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Framework Laptop pre-orders are open, starting at $999
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- poidos 5y agoI wish them all the best; this is an exciting, welcome offering in this space. I wish I could find the use for one, but I'm stuck with Apple's laptops for as long as I work in app development.
- nrp 5y agoFramework founder here. Happy to answer any questions anyone has on the product!
- ssivark 5y agoHi, thanks for hanging around; the idea seems exciting! A few questions (likely FAQs): 1. How much thicker & heavier is this laptop than similar screen size MacBook Pro and Thinkpads? (Is the battery life comparable?) 2. Is there soldered-on RAM and/or expansion slots? 3. Can this run linux without any hitch? —— PS: Website seems to be down for now. > Framework is undergoing maintenance right now. Please check back in a few minutes.
- nrp 5y agoThe website is back up! We're at almost exactly the same thickness and weight as a MacBook Pro 13-inch, and lighter and thinner than most T-series ThinkPads. The storage, both memory sockets, and WiFi are socketed for upgradeability, and the entire mainboard is upgradeable too! We're testing for compatibility with major linux distributions, and expect near complete support (with potentially only the fingerprint reader driver coming in later).
- uncletaco 5y agoWhen is the website coming back up
- nrp 5y agoBack up now! We upgraded some infrastructure quickly to handle the massive influx of visitors.
- zipityzi 5y agoI think it’s down again if you click the configurations. Home page is sometimes up, but that’s also down some of the time. “ 500 Internal Server Error If you are the administrator of this website, then please read this web application's log file and/or the web server's log file to find out what went wrong.” The hug of death.
- rpdillon 5y agoGot all the way to checkout, but couldn't order. I'll keep checking back!
- nrp 5y agoThanks for your patience! We're upgrading infrastructure further, but the website is very much still struggling under the load. On that note, we're hiring a Backend Engineer if anyone is interested! https://jobs.lever.co/framework/6935fb47-2921-49df-b94c-e45c52a1b9a9 https://jobs.lever.co/framework/6935fb47-2921-49df-b94c-e45c...
- foodstances 5y agoWhat was the point of signing up for pre-order emails and following your launch if it was going to be announced everywhere at the same time? Your website is down and it was impossible to complete a pre-order checkout because of all the errors.
- nrp 5y agoSorry for the go-live shakiness. The website is up and running solidly now. We sent out the email to the mailing list this morning with the intent of letting folks get in and order as the news started to trickle out. In reality though, there was an immediate, massive influx of traffic (in part from HN) that brought down the website. Lessons learned for the future.
- willtim 5y agoThis is a noble effort and you can certainly take the moral high-ground over companies like Apple. However, often the problem is not only whether parts are replaceable but also availability of spares. For example, my 2016 X1 Carbon needs a new battery and it is easily user-replaceable, yet Lenovo no longer make or sell them. How can you make sure that parts are available, especially if your suppliers stop making them?
- nrp 5y agoWe're committing to making compatible parts available. Part of how we're doing this is continuing to use this design and architecture going forward for the foreseeable future. This means that as we continue to refresh the specs each year, modules like the battery, display, and others will remain cross-compatible. This makes it easier for us to keep suppliers bought in for the long-haul.
- dflock 5y agoHow long is long?
- myself248 5y agoWhat's the UEFI / secure boot situation like? Say someone's been considering a Purism machine, how does the Framework compare?
- robotnikman 5y agoAny plans in the future to include a discrete GPU option?
- nrp 5y agoWe likely won't within this 13.5" form factor, since even with a discrete GPU there would be some problematic thermal budget tradeoffs with the CPU. GPU modularity is definitely a compelling area though!
- zipityzi 5y agoThank you so much for starting this project and hopefully long-term investment. Incredibly refreshing. The site is down for the moment. What is the situation about warranty? Do you plan to offer multi-year options? I’m all for repairing my own laptop, but if there is an option to pay upfront for some peace of mind on at least the parts, I’d bite.
- nrp 5y agoWe offer a pretty standard 1-year limited warranty. Extended warranties are something we are exploring, but are not available yet.
- zipityzi 5y agoThank you for the reply. Great to hear it's on Framework's radar. While the reparability helps (as I'm used to even $800 laptops calling for $300 screens + webcam + Wi-Fi antenna), if it's profitable for Framework, it'd be an instant buy here.
- dilippkumar 5y agoCongratulations on your launch! How do you track quality during development, production, product planning and polling for customer satisfaction? Can you share some thoughts on the current state of quality assurance in the industry in general? Is this an area for product differentiation?
- nrp 5y agoWe have both Quality and Customer Experience teams to span quality from the sub-suppliers and manufacturing through to customers, so that we can close the loop on any field issues.
- an_opabinia 5y agoIn what country are the laptops manufactured? Which three parts in a laptop have the highest failure rate, and what are those rates? What I can’t wrap my head around is, a consumer that feels strongly about repairing laptops themselves, for clearly non-economic reasons, but would balk at the cost of a laptop manufactured in the West, which is 100% of the labor the day the laptop ships, because then the computer would cost 3 times as much.
