Const-me wrote: | > In real world tasks (web browsing, opening an IDE) | | My real-world task is not opening an IDE, it's using that | IDE. Modern C++ compilers are using all available CPU cores | just fine. | | > It only loses to AMD in multi threaded benchmarks | | These are the only workloads I care about. Not just | compilation, many other things as well. | | You only need single-threaded performance for 2 things, for | the stuff that's inherently serial like gzip, or to run | programs made more than 5-10 years ago. | | I don't normally play games on a laptop, but even | videogames use multiple cores for decades now, since the | Xbox 360 / PS3 generation. | MikusR wrote: | Also web is still single threaded. | rvanlaar wrote: | What do you mean by that? | | Firefox and Chrome both have gpu hardware acceleration, | and different threads/processes for UI and webpages. | scns wrote: | Javascript is parsed and executed on one core. | littlestymaar wrote: | If you have just one tab, with a simple webpage with no | iframe, yes. But this use-case is handled even by a | first-gen Raspberry Pi. | | Once you start having several tas open, or web pages with | different iframes, modern browsers put those in different | processes. | Const-me wrote: | Indeed, but web is not computationally expensive. Even | old computers like my laptop with i3-6157u CPU handle web | just fine. | rvanlaar wrote: | For gzip, try pigz. It's the parallel version of it. | | I used to want high single core performance for my python | code. I've since switched to using VSCode with | devcontainers which run remotely on my 5950x. That makes | it fast enough ;-). | loufe wrote: | > You only need single-threaded performance for 2 things, | for the stuff that's inherently serial like gzip, or to | run programs made more than 5-10 years ago. | | You must not be grand strategy game players. Any titles | from Paradox and some other popular games are all limited | by single core IPC. They are a great example of the | limits of multi-threading, some processes and problems | cannot be adapted to take advantage of it. If I get such | a laptop I'd spend 50% of the time I use it playing such | games. | Const-me wrote: | > They are a great example of the limits of multi- | threading | | These are examples of lazy programmers and PC-only games. | Consoles have many cores for decades and these cores are | slower than PCs, developers of cross-platform titles have | embraced multithreading for quite some time now. | | Multithreading does have limits. Some things are | borderline impossible to parallelize, examples include | gzip, streaming encryption algorithms, or parsing long | streams of HTML and JavaScript. However, vast majority of | the CPU-bound stuff found in videogames scales just fine | with CPU cores. | sjogress wrote: | I must say the Framework laptop is a very enticing offering! | | Do you plan on offering it in Scandinavia with Scandinavian | keyboard layouts? | nrp wrote: | We do have artwork ready for several Scandinavian keyboard | layouts. The actual timing for each county will be later this | year or next year. | base698 wrote: | Where is mine? | G3rn0ti wrote: | Where do I get all drivers required when I decide to install | Windows myself buying the DIY version? | nrp wrote: | We have a link to the driver bundle at the end of the Windows | installation guide: https://guides.frame.work/Guide/Windows+1 | 0+Installation+on+t... | schmorptron wrote: | Hey! Love the entire concept behind it. That being said, for | mass-adoption and a large parts "ecosystem", do you guys | anticipate you'll be able to get the initial price for the | laptop down in the future with either cheaper casing materials | or after recouping the initial R&D cost for the custom | motherboard design and such? | | It's totally understandable that the first product from a | rather small company would demand some sort of higher price, | your initial investment into R&D and product design & | manufacturing must've been huge! But is this something we can | expect to get a bit better in the future? | nrp wrote: | The base price for a new system will likely stay in this | range, barring future lower-end mainboards like one using an | ARM SoC. However, one thing that will help on cost of entry | in the future is refurbished and used Framework Laptops. | Since the product is easy to repair and upgrade, we want to | foster a healthy secondary market. | | We don't want anyone to put an old Framework Laptop that they | are not using into a drawer and forget about it. We want to | get them to list it on the Framework Marketplace to find | another happy user. | schmorptron wrote: | Alright, thanks for the answer! | pzo wrote: | Some idea about considering other option as well. Would be | great to buy your motherboard (original with some adapter | or completely differently designed) that would fit into old | macbooks or thinkpads - this way people could reuse case, | keyboard, touchpad and maybe even battery or screen. | TreeInBuxton wrote: | If you ever do start doing bringup of an Arm SoC, drop me | an email (in my profile) - I work on an internal BSP team | at Arm and would be happy to (unofficially) assist | rogers18445 wrote: | How many monitors can you plug into the laptop given the | appropriate number of modules? Unlikely to be 4, but is it at | least 2 or hopefully 3? | arendtio wrote: | It probably depends on resolution and refresh rate, so you | might want to add some details. | nrp wrote: | You can run 4 4k 60hz monitors simultaneously if you turn | off the internal display, or three if you keep the internal | display on. The maximum external display resolution is 8k | 60hz, but you can't run multiple of those. | arendtio wrote: | Sounds cool. | | I have a Lenovo Thinkpad T490 which struggles to drive | two 4k displays at reasonable refresh rates. 4k60 + 4k30 | is the best I was able to achieve so far (via Thunderbolt | and an additional HDMI cable). | busymom0 wrote: | This is outstanding. One question - | | I really wish there was a way to remove the camera as well as | microphone (if there's any built in). Is that possible? | nrp wrote: | We have hardware kill switches for both the camera and the | microphone. You can actually also remove that module entirely | if you'd like. We published a guide on how to replace the | webcam (so you would just stop after the removal steps): http | s://guides.frame.work/Guide/Webcam+Replacement+Guide/87?... | fsflover wrote: | Consider Librem 14 laptop instead, it has hardware kill | switches. By the way, I wish this laptop had them too. | nrp wrote: | Good news! We do have hardware kill switches for both the | camera and microphone: https://frame.work/blog/1080p-webcam | fsflover wrote: | Amazing, thank you! | ghego1 wrote: | Thank you for this! I love the colored bezels, even if it's not | much, it's one of those little things that make a difference. | | Any plans to sell in Europe (Italy)? | nrp wrote: | Yes. We have the necessary certifications for Europe, and are | working through setting up keyboard languages, fulfillment, | support, and everything else we will need to have to be | successful there. | modernerd wrote: | Great to hear! Checkout page request: please make it so you | can buy a different keyboard than your shipping | address/locale, in case that's not already on your roadmap. | | Apple/Lenovo let you spec an "English International" (ISO) | keyboard even if you're shipping to Germany/Austria, for | example, so that you're not forced to buy QWERTZ. | stkdump wrote: | Does the extra connector reduce the quality of the USB-C | signal? I am asking because my current notebook seems already a | bit flaky with a 4K 60Hz display connected via USB-C, | especially with an extra docking station in between. DP and | HDMI directly from the notebook seem a bit more stable. | nrp wrote: | There is a small amount of signal loss from the extra | connector pair. This is normally fine, but if your | monitor+cable situation is already flaky, there is | potentially risk there. We would recommend picking up a cable | designed to higher protocol standards or using a shorter | cable if you see issues. | luckystarr wrote: | Any plans to "open up" (for a price) the specification for | outside companies, so they can build components labeled | "framework compatible" or some such? | nrp wrote: | Absolutely. We've already released open source reference | designs publicly for the Expansion Card system, and we're | happy to enable third parties on other modules too. | skykooler wrote: | What about the cover with the keyboard and trackpad?I know | you've said it's expensive to make tooling for, but perhaps | a 3rd party could offer an alternate version with a | trackpoint or something? | geophile wrote: | Why a 3:2 display? That is an extremely odd choice. I used 4:3 | displays for years, and was very pleased when wider displays | became available. | vngzs wrote: | I _love_ 3:2 displays. They 're wider than 4:3 but maintain | the vertical height necessary to see a bunch of code | onscreen. If I only get one display (for portable use), I'll | pick 3:2 every day. | bitL wrote: | 3:2 is great for coding. I've just started using 3:2 Zenbook | S UX393 3300x2200 and that screen ratio is phenomenal! | ghosty141 wrote: | The trend is going that way again. 16:10/3:2 is becoming very | common again and that's great! The extra screen real estate | is very useful and the body can accomodate a bigger touchpad. | 16:9 limts vertical space a little too much imo. | binarycrusader wrote: | Why not? Microsoft Surface devices also have a 3:2 display. | Personally I love 3:2 displays as vertical space makes for a | far more pleasant experience programming and reading. | nrp wrote: | Yep! The better experience for writing and coding with more | vertical real estate is why we chose it. It also gave us a | better form factor to work with for enabling our Expansion | Card system. | timwaagh wrote: | What kind of premium do you ask vs a reasonably priced brand | like Acer? | Dracophoenix wrote: | 1) What are the chances of a 15.6 inch version with a numpad or | should I not hold my breath? | | 2) Are dGPUs expected in the this or an upcoming version? | | 3) Color options other than white? | | 4a) Does the keyboard use low-profile Cherry switches or | something else? (Edited) | | 4b) Are the keys backlit? (Edited) | | 5) ETA on TB4 ports? | | 6) Is there a 99Wh battery for the laptop? | nrp wrote: | 1) We can't announce anything yet, but our current 13.5" | Framework Laptop will certainly not be the last product we | ever build! | | 2) See question 1. | | 3) We've designed the bezel to be color customizable, and | there are some photos of orange and white ones on our | website. We'll be adding more colors as we go. For the | chassis itself, it is anodized aluminum. We don't currently | have plans for additional aluminum colors though. | | 4) We have a custom keyboard with 1.5mm key travel scissor | switches, which is longer key travel than most other <16mm | notebooks. | | 5) We can't announce anything on Thunderbolt compatibility | until we complete certifications, so keep a look out for | that. | | 6) The internal battery is 55Wh. | rsyring wrote: | I bought six of these laptops for myself and my team, | mostly to support your efforts. FWIW: | | 1) I'd like a 15.6" version | | 2) Without a keypad...don't throw off the symmetry of | keyboard and touchpad | | 3) bigger battery | | Keep up the good work! I'd love to be using these laptops | 15 years from now. | nrp wrote: | Thanks! We hope you're using them 15 years from now too! | | We can't say anything about future product plans yet, but | our current laptop is not the last product we'll build! | skavi wrote: | Could the current model have TB4 enabled via software? Is | everything there on the hardware side? | nrp wrote: | We have the hardware for it, but until we can complete | certification, we can't claim Thunderbolt compatibility. | jsmith45 wrote: | I suppose what this really means is that you have USB4 | with support for the optional PCIE tunneling, and support | for the slightly higher frequency alternative mode, which | is generally enough to function with peripherals labeled | as Thunderbolt, since it is literally exactly the same | protocol. | | Somewhat obnoxious that you need additional certification | to actually call it what it obviously is. | Dracophoenix wrote: | I edited the 4th question. Hopefully you see and answer 4b! | Thanks for answering my other questions. I'll certainly be | looking forward to your product as more information and | metrics materialize. | nrp wrote: | Yep! The keys are backlit. | abledon wrote: | I love how you are actually mentioning the 1.5mm key | travel.... on so many other laptop review sites, and | manufacturer sites, they don't list the key travel. It is | infuriating when shopping for laptops. | | To hear it has a generous 1.5mm is awesome, i'll definitely | be keeping an eye on it in the near future for the 15" | version. | rvanlaar wrote: | I'm wondering about 5, thunderbolt. | | I now use a lenovo X1 thinkpad and use an external GPU to | drive 2 4K monitors. The internal Intel UHD 620 just can't | handle. | | Is the intel Xe graphics enough to handle this? If so, | thunderbolt would be a nice to have, but not a requirement. | tomComb wrote: | I find numpad throws off the alignment of the keyboard | relative to the touchpad and to the weight of the device. You | clearly want a numpad, but I would suggest most users should | avoid them, particularly if the will use the laptop on their | lap. | dylan604 wrote: | I would love to have a 10-key option, and to that end I | have attempted using a wireless option. That device however | won't even pair to my laptop. I would even be willing to | use a wired one, but not enough of me to make it viable for | someone to make. So many shortcut keys in my software are | missing for a laptop keyboard. Instead, I have to use a | full sized external keyboard and carry it around with me | instead of just a useful smaller external 10-key. | winthrowe wrote: | What about a hex numpad? IPv6Buddy is a real shipping | product, according to their longstanding website. | dylan604 wrote: | LOL, i've never heard of this thing before. However that | is not useful even as a gag. | Dracophoenix wrote: | What model of keyboard do you carry with you? | dylan604 wrote: | The full sized Mac USB keyboard | gilbertbw wrote: | I might be understanding, but is something like this | https://kinesis-ergo.com/products/#keypads what you're | looking for? | dylan604 wrote: | almost, but i'd really love to have the home/end keys as | well | kitsunesoba wrote: | Fully agreed, for me, with any size of laptop the presence | of an integrated numpad is a real nuisance due to how it | awkward it makes typing and trackpad usage. | | That said, there are times when numpads are useful. That's | why on my desktop, I have a discrete numpad sitting to the | left of my keyboard, which allows the most used keys to | remain centered. | | It would be neat if someone made a numpad module for these | laptops that can plug into either side of the laptop, and | then be tucked away when not in use. The little rails in | the module bays should make typing on the numpad almost as | solid as typing on the main keyboard. | blacktriangle wrote: | This is so important. I bought a laptop with a numpad | thinking it would be a huge win for spreadsheet jockying, | ended up never using the laptop due to how much of a | nightmare it is to type on due to the keyboard being | offcenter. Numpads on laptops are just failure. | mrleinad wrote: | Any plans for a different keyboard layout? I see you have | planned for different languages, but I didn't see different | layouts. | nrp wrote: | We currently have ANSI and ISO layouts for languages, and JIS | coming soon. Within this form factor, those are likely what | we are limited