- nrp 5y agoWe manufacture subassemblies and most modules in China with final assembly in Taiwan. In typical consumer notebooks, batteries, hinges, ports, and keyboards would be parts that wear out over time. We've designed the Framework Laptop to make each of those easy to swap as needed.
- samstave 5y agoDo you have an exploded diagram of all the individual parts?
- nrp 5y agoWe'll be publishing repair guides showing all the parts and assembly steps. In the meantime, you can check out some of the images that show modules: https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition https://frame.work/products/laptop-diy-edition
- samstave 5y agoDopes. The QR Code in the transparency section doesnt work: https://i.imgur.com/TjfcWOP.png https://i.imgur.com/TjfcWOP.png "page doesnt exist"
- nrp 5y agoYes... good catch. We wondered if people would start scanning that image. That will redirect into our product pages and repair guides before we start shipping units out.
- simon_weber 5y agoAny idea when reviewers will get their hands on it? It'd be nice to have some reviews prior to pre-orders going out.
- nrp 5y agoDefinitely! We'll be sending out review units before we start shipping out to customers.
- questionableans 5y agoHave you tested the laptop’s materials for offgassing? I’ve had problems with offgassing odors that never seem to go away on multiple monitors, MacBooks and an iPad in recent years. This leads to headaches that makes it impossible to use the machines for more than a few minutes, even with good room ventilation. It would be great to buy a laptop that is known to be low offgassing. I was wondering if a Framework laptop would have less glue and could be more effective offgassed in a shed by disassembling the components and ventilating.
- alisonkisk 5y agoWhat do you suspect is the chemical that is new and widespread?
- questionableans 5y agoI doubt it’s just one chemical, but various kinds of plastics and adhesives, and possibly some electronic components are all likely contributors. For example, on the 8th gen. iPad, the keyboard connector is surprisingly smelly. Heat increases the rate of offgassing, so a medium amount of heat in well power managed devices can draw out the time for which there is noticeable offgassing for years. I have found if you can burn-in a computer or TV with heavy load (and consequently heat) for say a month or two, that usually takes care of it. But some mobile devices (especially fanless ones) are “too good” at thermal management, making this difficult. And even for devices with fans, you want to run them in a clean environment so you don’t prematurely fill the fans up with dust or worse.
- LawnGnome 5y agoMaybe more feedback than questions, although if there are roadmap items that would address these it'd be good to know! I'm really excited about this — besides repairability, I think the USB-C expansion cards are great, and a really neat solution to a tricky problem. I love the idea of never having to carry a USB-C dongle ever again, particularly when travelling. The blocker that is stopping me ordering this today (besides being in Canada) is: 1. The display. I've spent the last several years using laptops with higher resolution displays (either Macbook Pros or, more recently, a 4k Dell XPS 13), and honestly, I'm not going back. It's a shame that the one thing that doesn't seem to be upgradeable right now is the screen configuration. (I realise that the Framework's display isn't exactly low-res, but it feels like it's going to be in an uncanny valley of not quite HiDPI/Retina.) Beyond that, other things I wish were different (or at least clearer), but which aren't blockers: 1. Like other commenters, I don't use Windows, and I don't particularly want to pay for a Windows licence. 2. There's no mention I can see on the product page of how many external displays are supported, and in what configurations, and that's important to me. 3. I'd probably be more comfortable if some late pre-production units had made it to independent reviewers for judging things like battery life and the display. (I'd love to see an Anandtech breakdown of a Framework!)
- nrp 5y agoWe're pretty happy with the display. At a little over 200 PPI, it is basically just over the edge of "retina" where pixels aren't visible at normal viewing distance, while being less power-hungry than a 4k panel. We offer the DIY Edition without Windows pre-installed, and will be publishing compatibility reports for popular Linux distros. With Intel 11th Gen CPUs, the Framework Laptop handles up to four simultaneous displays (which can be 4x external displays if you turn off the internal one). We'll be making review units available before we start shipping products out.
- LawnGnome 5y agoI really appreciate the response. Thanks!
- skratlo 5y ago
- SuchAnonMuchWow 5y agoThank you very much for what you build. It's amazing, and will be the perfect replacement for my aging laptop. The only thing missing for me is an ethernet port (which I need to connect to the internal network at work). Do you have any plan to add it as an extension card ? If no, any technical reasons why not ?
- nrp 5y agoThanks! We are developing an Ethernet Expansion Card. Due to the size of the receptacle and magnetics required, it'll bump out rather than being flush like the other cards, but still more convenient than an external dongle.
- motiejus 5y agoSame here, I am looking for something that does have rj45. Some dell latitude laptops have a connector that "packs" itself, making it slim enough to be buit-in, without bumps. Is this an option for you folks? How much do you think it will bump out? Will the laptop be stable on an even surface?
- m463 5y agoWhen Apple came out with flat keyboards (~2007/2008?) the entire industry copied the trend. The tops of the keys are flat, giving very little "context" to your fingers for accurate typing. It is hard to find the center or edges of the keys, which would be easier on sculpted keys which are concave and conform to your fingers. Do manufacturers even make keyboards like that for laptops anymore?
- nrp 5y agoWe put a lot of effort into great keyboard feel on the Framework laptop, both in terms of key travel (1.5mm) and key shape. There are limits to what you can do in a 15.85mm thick machine, but we stack up well compared to most other thin and light notebooks on keyboard quality.
- fomine3 5y agoThinkPad?
- m463 5y agocoincidentally I was reading this article yesterday: https://www.notebookcheck.net/X1-Carbon-Gen-9-Lenovo-has-to-be-careful-with-the-ThinkPad-keyboard.537996.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.net/X1-Carbon-Gen-9-Lenovo-has-to-...
- fyrn- 5y agoWhy go with an intel plastform right now when AMD laptops CPU are lapping intel ones for heavily multithreaded work like compiling? I suspect for developers which probably represent a larger than normal segment of your potential customers, that AMD cpus would have been the better choice for battery life and multithread?
- fomine3 5y agoUnlike other market offering by Intel, Tiger Lake is good choice especially for lightweight mobile laptop.
- MaxBarraclough 5y agoSimilar to the question from myself248: Does it run on Free Software? Put another way, what would the FSF Respects Your Freedom programme [0] make of it? How does it compare to the Purism Librem machines? [0] https://ryf.fsf.org/about/criteria https://ryf.fsf.org/about/criteria
- MaxBarraclough 5y agoAn update for anyone reading: looking at [0], they're planning on moving to an open BIOS, but it's not top priority right now. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27150566 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27150566
- skratlo 5y agoWhy did you choose Intel over AMD?
- GordonS 5y agoThe lack of upgradability of laptops is a huge problem, especially when so many come with 16GB or even a piddling 8GB of RAM - I'm excited to see you guys actually shipping! Do you have any plans to sell in the UK and Europe, through a distributor or otherwise?
- nrp 5y agoYes! We'll be selling directly to consumers in several countries in Europe (and UK) and Asia before the end of the year.
- pkulak 5y agoThat resolution is so close to 2X! Why not just a little bit denser so that desktops can integer scale instead of 1.8x? EDIT: Just did the math and your screen is 200dpi... which is very close to the 220 or so I'm used to on high-dpi, 13" screens. Maybe close enough that it won't matter?
- frmwklptpq 5y agoSpecial shout-out and thanks regarding: > To maximize eye comfort, we use a DC mode backlight controller instead of a PWM one that can cause visible flickering I hope this still stands, and it uses true DC dimming. If so, thank you so much! These days it is hard to find non-PWM laptops even in premium segment. Even high-frequency PWM is not great for eyestrain, so DC dimming is really appreciated! Some manufacturers go as low as 250HZ. p.s. If anyone wants to check if your display has PWM: 0. All OLED screens utilize PWM. They are terrible to view in low light environment. This means that all new phones and OLED laptops are terrible for night reading, don't do it! If you are curious about headaches after extensive screen time, guess no more. 1. For LCD laptops, however, set display brightness at 10% (can try different settings in low range, too) 2. Open some bright content (e.g. blank white page) and go to some completely dark room. 3. Using phone camera's preview screen, set it to photo mode and play with different settings of exposure (in pro/advanced settings) while pointing at the screen: try 1/8000, 1/250, etc. Also try slow-motion capture of the screen. High-frequency PWM (new Mac laptops) is quite bad, but hard to detect without special equipment, but still can easily put eyestrain. Low frequency PWM is much easier to detect with just a phone camera.
- anigbrowl 5y agoHi, thanks for your availability and a cool product. I wonder if you plan to make the hardware spec (or parts thereof like the form factor) open source? It's nota deal breaker if you don't, but would be a big plus if you do (although more challenging from a business logic standpoint, but Red Hat seems to have done OK).
- TheSpiceIsLife 5y agoI recall reading previous HN thread where they said they were / would permit / encourage others to build compatible component.
- nrp 5y agoYep, that is right. We're releasing reference CAD and documentation under open licenses for some modules like the Expansion Cards to enable community development.
- dmayle 5y agoHi! I've got two questions about input: 1. Will there be an ISO option for the keyboard layout? (To support non-US layouts, and for those who aren't familiar, just changing the key mapping isn't sufficient, ISO has an extra key and a different shape on the enter key) 2. Any plans to support Sensel touchpads? The tech is really amazing (I've heard the latest described as better than a macbook)
- nrp 5y agoYes, we have some photos on the website currently showing ANSI and ISO keyboard geometry. As we continue to add more keyboard languages, there will be both ANSI and ISO ones depending on the language (and JIS for Japan). The touchpad is replaceable, though we don't currently have plans for alternate types.
- kevinkeller 5y agoIs it possible to run the laptop directly off AC power, bypassing the battery? Alternatively, is it possible to cap the battery charging at, say, 60-80%? Since one of the key aspects of the laptop is the longevity and serviceability of the hardware, I am curious how the battery health can be managed.