to. | rgoulter wrote: | How feasible do you think an ortholinear layout would be? | nrp wrote: | It is technically possible, but the cost of custom | tooling for it would be unfortunately be astronomical | relative to the number that we could reasonably sell. At | some point in the future as we continue to grow the | Framework Laptop install base, we'd love to revisit that | though! | Rd6n6 wrote: | Not really a question, but if you one day offered a thicker | version with the option of an extended battery and more key | travel, that would be exciting | Foomf wrote: | Any plans on a model with a touchscreen? If this could have a | touchscreen, I'd buy it in an instant! | nrp wrote: | We designed the display interface to be able to support a | touchscreen, and we've designed the display to be easy to | replace, but we don't have a touchscreen yet! | Frameworkscr wrote: | Perhapa just kike the initial announcement post- list out | all the replacements in piepeline so people wont ask "any | plans for this optjon" | Elvar wrote: | Why are there not a Linux version? Hate to pay for Windows, | that i won't be using anyway. | bmsleight_ wrote: | Customise the order and there is an bring your own OS option. | gradstudent wrote: | It's a shame it's not an option for the preconfigured | version. Especially as the DIY Laptop pricing has Windows | 10 at ~$200. | jagged-chisel wrote: | > You can also load your own operating system later, like a | Linux distribution. | | Yeah, but I'd rather not pay for that Windows license. | | Edit: Oh, I see that you have to DIY the entire laptop in | order to NOT select a Windows OS. | nrp wrote: | That is correct, DIY Edition comes without an OS | installed or an OS license (though you can add a Windows | license). | | We've made the setup process for the DIY Edition really | straightforward, and we think kind of fun too: https://gu | ides.frame.work/Guide/Framework+Laptop+DIY+Edition... | ajot wrote: | Do you have any other keyboard + pointing device design in | mind? I've read sibling comments about trackpoint and numpad, | but what about a 7-row keyboard and/or a smaller trackpad with | real buttons for clicking? Is this possible? Do you see there's | a market for it? | nrp wrote: | The cover that the keyboard and touchpad install into is the | limiting factor. The tooling for that part is extremely | expensive, so we only have one version of it. We have the | ability to install ANSI, ISO, and JIS keyboard layouts with | any language in the artwork, but we can't change the keyboard | or touchpad geometry beyond that without shelling out big | money for a new cover. | | A touchpad with buttons is something we believe could fit in | the existing cover though, and something we want to explore | more when we have time. | Liskni_si wrote: | +1 | | The current keyboard is not really fit to be used as a | primary keyboard. A proper 7-row keyboard with full-sized | arrows is really a must for people who use laptop keyboards | as their main daily driver. Here's a picture of what one | looks like: https://imgur.com/Epo5kBw | | Please make something like that possible! | rarspace01 wrote: | When can I expect a German Keyboard? | Seirdy wrote: | One of the biggest causes of (un)planned obsolescence, if not | the biggest cause, is an end to firmware and microcode updates. | Once they stop coming in, vulnerabilities start piling up. | | For how many years can consumers expect to receive these | updates? | nrp wrote: | For the firmware we control, there is relatively little | surface area and it is easy for us to continue to maintain. | For the firmware that is delivered or embedded by Intel, | we're in the same boat as everyone else using the same CPUs. | OJFord wrote: | Can you give the roughest of indications for European orders | (UK for me, if it's going to be that granular)? I've been | signed up to the mailing list to be notified since first post | here, really looking forward to it; I've been tempted to use | Canadian pre-order via a favour ever since that opened up, but | should I just be patient, will it be 'soon'? | | Do you anticipate that (if this goes as well as I hope and | assume it will/is) a v2 model would have an upgrade path from | 'v1' (as it were, that for pre-order/sale now) - i.e. buy new | case, new motherboard (or whatever) and it's effectively the | same as if you bought the new one? Or have you accepted/do you | think that not _all_ parts can be fully modular and | independently saleable? | nrp wrote: | We're aiming to be in the UK, parts of Europe, and parts of | Asia by year's end. | | We plan to keep compatible within the current chassis for the | foreseeable future. This means that as we support new CPU | platforms, existing users can upgrade to them by replacing | their mainboard (and in some cases memory). | pmorici wrote: | Will there be a version that you can use a 2.5" drive with? | baybal2 wrote: | Who is manufacturing it? Did you pick a single contractor, or | separate companies make separate modules? | nrp wrote: | I noted in another comment that we partnered with Compal as | our main manufacturer, as they are one of the strongest | notebook manufacturers currently and they believe in our | mission. | | For many of the other modules, we've partnered with other | manufacturers specialized in different areas. We have a | series of technical deep dive blog posts where we go into | each: https://frame.work/blog/framework-laptop-deep-divethe- | touchp... | baybal2 wrote: | How do you connect the keyboard? | | I see the cable from the keyboard in the upper lid not | going directly to the main PCB, but first to the same board | as the touchpad. Is there some IC scanning the keyboard | right in the keyboard module, and turning it to something | like usb or i2c? | nrp wrote: | The touchpad PCB acts as a passive signal passthrough for | both the keyboard and the fingerprint reader, so that we | can have a single cable going from the Input Cover to the | mainboard. | dbeley wrote: | Hope it succeeds, the HN-crowd is obviously very tacky and | already know some well established alternatives (used thinkpads, | librem laptops, pinebook, MNT reform) that may be even better for | a niche audience (open hardware, no management engine, trackpoint | option, etc.), hence the criticism. | | But marketed directly to the people that buy all the "normal" | laptops out there, it could be a great success. | freeopinion wrote: | Still no Ryzen option? Pass. | andrepd wrote: | Shame it has no AMD configs, and also that I can't buy it without | Windows. | Karsteski wrote: | Check the DIY edition, you can get it without paying for the | windows license there | kyledrake wrote: | There really needs to be an option to include Linux or even just | no OS. It's really frustrating to have to pay the Microsoft tax | for something that's supposed to give me a choice and modularity. | [deleted] | md2020 wrote: | There is in the DIY option, but I agree it'd be nice to have | the Linux/no OS option in the pre-built as well. | g_delgado14 wrote: | You can choose "bring your own / no OS" option when you build | your own. | kup0 wrote: | I really, REALLY hope this takes off. This would be my ideal | laptop | Zachsa999 wrote: | Damn once saw the swappable ports I suddenly needed a new laptop. | Anyone want to buy a 1yo thinkpad? | chana_masala wrote: | If you're sincere - what are the specs? | lyptt wrote: | Shame it's not shipping to the UK yet. Hopefully it does soon. | mixmastamyk wrote: | This is awesome but Windows? Should ship with Linux option, it | isn't hard. Other nitpicks: | | - USB C Module should have two ports at least. | | - Ports in the back, who wants a monitor cable sticking out the | side? No one does this anymore. | | - Waiting for larger screen. | | Props for 3:2 screen and modules. | whitepaint wrote: | Oh man, I really hope you guys have a huge success. | 0235005 wrote: | Great! I hope you all the best. I know it's kind of a generic | comment but I've been waiting so long for a computer like this, I | really hope that your crush the market | nrp wrote: | Thanks! It really is long overdue, and we've seen a ton of | enthusiasm from folks who have been waiting for this. It's all | the more strange that laptops are so locked down, since desktop | PCs are one of the few remaining consumer product categories | where repair, upgrade, and customization are the norm. | colordrops wrote: | The DIY form jumps around after each selection is made, at least | on mobile. Not fatal, but quite annoying. | nrp wrote: | Thanks for the report! We'll dig into it. | colordrops wrote: | More detail: It takes a couple seconds for the selection to | register, and if you scroll after tapping but before it | registers, it scrolls back to your original position. | nrp wrote: | Thanks! It turns out this was on our backlog, but we had | deprioritized solving it. With the massive amount of | traffic on the site today, the slowness makes it much | easier to hit. We're reprioritizing fixing it. | naturalauction wrote: | Very specific question but how much is a replacement screen and | can you do the repair yourself with just a screwdriver? I've | somehow broken my screen twice with each of my last two laptops | and at least for the MacBook, screen replacements were like $400 | a pop. | nrp wrote: | You can replace the screen with just a screwdriver (in fact, | the screwdriver we include in the box with every Framework | Laptop). We haven't set pricing for this replacement module | yet, but our general philosophy around repair part pricing is | to make it the obvious choice to do the repair. | | Edit: This is actually one of the guides we published recently: | https://guides.frame.work/Guide/Display+Replacement+Guide/86... | Teknoman117 wrote: | Is there any public documentation about the expansion card | interface? Is it USB 3 or Thunderbolt or something custom? The | storage expansion card says it's using USB 3.2. | deathanatos wrote: | > _We designed the adapter to be modular, with both the 1m AC | cable and 2m USB-C cable detachable and replaceable, reducing | waste in case your cat chews through one of them._ | | Thank you. This is one of my chief annoyances with Lenovo's | connector, and it smacks of planned obsolescence, since there is | no other conceivable reason for it. I think every brick I've had | has failed in the same spot: between the connector and cord at | the laptop, which, of course, is the non-replaceable cable. | chrisseaton wrote: | Isn't this exactly the same as Apple's design? | rsynnott wrote: | -ish; the Apple one no longer comes with an AC extension, | though you can still get them and attach them. | nrp wrote: | Yes! It seemed pretty obvious to us that this is the right way | to go. Keeping the AC cable removable is also nice for | international travel, since IEC C5 cables for different AC plug | types are extremely inexpensive. | stefandesu wrote: | Our cat likes to chew on cables if we're not careful, and he | has already destroyed multiple cables including one older Apple | MacBook charger which costs like $80 to replace if bought from | Apple. | selykg wrote: | Been there... I try really hard to keep the cables hidden so | she can't see them, and my office is a no fly zone for her. | So far so good. But she's ruined something like $300-400 | worth of cables. Worse is the risk of fire or electrocution | that bothers me. | paxys wrote: | Any plans to sell one without a Windows license? If I bought one | I'd immediately format it and run Linux, so would be nice to not | have to pay the ~$100 extra. | wayneftw wrote: | Yes, they already do that. You can pre-order it that way if you | wish. | paxys wrote: | All 3 options available on their website right now come with | Windows. | wayneftw wrote: | Start configuring from the DIY edition. | nrp wrote: | Here's a link to the Framework Laptop DIY Edition, which | defaults to no operating system: | https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition | COGlory wrote: | They already do. The DIY edition.. | gnull wrote: | Is there a possibility to install more exotic peripherals like 4g | modem (or a smartcard slot)? I don't see them mentioned anywhere, | but I'd expect a hackable laptop to have these. | cl3misch wrote: | The concept sounds more like "user serviceable" than "hackable" | to me. | | But still, knowing the physical dimensions of the slot and | having the USB-C port itself providing retention, it should be | straightforward for 3rd parties to design more peripherals. | swalsh wrote: | Super disapointed. Just a few weeeks ago I bought a macbook pro | with an M1 from Apple, it's kind of the default choice at the | moment. I love the concept of this laptop so much though. If it | was available when I was making my choice, I would have seriously | considered it as an option. | okamiueru wrote: | I would think apple products are the antithesis to the | Framework laptop. How can you go from the M1 being "the default | choice", and being disappointed that this wasn't a possibility? | Wouldn't there have been a myriad of other choices closer to | the Framework laptop, than the M1? | swalsh wrote: | It's a love/hate relationship. I hate the closed nature of | Apple, but it's a superior build quality. | | This laptop looks like it offers both. | okamiueru wrote: | I see. I suppose that might make sense. I would personally | trust the ThinkPads to have higher build quality than a | non-battle tested new brand. | | But, then again, I would also consider the ability to | change a faulty part as part of the build quality equation, | and as such rank apple products much further down than | most. | thefr0g wrote: | Are there other companies doing similiar projects? This is a good | step in the right direction but there are some major drawbacks | for me: | | - 3:2 screen makes the laptop bigger and adds space thats pretty | much useless except for video editing I guess | | - No option without camera, mic and fingerprint reader | | - Intel CPU | | - Thin instead of robust | | - American company | Karsteski wrote: | I had a surface pro throughout university and I found 3:2 to be | perfect for productivity. Also it's nice to be able to see more | code if you're into that. | | Why don't you like that they are American? | thefr0g wrote: | > Also it's nice to be able to see more code if you're into | that. | | I guess that depends on font scaling but if there is code | that long there is usually something wrong with it :D | | I like to have views side by side but the 3:2 doesn't really | help with that either (at least for code on 13") | | > Why don't you like that they are American? | | That usually complicates payment and shipping (at least with | smaller companies) plus I don't really like (indirectly) | supporting a government that thinks human rights are for | citizens only. | throwuxiytayq wrote: | The fact that it has a 3:2 screen makes me IMMENSLY happy. Hope | they manage to eat up some of the MS Surface userbase. | anoncow wrote: | Is the webcam upgradable? | nrp wrote: | We've designed it to be easy to replace: | https://guides.frame.work/Guide/Webcam+Replacement+Guide/87?... | | We don't currently have any plans for a new version of that | module, but it would be upgradeable if we did in the future. | victor9000 wrote: | I've never dealt with captured case screws before, what happens | if the screws get stripped? Is there a way to swap them out? | nrp wrote: | We use a T5 bit to make it really hard to strip, but in the | event it ever does, you can remove the fasteners with a bit of | effort and probably another tool to apply force to get the | thread to bite. | mindcrime wrote: | Really happy to see this news. I hope these folks succeed. I'd | order one right now if I hadn't just bought a new System76 | machine a month or so ago. | | Still, if I can find some free disposable cash anytime soon, I | might order one anyway, just to support the