- nrp 5y agoIt is! You can actually unplug or take out the battery and still be able to run the system. Configurable charge limits is on our firmware roadmap, though unlikely to be available at launch time.
- Matrixik 5y agoAny plans for display with at least 99% Adobe RGB (for working with pictures color grading)? Good uniform brightness would also be nice. It doesn't need to be as good as Eizo/Nec, but something on the level of BenQ PhotoVue would be nice. And if it supported hardware calibration that would be on completely another level.
- ruph123 5y agoI am really excited for this and consider buying a second gen next year if they support Linux. But $2000 + tax for a quad core is pretty brutal (i7-1185G7). I got a 14” notebook with a Ryzen 7 4800H for less than 1000€ from a small vendor (Tuxedo). Hard to choose this as it stands. Still I would support them and pay the markup. Hopefully they can support AMD CPUs in their next models.
- nrp 5y agoJust a note that the Base configuration that starts at $999 is also a quad core, the i5-1135G7. The i7-1185G7 is really only necessary if you need vPro for enterprise fleet management reasons (we also have a i7-1165G7 SKU for folks who want higher clocks but not vPro).
- ruph123 5y agoOkay but that does not make it better. A slightly higher boost clock on one hand vs a strong octa-core CPU on the other (and this is last year’s generation).
- COGlory 5y agoAre you able to elaborate on why there's no AMD option? I've preordered a DIY one, with the hope that down the line I can put an AMD main board in. (Still undecided on whether I'll want it if that never becomes an option)
- nrp 5y agoWe designed our mainboard system to be able upgradeable to future CPU platforms. We have nothing we can share around that today, but it's a core part of the product!
- Swinx43 5y agoLooks like the site is down. There must be an insane amount of traffic hitting it.
- luke2m 5y agoBack up now
- moneywoes 5y agoWhat’s the catch? Sounds too good to be true
- luke2m 5y agoIt all depends on this company surviving
- pjerem 5y agoEven if you never get the opportunity to upgrade or replace parts, the price per spec seems really honest.
- bpye 5y agoThe chances seem good that some upgrades will be possible to make as a third party too, maybe not a new motherboard - though I wouldn’t be that surprised to see somewhat put an ARM SoC in there - but the ports are based on USB-C and it’s definitely reasonable for someone to design their own.
- elif 5y agoIMO Samsung is taking laptops to 2.0, making them as functional and ergonomic as phones, and after apple follows, this will look like the very best 1.0 laptop.
- emptysongglass 5y agoMy employer offered to buy me a new laptop and it would have been a pre-order for your Framework if the pre-order today was offered in the EU.
- nrp 5y agoWe'll be opening up ordering in Europe and Asia before the end of the year. Thanks for your patience (hopefully)!
- TheSpiceIsLife 5y agoAnd Oceania too? I'm in Australia and have been holding off buying a new laptop with one eye on Framework. Happy to wait.
- nrp 5y agoYes, good question. Australia and New Zealand are on our target list to open before the end of the year.
- TheSpiceIsLife 5y agoExcellent, thanks :)
- ramanujank 5y agoCongratulations to the founder(s) on the launch. Wishing you nothing but success! Nice to see a pluggable approach at a time when "repairability" is catching the fancy of the whole world. If I had to nitpick, it would be the fact that Linux is unfortunately a second class citizen. However, I do see that support for mainstream distros is available. Can you possibly shed some light on that and be a bit more specific? What distros have you tested? What are the outcomes?
- nrp 5y agoWe dogfood regularly on Ubuntu LTS and Fedora, and we've been working with the team at Fedora (and have provided them a pre-release unit). In general, the only issue we foresee in the near term is that the fingerprint reader likely won't work out of the box in Linux. There is a driver though, and we're working on making that setup as easy as possible until it is in mainline.
- Abishek_Muthian 5y agoCan you please ensure that you support Linux Vendor Firmware Service (LVFS)[1] i.e ensure your vendors support it. Edit: Bit more rant about LVFS goodness Even my Logitech 2.4 Ghz receiver gets regular updates on LVFS, can't remember it happening even with official Logitech SW on Mac/Windows. LVFS fixes the embedded controller security/bugs mess. A functional laptop like Framework when released with first class support for Linux features like LVFS can add more value to the customer. [1]https://fwupd.org/ https://fwupd.org/
- nrp 5y agoDefinitely! We're set up as a vendor there and will be using it for updates in the future: https://fwupd.org/lvfs/vendors/#framework https://fwupd.org/lvfs/vendors/#framework
- Abishek_Muthian 5y agoYay! Added some more rant about LVFS to my original comment.
- aquaticsunset 5y agoYeah, it's throwing 500s for me when I try to preorder. I'm very excited for this laptop! It's not even the fact that they essentially moved the dongles inside the frame, it's that it feels like a laptop for people who want to open it up and replace stuff.
- dham 5y agoHey this looks great. Looking forward to Linux compatibility statement. The site looks like it's getting the hug of death, which is going to be hard dealing with on Rails unless you have some kind of caching. It looks like you're on Cloudflare. I would recommend doing site rules and turn on static html caching for a lot of front facing pages. Basically anything that isn't the laptop build page.
- nrp 5y agoThanks! On Linux, we dogfood on Ubuntu LTS and Fedora, and have a pre-release unit with the Fedora team. We'll be publishing more detailed compatibility results soon, but it looks good. We're definitely having some back end issues under the load! As noted elsewhere, we're hiring in this area (help us, please): https://jobs.lever.co/framework/6935fb47-2921-49df-b94c-e45c52a1b9a9 https://jobs.lever.co/framework/6935fb47-2921-49df-b94c-e45c...
- lawn 5y agoLove the idea here, but I'm underwhelmed by the CPU. Such a shame.
- enlightens 5y agoI'm excited to see orders open up. I'm not overly familiar with current computer pricing but I'm pretty happy with what these are selling for.
- anotheryou 5y agoI'm always out of the loop with hardware: how much does an equivalent system from the big ones cost? And how future proof/upgradable are cpu and gpu? I assume storage, ram, motherboard and usb-c will take you far otherwise. And I wonder if it's available in Europe. edit: oh, no dedicated GPU.
- nrp 5y agoWe've designed the mainboard (with CPU) to be upgradeable. Since the storage, memory, ports, and WiFi are socketed, that reduces the cost of the mainboard by itself.
- anotheryou 5y agoThanks! Still sounds really good :). Is there a usb-c gpu that would be compatible? (edit: we'll see: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27144085 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27144085 ) I already replaced my battery 2 times, speakers once, wifi once. All was just so still possible on my 2016 laptop. I have an even older laptop with broken screen in use too. If only I didn't want to run a game every now and than :). I now wonder what to get next: - another laptop with a dedicated gpu - something like this here and some usb-c gpu as soon as the onboard gpu doesn't do the trick anymore - or a desktop for games and media stuff (and a pinebook for typing and youtube or just use my machine from work)
- yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago> If only I didn't want to run a game every now and than I hear surprisingly good things about remote options like https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/ https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce-now/ which would avoid you needing the hardware at all.
- anotheryou 5y agoOh that's right. I had a mostly fun time with google stadia. My internet latency is just good enough, even for shooters. Some days it was playable, others it wasn't. They do focus on AAA games though, which I don't want to afford as a casual player. I like multiplayer with friends so we usually play not to pricy or free things. The only "single player" I'm hoping for would be MS flight sim, but even there I'd just sing a few hours, not more. To me it feels like I should invest in a good machine with a GPU another time because: - streaming games is just not ripe enough - I'll keep the machine for >5 years. Good to have one bottleneck less and such long usage is worth some investment. --- edit: maybe I should look in to https://shadow.tech/ https://shadow.tech/ Doing some math: 5 years * 12 month * 12$ or subscription = 720$ If I'm generous and say my gpu only stays up to date 3 years: 430$ So I have 430$ at least to spare for a local GPU and for the first 3 years will have the better performance (lag, compression, internet-dependence) and for the last 2 years I can still think about renting for another 300$. I'd say if I keep my current computer it's worth it, if I buy a new one anyways I should get one with a gpu. uh oh, monthly pricing is 15eur
- deltron3030 5y agoIs Thunderbolt 3 (for eGPUs) an option? Couldn't find any info on that..
- nrp 5y agoWe support USB4 on all four ports. We can't state anything about Thunderbolt compatibility until we complete certifications around it.
- jessikat 5y agoAre the expansion cards based on USB, or is it more like Thunderbolt, built on top of PCIe? The lack of Thunderbolt makes it a complete no-go right now.
- shimonabi 5y agoI made this comment a while ago and got a ton of negative votes: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27053745 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27053745 They either listened to me or I should be a contestant on "The Price is Right". ;)
- rgrmrts 5y agoReally exciting and congrats on the launch! I was somewhat hoping there would be “see through” options for the bezel and the keyboard/trackpad frame - maybe a future consideration? I’m likely going to order one in the near future to use as my Linux driver.
- nrp 5y agoThanks! We actually do have a clear keyboard design (https://youtu.be/XFrJcjCbCA8?t=1005 https://youtu.be/XFrJcjCbCA8?t=1005) which we'll be making available later this summer. We've prototyped a transparent bezel too, but aren't happy with the quality on it just yet. That is something we'd love to make available too though.
- daedalus2027 5y agoI wish i could buy it in parts, the customs in my country doesn't allow anything above 200 usd to go throught. I wish i could buy one day the frame, other day yhe motherboard and so on...
- samstave 5y agoWhat country is that, and why is that?
- gruez 5y ago>and why is that? probably import tariffs on tech products, with exceptions if it's below a certain amount.
- nrp 5y agoA lot of countries have "de minimus" thresholds below which an individual can import duty-free. In the US for reference, it's $800, but other countries have other limits. If you're over that limit, either the product needs to be delivered duty paid (DDP) by the importer or if it is un-paid, the end recipient has to jump through some hoops to pay, with varying complexity in different countries. Trade logistics is an interesting challenge, and one we want to solve so our customers don't have to... That is part of why we're introducing new regions in phases.