concept and to have a | spare machine. I'm sure I could use an extra machine for | something-or-other. | liminalsunset wrote: | Does Framework [the company] offer, or plan to offer internship | opportunities for students at any point? As a student, I would | love to have the ability to work at a company like Framework that | is innovating for a good cause. | nrp wrote: | When job offers were getting rescinded in summer 2020, we | opened up an internship and brought in an awesome firmware | intern. We didn't have the bandwidth this summer for interns | (and the job market is much better), but it is something we'll | do again in the future. | anentropic wrote: | I think I like the 3:2 aspect even more than the modularity! | filereaper wrote: | Any idea if we/when we can get a Ryzen based models? | | Ryzens have higher thread-counts and Vega Graphics outperforms | Iris graphics. | | If this can be paired with Thunderbolt, I'd be super happy to | purchase this laptop. | | The idea of swappable ports is great! Why not make a large 17" | model with desktop components and even more ports? | truth_ wrote: | I would really like an AMD version, too. | | Buying Intel makes no sense now. | speedgoose wrote: | My Intel i9 gaming laptop is pretty good to keep food warm or | dry my hair. | vngzs wrote: | Ryzen tends to get better battery too. I read an article | complaining about high temperatures and bad battery life, both | of which tend to be significantly better on AMD hardware. | Honestly, it's the only thing keeping me from ordering one | today. | waynesonfire wrote: | great design. looks like the 2015 mac book pro. i'll continue to | use mine until the wheels fall off. | mateuszf wrote: | I wonder about the software though. - What kind | of BIOS does it have? - Does it support coreboot? - | Can Intel Management Engine be disabled? | | I was looking for something similar recently and have found | StarBook MK V - https://starlabs.systems/pages/starbook. | | It supports coreboot and has most of Intel Management Engine | voided. | | It's repairability looks good too: > Open | warranty. Laptops designed for open-source software need open | warranties. Our 1-year limited warranty allows you to take your | laptop apart, replace parts, install an upgrade, use any | operating system and even your own firmware, all without voiding | the warranty. | user_agent wrote: | Regardless of the questions stated, thank you for mentioning | Starlabs Systems, @mateuszf. I'll be looking for an Intel-ME- | free laptop during my next purchase and I had no idea about | that particular project. | jonatron wrote: | Ctrl+f for the first two questions | mateuszf wrote: | Ok, seems that the BIOS is proprietary, but they're planning | to support coreboot in future. | tablespoon wrote: | https://frame.work/products/laptop | | > Display | | > 13.5" 3:2 | | > 2256x1504, 100% sRGB color gamut, and >400 nit | | I approve. | sinsterizme wrote: | The pluggable expansion card (usb, hdmi, storage, etc.) feature | is SUCH a great idea! Great work, and congrats on the milestone | squarefoot wrote: | This is fantastic! The pluggable module concept makes it even | more appealing. I can easily see a lot of development going in | modules for various tasks (multi i/o audio/midi card, A/D signal | analyzer/scope front end, LoRa transceiver, ECG analog interface, | etc.) so that "only" 4 ports might one day even become a | limitation. Seriously considering one. They will need to arrange | with some resellers in the EU however, or shipping+import taxes | could make it too costly. | mkoryak wrote: | There is a bug on their configuration website where you get to | the step with all the expansion cards and you get kicked out back | to the main site. | | I wonder how many sales they are losing | fmx wrote: | Speaking of website bugs, whenever I change any options on | https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy- | edition/configuration/edit it reloads a page, scrolling to the | top. Probably not something that would stop me from buying if I | was going to, but annoying nonetheless. | blunte wrote: | Great initiative, but who decided to put the user-hostile | return/backslash keys together? Key gaps exist for a reason, and | it's especially important on certain keys. | smorrebrod wrote: | I believe this is to accomodate for ISO layouts. They build one | chassis which is compatible ANSI and ISO. | novok wrote: | Pretty exciting! | | A few questions: | | Why are the higher end cpu options so much more when the price | difference is only about $100 according to intel and they all | have the same core count? Do you plan to offer 6 core or more | versions? AMD zen 3 or 4? Im guessing you will release a version | with 12th cpus in the future? | | Will you have a version with two m.2 storage slots and maybe a | bigger battery? A version with lpddr5 in the board? | | Are the usbc slots also thunderbolt 3 or 4 slots like a macbook | pro? How is egpu support? | eplanit wrote: | Godspeed to framework! When you have a linux version I'll buy | one. | nrp wrote: | We currently have the Framework Laptop DIY Edition, which ships | with no OS installed. We're in the process of writing guides | for Ubuntu 21.04 (works out of the box except fingerprint) and | Fedora 34 (works entirely out of the box on the latest re-spin | images!). | eplanit wrote: | Great! Thank you. | arendtio wrote: | I really like the replaceable USB-C ports. From my smartphone I | know, these things wear-off when being used multiple times per | day and being able to simply replace them is much more useful | than it might look like at first sight. | Aachen wrote: | I hear this a lot but only from people with USB-C. Sure, on | occasion you'd also hear someone who broke their mobile micro- | USB or even USB-A laptop ports, but usually that was from | bending the connector accidentally if I remember correctly. | | As someone with zero problems finding the correct orientation | (it's both tactile _and_ visual) who is in the market for a new | phone, makes me wonder if I should look for one with micro-USB | again. Replacing that port sounds like hell, and I use devices | at least 4 years so if C is prone to wearing I 'd definitely | have to. | eric__cartman wrote: | Personally I've had more micro-USB connectors and cables fail | than USB-C. Maybe it's just luck, but USB-C has been | extremely reliable in my experience. | arendtio wrote: | Micro USB was definitely worse than USB-C. | | For context: I am someone who still has a 9 years old | smartphone in use (not exclusively). So for the normal 24 | months usage the connectors might suffice, but I prefer | solutions which are either easily replaceable or hold longer | like wireless charging for example. | jdc0589 wrote: | im on year two with a USB-c phone and the only issue I have | is having to pick pocket lint out of it every couple of | months. | dang wrote: | Past related threads: | | _Framework Laptop - How ALL laptops should be made_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27925405 - July 2021 (5 | comments) | | _Framework Laptop - pre-orders are now open_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143545 - May 2021 (16 | comments) | | _Framework Laptop pre-orders are open, starting at $999_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143076 - May 2021 (203 | comments) | | _Preparing for Pre-Orders! (Framework modular laptop)_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27052468 - May 2021 (79 | comments) | | _The Framework Laptop_ - | https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26263508 - Feb 2021 (991 | comments) | ilrwbwrkhv wrote: | Inverted t missing | Frameworkscr wrote: | Hello there, mr creator nrp-- if ThinkPad durability were 10, how | many points would you give yourself? | | Thanks for taking the risk and creating this. | nrp wrote: | I guess it would vary depending on the model of ThinkPad, but | in general we follow the equivalent reliability test standards | to what other laptop makers use for their premium models (e.g. | the drop height and surface, hinge cycle count, etc). | queuebert wrote: | This would be perfect for me. I have a pile of Macs with various | individual hardware failures that would never have been replaced | had I been able to easily swap out new parts. (Not to mention the | ridiculous hardware failure rate of Macs.) | | I also hate having machines with that one piece of hardware that | doesn't work on *BSD, because getting it to work is such a pain. | It would be much easier to swap out the offending hardware for | something more compatible. | sim_card_map wrote: | Windows only, no option to use linux instead. Pass. | loufe wrote: | This is just plainly false. Take the time to read before | spouting such negative drivel. | kaishiro wrote: | Instead of being so dismissive, you could have taken a few | minutes to check the site. The DIY builds all allow you to drop | Windows and roll your own OS: | https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition/configuration... | rb666 wrote: | Pick DIY, select "None" for OS? | tedk-42 wrote: | Hi Nirav, exciting times ahead! | | Key highlights I'd like to point out is that you nailed the | screen specs (3:2 and brightness) as well as the 1080p camera | which is something that has always annoyed me. | | Do you have a timeline of how long you expect to keep the | mainboard design replaceable with this frame? | | I'd personally love to see an AMD chip in there over Intel but | this is right up there for my next laptop purchase (when i need!) | - I expect people might wish to swap out the motherboard/cpu | combo. | | Also, can we expect a bigger version? | oxplot wrote: | Major thumbs-up for AMD chip. With a replaceable main board, | this will be a dream. I ordered a framework laptop at its | highest CPU+RAM spec and can't wait to replace my 6 years old | ThinkPad x250 with it. | | EDIT: would also add that the open source design USB-C based | side modules are amazing - looking forward to designing my own | modules. | nrp wrote: | Thanks! We're looking forward to seeing the modules everyone | develops, and we're excited to get new mainboards out in the | future. | PlasticTank wrote: | Another +1 for AMD from me, only reason I haven't bought | one yet was I was hoping to get an AMD chip for my next | laptop. | trewnews wrote: | I'll wait until there is an AMD CPU to buy with this setup. | carlio wrote: | +1 for AMD for me, I'd absolutely buy this today if I could | get a 5000 series HS in it too. | pzo wrote: | Not sure if this is technically possible. However I would | like to see in the future, version with AMD APU but | replaceable so you can upgrade as well. Amd seems not | selling ryzen mobile that is swappable but maybe possible | to design motherboard that will fit ryzen desktop, | undervolting it a little when not connected to power to | conserve battery - even at the expense of slighty thicker | laptop | kubafu wrote: | +1 for seeing AMD chip in it, please go for it! | accelbred wrote: | Any chance for an ortholinear keyboard? | hexo wrote: | +1 | criddell wrote: | Why AMD? What about ARM? | | I don't want to use an Apple laptop, but I do want a | fanless design with M1-type performance and battery life. | Can you do that with anything from Intel or AMD? | ndiddy wrote: | The bigger problem is that Qualcomm and Mediatek are so | far behind Apple that nobody else makes an ARM chip with | M1-type performance and battery life | adrusi wrote: | No and it's probably not possible to get M1 results out | of anything remotely modular. The M1's success is largely | due to vertical integration. You definitely can't get as | good a laptop using a non-Apple ARM chip (see e.g. the | Surface X). | nrp wrote: | Thanks! | | We aren't able to announce anything yet, but we have certainly | designed for being able to support different CPU platforms, and | for folks to switch between them by upgrading just the | mainboard or the mainboard+memory. | stonecharioteer wrote: | I would buy this yesterday if you could make a Ryzen 7 | version. I'm not buying Intel shit any longer. | [deleted] | winter_blue wrote: | What is the likelihood of a 4K (like 3840x2400) screen option | appearing anytime in the near future? | nrp wrote: | We don't have any plans we can share yet, but we did design | the display to be easy to replace by putting it behind a | magnet-attach bezel and using fasteners to affix it the | lid. | Aeolun wrote: | I'm curious about these responses. They kind of read like | "Yes, but we don't want to commit to anything right now." | ncallaway wrote: | No matter how much you qualify an answer: "yes, but it's | extremely early in design, we may not be able to find the | right manufacturers so it may not happen at all, but the | earliest possible date would be late 2022", there is a | segment of people that will have an expectation that you | will deliver the product before 2023 and will be upset if | you don't. | heywherelogingo wrote: | Sounds sensible. They're working on it but wouldn't want | to have an unexpected obstacle turn into broken promises. | nrp wrote: | That is right. I've answered a few questions in these | comments where the answer is basically: It's technically | possible, there is a plausible market need, we think it | is worthwhile to do, and we've designed for it | architecturally, but we can't commit to a specific date | because there are always implementation risks, supplier | risks (especially this year), and a large number of | programs we have to prioritize between as a small team. | nitsky wrote: | Are you considering OLED as well? The Dell XPS has that | as an option and it is a serious draw, especially for | coders who stare at a mostly-black screen all day. | pabs3 wrote: | I wonder if eink would be feasible. | robinsoh wrote: | > I wonder if eink would be feasible. | | It would depend on your meaning. If you mean taking a | device like a Dasung or a Onyx and connecting to the | laptop and using it as another screen, then sure, that | should work fine. If you mean taking out the LCD and | popping in a raw eink panel, then no because they have | different interfaces. Speaking of which, I don't see any | clear specification on frame.work for the LCD connector | or power specs. | | I see they wrote on their blog. | | " We don't currently have plans for alternate displays, | but we've designed the display to be easy to replace and | the display connector on the mainboard to be able to | support a broader range of possible displays. It's | unlikely we would go lower resolution in this form | factor, but I agree there could be an interesting case | for a display resolution that works at 2x scaling (at the | tradeoff of battery life). " | | But I couldn't easily find on their website the info for | what type of connector and what type of power is | delivered to it. | nrp wrote: | We use a relatively common 40-pin I-PEX connector. We'll | be publishing more detail on it as we have time to. | nrp wrote: | @pabs3, there is actually a 4:3 13.3" e-ink panel that | may be possible to fit, but it would be challenging to | interface. | | On OLED, nothing we can share yet, but there are | certainly benefits to OLED panels. | mlboss wrote: | +1 for eink. Maybe something to do with collaboration | with Dasung. | geniium wrote: | I would buy one just to get the eink screen on a laptop! | rraihansaputra wrote: | This might be a bit much, but if you offer an e-ink with | the same interface as the laptop, it would be very cool | to have an external usb-c case for it. So people can | choose which display for their "main" monitor, and have | the other one as an external portable monitor. | oreilles wrote: | My god, if you can make an e-ink display work it would be | an insta-buy for me. | rraihansaputra wrote: | It would be really cool if Framework would release an ARM | platform based motherboard in the future. | Frameworkscr wrote: | Guys, everything is modular, please respext the creator by asking | intelkigent questions and NOT (when will you make a laptop eith x | in place of y) | | (my username is new, i am not associated) | teddyh wrote: | No RYF certification, no sale. | ChrisMarshallNY wrote: | There's lots of opinions around this (looks down at robust | comment section). | | If enough people want the device, they will buy it, and support | the effort. | | Time will tell. I wish them luck. This has been a true labor of | love. | codedokode wrote: | It must be a lot of work to design a laptop. The PCBs look very | complicated and the components are tiny. | | What I don't really like is the price. I think a good laptop | should cost somewhere around $400. It is not necessary to install | the most expensive CPUs because they usually have lower | performance to cost ratio than cheaper models. Webcam, | fingerprint reader and Wifi 6 are not necessary. | | The laptop doesn't have space for a HDD which means that user has | to buy an expensive SSD storage. 