- mike_k 5y agoThanks for doing this! It would be very nice to know the list of countries where you will ship this year. I was very excited and ordered it to an US address. But that means: I pay US tax + shipping/forwarding costs + local import tax of 30% on anything above USD150. Also, I will have to order an ISO keyboard separately, when it becomes available (and it is not clear when that happens). I figured out that metal cover should be compatible between US and ISO keyboards, right?
- daedalus2027 5y agoIn Uruguay, anything above 200 usd pays roughtly 100% in taxes, you have to import it. And you have only 3 tax free shippings per year.
- mxwsn 5y agoI've been eagerly anticipating this, and am very pleasantly surprised by the price. Excited to have pre-ordered in batch #1 :)
- nrp 5y agoThanks! We wanted to make the it a really easy choice, and didn't want anyone to have to pay more for a longer-lasting product.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- dempseye 5y agoThis is not a knock on Framework, but it amuses me that a base spec of 8 GB of RAM is acceptable in 2021. The last time I bought a laptop was 2014. It was a Macbook Pro 15'. Even then, 8 GB was an irritating amount of RAM, so I bumped it up to 16 GB. 7 years later things have hardly improved.
- pjerem 5y agoHey, at least here, you can upgrade after the purchase ;)
- oldandboring 5y agoAgree 100%.
- gruez 5y ago> This is not a knock on Framework, but it amuses me that a base spec of 8 GB of RAM is acceptable in 2021. my theory: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27097103 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27097103
- CarelessExpert 5y agoEh, if I was buying my mom a laptop I'd probably not waste money on more than 8GB, especially given I know I could just add more later.
- shimonabi 5y agoThis is really a great idea. I hope your company succeeds. I would buy it just for the blank ISO keyboard. I hope you also add shipping from the EU. BTW. Why does the Enter key look so strange?
- abrowne 5y ago> Why does the Enter key look so strange? It looks like a design some other laptops use, with the top enclosure cut to fit both ANSI (horizontal) and ISO (vertical) enter keys, so there's no silver metal case between the enter key and the one next to it, just dark plastic from the keyboard.
- grecy 5y agoCan I get it without Windows please and save the licence fee for something I'll never use?
- boudin 5y agoIt's possible, when pre-ordering the DIY one there's a "bring your own" operating system option. That's too bad they don't talk about this DIY pre-order option that allows to customize a lot of things. They even say they support Linux, which is a great selling point.
- janmo 5y agoI hope the hinges are of good quality and can be easily replaced, my two last had massive hinge issues, and replacing them is no easy task.
- NiceWayToDoIT 5y agoProbably part of planned obsolescence, they any other part would ruin manufacturer reputation, let say if you loose data etc.
- nrp 5y agoWe test to 20,000 hinge cycles, and we also made them easy to replace.
- neuromute 5y agoI can't seem to find any information on the BIOS for this machine. I'd like to see something like this come with coreboot.
- yjftsjthsd-h 5y agoActually, I'm curious why coreboot (probably with TianoCore and maybe SeaBIOS payloads) isn't wildly popular; is it just that companies making motherboards (I think?) just tend to do their own think and OEMs just go with that by default so it'd be extra work? Because if every OEM had to go get a firmware implementation for every machine, I'd naively expect coreboot to be super widespread just by virtue of costing nothing and probably having better tooling than the proprietary alternatives.
- gruez 5y agoHow does the DIY edition work? It seems to be cheaper to get that and bring your own parts than it is to get a preconfigured version. Do you just insert the missing parts (memory, ssd, wifi)? Or do you have to assemble the whole thing from scratch?
- ben509 5y agoThe relevant blurb seems to be: > Build it Yourself > The DIY Edition is the only high-end laptop you can customize and assemble yourself from a kit of modules. Coming in at just 15.85mm thick and 1.3kg, the Framework Laptop delivers the modularity of a desktop in the form factor of a thin and light 13.5” notebook.
- gruez 5y agoRight but what does the "kit of modules" consist of? Do I have to assemble the motheboard/case/display/keyboard? Or is it just the configurable components (memory, ssd, wifi)?
- danielovichdk 5y agoLove it. Feedback would be that the keyboard must have different options for the pad. It looks like the pad now is too big for me at least. So make it a an option please.
- emsy 5y agoI can hardly wait for them to be available in the EU/Germany. This is pretty close to my ideal laptop: reasonable aspect ratio, repairability and a competitive price point.
- tormeh 5y agoWish there was a ATX-like standard for laptops. It wouldn't work for 13-inch laptops with super-tight internals, but for gaming laptops and mobile workstations it'd be awesome. Imagine your laptop is getting a bit old, so you swap out motherboard, CPU and RAM. That's the kind of laptop I want.
- nrp 5y agoWe wish there was a standard too! We designed the mainboard in the Framework Laptop to be replaceable and upgradeable to future generations, along with the upgradeability of memory and storage. We've be developing new mainboards ourselves, and we'd love to bring in third party compatible mainboards too.