13 inch screen is too small to | work with code or texts. Also, modern websites have gigantic font | size so only several lines of text would fit on such a small | screen. | | 64 Gb RAM limit is higher than most of laptops which is good. But | why not 128 or 256 Gb? It it difficult to add several more | address lines? | | They have written that they would love to hear a feedback on | keyboards. Well, here you go. | | Sadly the keyboard is a Latin-oriented 26-letter model. Russian | language has 33 letters so I would prefer a 33-letter keyboard | with two dedicated keys for switching layouts. This means that 9 | new keys should be added. Currently nobody makes such keyboards, | even Apple. Manufacturers seem to have no interest in adapting | keyboards to needs of Russian users and instead use inconvenient | 26-letter western keyboards. Adding more keys for me seems more | important than unnecessary back light. Also, I think it would be | better to make up/down keys larger and make | Home/End/PageUp/PageDown as separate keys. These keys are useful | for browsing or editing texts. On the other hand, CapsLock is | useless and can be removed. | | The touchpad doesn't have buttons. How does one do a right or | middle button click? | shurikdima wrote: | As someone who lives in Russia, by the end of your second | paragraph I was thinking to myself "This guy must be Russian". | and I was right. I swear, Russians bitch about everything. no | matter how good something is, some Russian will find something | to complain about. | codedokode wrote: | Yes, but I tried also to be useful and suggested the ideas | for improving the keyboard. | codedokode wrote: | Regarding screen, they write: | | > A high resolution 3:2 aspect ratio display lets you fit more | code and creativity on-screen at once. | | I doubt one can edit code on a 13 inch screen. Even 15 inch | screen is too small for IDEs. | proyb2 wrote: | I'm not sure how to feel about this warning notice? | | "This product can expose you to chemicals including Nickel | (Metallic), which is known to the State of California to cause | cancer, and Bisphenol A (BPA), which is known to the State of | California to cause birth defects or other reproductive harm. For | more information go to www.P65Warnings.ca.gov" | dehrmann wrote: | I see a similar warning on balsamic vinegar, and I've seen it | at a Starbucks for coffee. | Karsteski wrote: | It's like the hazard warnings I've read on the SDS for water | :) | mimsee wrote: | Aren't these types of warnings everywhere in California? So | much so that nobody takes them seriously as the warnings are | everywhere. | sschueller wrote: | Isn't BPA an issue mostly when it comes to food containers and | drink holders. Specifically when holding hot items the BPA can | leach into the food? | dredmorbius wrote: | Well, for more information, you can go ot | https://www.p65warnings.ca.gov | | The warnings are required by a 1986 statewide proposition, | numbered 65, for chemicals posing chancer, birth defect, or | other reproductive harm, and though they're obligatory only if | the risk is greater than 1:100,000 over a 70 year lifespan, | many companies feel it's safer to include the warnings | regardless to avoid nondisclusure actions. | | https://askthescientists.com/qa/california-prop-65-warning/ | | You can find a similar listing for, say, Apple, Inc.'s | products, running to 25 pages: | | https://www.apple.com/environment/pdf/Apple_Regulated_Substa... | (PDF) | dredmorbius wrote: | s/chancer/cancer/ | 0des wrote: | >I'm not sure how to feel about this warning notice? | | Is that because these warnings are so ubiquitous they've lost | all meaning? | Causality1 wrote: | Shame they don't offer a touchpad with separate buttons. I will | never understand why people tolerate clickpads. They're just ok | with not being able to feel where the dividing line between left | and right clicking is? The way the pointer slightly jiggles every | time they click doesn't bother them? | bombcar wrote: | I can't figure out how to click and drag on them! I can click, | I can move the pointer, but switching between those seems to | unclick. | augusto-moura wrote: | Well, I'm not sure about repairability of the case, but I | suppose that after buying you can always buy/hack your own | build with separate buttons. This is the beauty of full | repairable hardware | | If this is a popular idea you can even monetize pre-built | touchpads | stronglikedan wrote: | One of the pics on the product page indicates that this may be | able to be opened to lay flat, but I don't see a definitive spec | regarding how far it opens. Anyone know if this is the case? | RGamma wrote: | This needs a trackpoint! Cool stuff. | [deleted] | alimbada wrote: | Shame there's no AMD option. | FullyFunctional wrote: | This looks great. My only comment is whether the population for | whom this is interesting wouldn't be more likely to want Linux? I | suspect the focus on Windows is misplaced. | | I might get one, but I'd want 100% Linux support, notably wrt. | power management. | | EDIT: language | tele_ski wrote: | The faq says they'll support main distros, but power management | with Linux is always not great in my experience, hopefully it | works out! | yewenjie wrote: | Is TLP not enough? I would be curious to know how else people | manage power on laptops here. | rodolphoarruda wrote: | I visited the website just to check which distro they were | using. I was surprised when I saw the only two "distros" | available. LOL | SkyMarshal wrote: | PoP!_OS would be worth trying, it's built for laptops, could | probably do power management well on this one. | Aachen wrote: | Just one year of warranty? I should hope their hardware lasts | longer than that on average. Is that actually legal to sell to EU | customers? The EU minimum on new electronics is 2 years, and the | Netherlands has an unlimited period so long as you could | reasonably expect it (which shops then translate as 2 years, but | if it dies one day after then you aren't necessarily out of | options). | nrp wrote: | We'll be complying with all local requirements around warranty | as we add additional countries. | | We'll be offering extended warranties in the future, but we're | allowing for time in market for us to be able to price that | appropriately. | Aachen wrote: | Thanks! I read after posting the comment that you currently | don't ship to the EU in the first place, so that makes sense. | Great to hear you'll support the longer warranty requirement! | | I'm super thrilled to see this design, it's really cool. | Particularly the adapter thing, I can't believe I've never | seen or thought of that solution before, it's so much better | than loose dongles. Personally 13" isn't for me though, but I | saw the reply to people asking for a larger version elsewhere | in the thread. For now I've linked it to some friends, | perhaps they're interested in the 13" version :) | | All the best, I would love to get a Framework laptop in the | future! | adminscoffee wrote: | if it produces less waste in the end, i am all for it. it's so | sad seeing landfills with old electronics in them. | dredmorbius wrote: | Having been delighted with a 13" e-ink display with roughly | comparable display resolution, I've got to say "dayuuuuum" on the | display specs. Aspect ratio, resolution, DPI, and nits all look | excellent. | | (E-Ink differs notably in characteristics, but simply on density, | 200+ DPI is amazing to look at.) | | The rest of the specs and design intent also look impressive. | Very nicely done. | gregwebs wrote: | How is the screen outdoors? Total brightness and glare are | important factors here. IPS is good. | nrp wrote: | I've been using it outdoors in the California sunshine. It goes | up to 400 nit. It has an anti-glare coating, but it is still a | normal glossy screen (meaning no matte layer added on top). | octos4murai wrote: | Could you please share the exact screen measurements? I | purchased one but strongly prefer matte screens so I'll be | trying to look for a matte screen protector that fits. | edding4500 wrote: | Oh this is sweet! | | Any specs in the case? Is it fully aluminium? | | Too Bad I just baught a Thinkpad with the same price tag :( | nrp wrote: | It's 50% post-consumer recycled formed and milled aluminum, | with some internal 30% post-consumer recycled plastic frame | parts. | d0100 wrote: | Is the keyboard also modular? I really dislike chiclet keyboards | kohlerm wrote: | The Gizmodo review is odd. Comparing this to an M1 based Apple | Laptop, with regards to battery performance? You could do that | for every Intel/AMD laptop and they all will kind of suck. But if | you do not want Apple or you need Intel/AMD than it is not really | an argument. They also claim it runs hot, but Verge says | something different. | z3ugma wrote: | Does it look to anyone else like all the screen images on the | website are pasted on in Photoshop, with some slightly misaligned | angles that hit prime "uncanny valley"? | nitsky wrote: | My framework DIY edition is arriving tomorrow. I'm so excited! | I'll be loading NixOS on it. :) | nrp wrote: | Excellent! Let us know how NixOS goes. | vbezhenar wrote: | Absence of Xeon with ECC support is a pity. | hmm320 wrote: | If you guys could just happen to make laptops that are relatively | easy to put hackintosh onto, that would be awesome | spuz wrote: | Would it be possible to design an expansion card with 2 USB C | ports on it? It seems that there would be enough physical room. | flowerlad wrote: | The screen resolution, sadly, is only 2256x1504. This is not | retina. I don't get how new laptops can be sold today with non- | retina screens. The most common resolution these days is | 1920x1080. | | My current laptop is Samsung ATIV Book 9, which is more than 5 | years old. The 13" screen is 3200x1800. The best screen ever | made. Possibly the best laptop ever made. The industrial design, | the backlit keyboard, touchpad, everything is perfect. Sadly even | Samsung does not make laptops like this anymore. | lalaithion wrote: | The 13 inch macbook pro is only 2560x1600. The PPI of this | device is 200, according to my calculations, so it's not | totally unacceptable. | flowerlad wrote: | I saw a Surface laptop at Costco last weekend, which is also | 2256 x 1504, and I could see individual pixels. My current | 5-year-old Samsung has spoiled me, I can't use a laptop where | individual pixels are discernible. If this tech was available | 5 years ago (and at a low price) why has the industry gone | backwards? | fny wrote: | Holy crap, I was about to dish out for a 76, but this is the | exact form factor I'm looking for. | elcritch wrote: | With a nice 3:2 screen! The swappable modules look awesome too. | ghosty141 wrote: | yea this seems like the perfect modern linux "hacker" laptop. | notpatio11 wrote: | Hey Nirav - Awesome project. I want to see this succeed. Can you | talk a little bit about how you plan to keep this project inline | with the original vision. I have purchased from/seen so many | startups start with a great cause and good purpose, but then | succumb to just simply "too good of offer" to pass up and | eventually "pivoting" to something that is more lucrative. | | I believe that the the reason right to repair isn't adopted by | more companies is simple... it's way better for the bottom line | to control everything and increase profits. How do you guys plan | on dealing with this in the long run, without becoming an Apple | yourself? | nrp wrote: | We're building our business model to align incentives around | product longevity. We want as many people using our products | for as long as they possibly can. As a company, we benefit from | that by continuing to develop new modules and upgrades and | fostering the developing of compatible parts that can be sold | through our marketplace. Even after an individual no longer | needs their product, we want that product's life to extend by | getting it refurbished or resold to the next consumer who can | keep using it and participating in the ecosystem. | throwmanhands wrote: | Something creepy about the hands in the animations. They look | like man hands but they have nail polish and are somewhat | feminine looking. I'm more confused and focused on them than the | laptop. | wellpast wrote: | I wish we could do this with houses. | vzaliva wrote: | What about extending "right to repair" to OS software and | supporting open source OS like Linux or FreeBSD? Current product | page only lists Microsoft Windows. I do not see an option to | purchase it without, so Microsoft tax seems to be collected :( | pabs3 wrote: | Try the DIY edition, which comes without an OS: | | https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition | nrp wrote: | The Framework Laptop DIY Edition ships without an OS or OS | license: https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition | | We've been testing with Ubuntu 21.04 and Fedora 34 so far. The | latest Fedora 34 respins actually have full functionality out | of the box, including the fingerprint reader: | https://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/alt/live-respins/ | marilyn2 wrote: | This is great! Was about to order an XPS or Thinkpad but think | I'll go with this instead! How many external displays does it | support? Would I need thunderbolt (would that just be a $9 | adapter???)? I'd like to connect at least 3 external displays (so | 4 total screens including the laptop). Is that possible? Thanks! | nrp wrote: | You can use up to four displays simultaneously, so three | external displays along with the internal display would work. | You can connect monitors directly using USB-C (with DisplayPort | Alt Mode), DisplayPort, or HDMI Expansion Cards, or you can | connect them through a dock. | baybal2 wrote: | No thunderbolt on it. | | Thunderbolt is very hard to implement. | nrp wrote: | It's currently Schrodinger's Thunderbolt, but it'll collapse | to an answer once we complete certifications. | pzo wrote: | Isn't usb 4.0 pretty much thunderbolt specs wise? | nrp wrote: | Thunderbolt 4 is basically a superset of USB4. It's USB4 | with some of the optional features required, and more | rigorous testing required for certification. | canadaduane wrote: | How easy is it to replace the battery--for example, can I carry | an extra battery around in my backpack and expect to swap it at a | coffee shop, or is it necessary to bring tools / do it on a | workbench? | qwerty456127 wrote: | I don't feel like buying it this time because I have just bought | a rather good new laptop recently and don't have money to spare, | but I really hope this isn't going to be a one-time single-batch | device project. I will definitely lean towards this (if something | like Purism won't beat it too hard) for the next laptop I buy. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-07-23 23:01 UTC)