- Badfood 5y agoI would love to make an arm board. Would be cool if you could publish some sort of reference design EDA files with just the board outline and IO connectors populated.
- nrp 5y agoThat is doable!
- TreeInBuxton 5y agoIf this goes anywhere let me know - I work on BSPs at Arm
- leetcrew 5y agolaptops with discrete GPUs usually have an integrated heatpipe solution that cools the CPU, GPU, and chipset. at least that's been the case with all the ones I've opened up. so you would probably have to replace the GPU also. even without the GPU, the CPU/RAM/mobo is already a pretty big portion of the BOM. at that point, I have to wonder how much you would actually save by not replacing the screen, chassis, and storage. overall, this concept strikes me as more of a win for repairs than upgrades.
- 5y ago
- candiddevmike 5y agoEchoing the other feedback here--I thought it would be cheaper too. The DIY edition where you have to bring your own components is at least double the price of a slightly slower laptop with RAM and storage included. I was expecting the DIY to start at $300-400, the current price point is far too high for unproven build quality.
- lilactown 5y agoI'd be OK paying a premium for more modularity. I'm curious what the support for things that I can't upgrade will be like if I want to run Linux.
- boudin 5y agoThe possibility to upgrade and repair easily must have been quite a bit of engineering upfront. It's also quite a niche laptop, so I guess there's less saving at scale than the big players in this market.
- kitsunesoba 5y agoAlso, that screen panel probably wasn't cheap. Its ratio is unusual for consumer products so it's likely a somewhat low-volume part, and its high resolution, wide gamut, and high brightness likely bump its price up as well. Normally in $300-$400 laptops you're getting a low resolution display with a truly horrible TN panel or low-end IPS panel with mediocre color and brightness so low it's difficult to use in even a well-daylight-lit room (200-300 nits).
- neolog 5y agoThe price point seems fine to me. These systems are for professionals, so they're competing with MacBook Pro, not budget vendors. The same should apply to Pine64 and Purism, though they might not realize it yet.
- elric 5y agoThey're similarly priced to Thinkpads, and they have similar specs. I'd agree that the price seems fine. The warranty seems pretty limited (1 year!), businesses won't be happy about that. Hell, EU mandates a minimum of 2 year warranty for consumer goods. I'm overall very impressed with their offering and the progress they've made, but I hope it will be refined in the future.
- neatze 5y agocompelled to buy because of blank keyboard, have been using das keyboard with blank keys for ~8 years.
- CarelessExpert 5y agoUS only. I am a sad panda...
- nrp 5y agoWe're adding Canada in the next few weeks and additional countries before the end of the year.
- CarelessExpert 5y agoOoo, great news, thank you!
- macdamaniac 5y agoThis looks awesome, hopeful for the future where they have AMD CPU options as well.
- axelthegerman 5y agoCan't wait to watch some product reviews. That and full Linux support - until then my Pinebook Pro does almost everything I need. Not the fastest but more devs should use lower spec hardware.
- cyberpunk 5y agoWhy should they?
- jacob019 5y agoSo that they can pay more attention to performance.
- Koffiepoeder 5y agoIf you design for slow hardware it will sure as hell work well on fast hardware. If things become unbearably slow on your slow hardware however, you're closer to actual user experience and will notice this earlier. Long story short, using slow or bad hardware helps detecting performance and usability issues earlier.
- CobsterLock 5y agoI have a coworker that always preaches testing on bad hardware. Sometimes it catches multi threaded issues, like if you arent locking correctly and use a resource before its generated. Other than that it helps ensure that you are squeezing more performance out of the software rather than relying on fast hardware. I think this sentiment comes after dealing with a ton of chromium apps that can be resource hogs. Presumably they are developed on machines with tons of resources then forced onto my dev machine and still use tons of resource that I need to write my own stuff. Personally I dont care too much, if the software has performance critical requirements, it should be thoroughly tested in some pipeline not my machine.
- michaelpb 5y agoRe. your last point, I generally agree with the idea that performance testing should be automated, not on an ad-hoc local machine basis. But I also do think developers live in bit of a "CPU bubble", and we need to break out of it. Most people don't have pricey hardware, and no matter what your reasoning (environmental / e-waste, user experience, simple love of the craft, etc), it is important to write performant software. In using old hardware I've discovered many, many apps are so incredibly frustrating to use for average users --- borderline unusable --- and I suspect their developers aren't even aware. So, I don't know what the issue is, if it's tech management trends (eg "sales-driven" development), or it's a lack of automated performance testing, or beefy dev boxes, or what. But IMO it's downright embarrassing to the entire industry how bad software has gotten on average.
- bpye 5y agoLooks like I’m waiting a little longer for Canada preorders. I don’t need a new device but I really want to see this be successful m.
- geophile 5y ago3:2 display. WTF?!
- ranger207 5y agoThe 3:2 display was my favorite part of my Surface. I'm considering this laptop so that I can get 3:2 and also be able to repair it when something fails, unlike my Surface
- NiceWayToDoIT 5y agoI just hope they made unbreakable hinges
- nrp 5y agoThe hinges are end user replaceable in case they ever wear out!
- the_arun 5y agoSeems very expensive
- wackro 5y agoYou have to factor the cost of this laptop + cost of future upgrades vs the cost of a Dell/Macbook/whatever + its inevitable replacement. If it wasn't cheaper then they wouldn't have much of a business model.
- elric 5y agoThe keyboard makes this a no-go for me, though I'm hoping they will be releasing additional versions? And I'm not talking about ANSI/ISO or internationalization (which they will be releasing), I'm talking about the lack of page up/down keys, the arrow keys, the lack of dedicated home/insert/end keys. These all fit comfortably on my X230 (which is smaller), and on my T470 (which is bigger, but has ~4cm to spare).
- clarge1120 5y agoYes, that's a valuable observation. Perhaps, if this laptop can become sustainable they may offer more keyboard options to capture larger market share. If not, competitors will fill the need.
- conqrr 5y agoWish there was an option to skip windows and shave a hundred bucks or so.
- f6v 5y agoHow long does the battery last with an i7 though?
- pjungwir 5y agoWow these look great! My family has two 2013 Macbook Airs I need to replace soon, and the latest Apple options feel like big compromises. I love that I can get high levels of RAM. Linux support is a hard requirement for me though. And I'd love to see some numbers re battery life. The price is lower than I expected. I wouldn't listen to the people saying it's too high. Nice job!
- chafporte 5y agoI want to see the charger plug and the socket. these are the first cause of death for laptops.
- nrp 5y agoThe Framework Laptop can charge through any of the four Expansion Card bays using a USB-C Expansion Card. This means that the charging port is replaceable. The power adapter also has separable AC and USB-C cables that can be individually replaced if ever needed.
- 4cao 5y agoAn excellent idea. I sincerely hope you succeed. 1. Would be good to know more about the UEFI on it¹, in particular: - Whose implementation will you be using? (AMI? Insyde?) - Will it expose the all the settings to the user? - Will it be easily flashable (via software)? - Is there going to be an easily accesible "alt-disable" mode for ME or, if not, an equivalent solution (e.g. the ability to leave it in manufacturing mode on the ordered unit)? (2. Here I wanted to ask about Thunderbolt compatibility but this question has been answered already², and the answer is: "maybe.") 3. What do you mean by the pre-order being open to the US only? Specifically, can I pay with a non-US issued credit card as long as I provide a shipping address in the US (forwarder's)? ¹) Also asked here by another person: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143526 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143526 ²) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143958 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143958
- kevinherron 5y agoThe odd resolution display (2256x1504) will likely require that your OS have good high DPI / fractional scaling support, making this not really an ideal candidate for running linux :/ (save your Wayland/sway/"works for me" story for somebody who cares. I do have a working high DPI Linux laptop setup and am fully aware of all the tradeoffs that are required from each of the various configurations)
- nrp 5y agoWe've found the display resolution and scaling to work well in Ubuntu 20.04 and Fedora.
- worik 5y agohttps://frame.work/ https://frame.work/
- dang 5y agoRecent threads: Preparing for Pre-Orders! (Framework modular laptop) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27052468 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27052468 - May 2021 (79 comments) The Framework Laptop - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26263508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26263508 - Feb 2021 (991 comments) There's also Framework’s repairable laptop is up for preorder, starting at $999 - https://techcrunch.com/2021/05/13/frameworks-repairable-laptop-is-up-for-pre-order-starting-at-999/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/05/13/frameworks-repairable-lapt... (via https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27142913 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27142913, but we merged that thread hither)
- andreareina 5y agoHi Dan, wondering if this thread should be merged in: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27143545
- car 5y agoThe power supply is using gallium nitride [0], very cool! Using GaN shows attention to detail, glad I ordered that as well. [0]https://frame.work/blog/power-adapter https://frame.work/blog/power-adapter
- GameOfKnowing 5y agoA) this is awesome. Great job B) they seem to be leaving some motherboard longevity on the table by not using an AMD and/or server CPUs, which tend to use the same socket & chipset for longer.
- rasz 5y ago"Repairable" >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? "Expansion Cards" More like a build-in USB 3.1 dongles :). How much are you planning to sell them for? How many USB-C "Expansion Cards" can I chain in a row for a hilarious meme video? :) "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? Competition today: "System76 laptop engineer SUPPORTS Right to Repair; interview with Louis Rossmann" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGle6z9KfZQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fGle6z9KfZQ
- wayneftw 5y agoAs a desktop user mainly, this is exciting! I really only use laptops for meetings, but next time I upgrade my laptop, I'm getting one!! If it works well, I might consider switching back to a laptop for my main workstation...
- IE6 5y agoWould love to see some kind of follow up with Louis Rossmann as he is currently a strong voice in the right to repair and I know he had a lot of positive things to say about this machine along with some criticisms and questions. I know the first release won't be everyone's utopia view of the perfect open laptop but I really like the concept and execution and have already pre-ordered :)