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Framework Laptop with Ubuntu Review

512 points by luisartola 5y ago

garyfirestorm 5y ago
I have a couple of years old Thinkpad X1 and the WiFi issues are pretty much the same on Ubuntu. Drops out after a while.
skunkworker 5y ago
Unfortunately I didn’t see any comments other than one in passing about the trackpad’s feel and software integration. At the moment I consider macOS to still have the edge over other implementations (software, the glass feel and haptics all in harmony), but I do know that in recent years the precision touchpads have come a long way.
- FearlessNebula 5y ago
  The trackpad is top-notch for something not a MacBook
2-718-281-828 5y ago
What is even the appeal of such a device. Linux runs as smooth as it gets on Thinkpads and those are also pretty upgradeable and components can be replaced if required. Maybe not onboard Wifi or GPU but pretty much anything else. So why the fuzz about this laptop?
pjerem 5y ago
Nice review. I'm sad about the speakers if they are as flat as they said, even more if they are not upgradable parts. MacBook speakers are really good for their purpose and I even consider them to be one of the importants things I trully love on macbooks (with the screen and the touchpad). Anyway, I'm still looking to buy a Framework laptop soon but I'd love to be able to test one before buying it.
- prmoustache 5y ago
  Who listen anything on speakers anyway? When travelling I will always use headset, when hooked to docking it uses my home studio monitor speakers and if I want to listen to watch a movie in the bed or a show in my kitchen it is paired to my Bose bluetooth speaker.
- kzrdude 5y ago
  And no mention of the touchpad quality either, in the review.
- james_in_the_uk 5y ago
  Most modern laptops use DSP to get the speakers to sound the way they do. If you switch that off they have the same ‘flat’ sound described in this review. Wonder if this can be solved in software ?
  - marcan_42 5y ago
    This is one of those things where Linux is a decade behind everything else because nobody has bothered to solve this problem yet. Yes, most laptops require DSP for the speakers to sound the way they're supposed to, and Linux has no way of handling this. The Windows driver provided by the OEM would normally do this, AIUI. While you can certainly manually add DSP to your system (PulseEffects, some random JACK or PipeWire flow, etc. - I do exactly this for headphone calibration on my desktop), what we need is a standardized mechanism for storing speaker profiles and having the audio subsystem seamlessly and transparently apply the right EQ and crossover profile for your device (there are usually more than 2 speakers). This is already a thing on e.g. Android, but not desktop Linux. This is required for MacBooks too. For Asahi Linux, once the underlying sound hardware works, we'll be spending some time working out a sane way to do this; I consider it a mandatory feature in this day and age. And once that's all done, everyone will be able to use it to get proper sound on any laptop as long as they can obtain or make an EQ profile. For the Macs, our plan is to measure impulse responses of what macOS does (we have the ability to snoop on its hardware accesses, so we can just play a test sound and capture the raw samples going to the speakers) and use them on Linux. This should give identical audio at moderate volumes. I'll have to check whether it also does some kind of compression or volume-dependent EQ worth replicating or emulating too, at higher volumes.
gbrindisi 5y ago
how is the battery life?
- Karupan 5y ago
  Same question here. I’d love to ditch my MBP for this, but I rely on portability heavily and will need something that will last a work day.
- 8jy89hui 5y ago
  I run the framework with a i7-1165G7 and Ubuntu+i3wm. I have had this laptop for ~3 weeks now. Battery life for me is running around 5-8 hours with full brightness, music streaming, and somewhat active use. It isn't fantastic but it is pretty reasonable. I haven't conducted any serious measurements but I'd say the battery life is pretty solid (and the screen is pretty bright). (This is all anecdotal though, If you really want serious numbers, I'd wait for some tech reviewer)
- FearlessNebula 5y ago
  Unfortunately it’s the Achilles heel of this device. I was getting 3-4 hours of battery on Linux web browsing and VSCode
Lio 5y ago
> I have a machine with better specs than a comparable MacBook Pro M1 for less. The “for less” bit might be true but is the better specs part? In a comparison[1] the M1 in a MacBook Air seems to handily beat the Intel Core i7 1165G7 chip on most metrics. Personally I’m not that CPU bound generally and I like Intel Linux compatibility so I’d still make the trade off. 1. https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare/intel-core-i7-1165g7-vs-apple-m1 https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare/intel-core-i7-1165g7-v...
- pja 5y ago
  Raw CPU perf obviously favours the M1, but if you're a dev, then a laptop that can take up to 64Gb of commodity RAM & as much fast storage as you can cram into it is pretty compelling. Compiling LLVM eats a lot of memory for instance. 16Gb is not really enough to take full advantage of the number of CPUs in a modern laptop. Is this a laptop for everyone? Not necessarily, but for certain classes of users it's manna from heaven.
  - google234123 5y ago
    You sure this is true? I would bet the M1 is faster https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2021/apple-m1-compiles-linux-30-faster-my-intel-i9 https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2021/apple-m1-compiles-lin...
    - samhw 5y ago
      As he explicitly points out, the benchmark amounts to cross-compiling for the Intel CPU vs compiling native code for the Mac CPU, so it's not exactly even. I have no dog in this hunt, I don't have an M1 Mac and I don't care, but it felt wrong to let that stand without correction.
    - pja 5y ago
      Kernel compiles are not particularly memory hungry. LLVM compiles on the other hand are very memory hungry, especially during linking. I’m sure there are other 'workstation-ish' jobs that people would happily run on their laptop if it had > 16Gb memory. 64Gb is quite the leap.
holografix 5y ago
This is such an interesting laptop. Hopefully an AMD based version with a more premium screen will be released.
- qbasic_forever 5y ago
  Yeah the AMD APU laptops are absolutely amazing. Be ready though, their Linux support is quite possibly the worst I have ever experienced in almost 30 years of using Linux. I'm typing this right now on a first gen Ryzen APU laptop (Raven Ridge) and it took more than three years for enough kernel bugs to be fixed that plain old Ubuntu LTS wouldn't constantly crash or hard lockup randomly. There were straight up silicon bugs and major sleep state issues that had to be sorted out and worked around with this early generation of chips. It's finally a great machine but it really soured me on the quality of AMD GPU code in the kernel--apparently it is a huge black box even to folks like Linus and can be quite the bug farm.
  - dagw 5y ago
    Be ready though, their Linux support is quite possibly the worst I have ever experienced in almost 30 years of using Linux. So it's not just me :) I bought a Ryzen APU since everybody kept telling me that AMD GPUs where the best when it came to Linux support, and it has been a massive pain. It finally runs almost stable using the latest Pop_OS, but it has been a not fun journey to get here.
  - holografix 5y ago
    Oh the “joys” of Linux. Precisely why I use a Mac. However everyone and then I get tempted.
  - devKnight 5y ago
    i've been running a ryzen 5 2500u laptop for the last 2 or so years. no issues at all getting things running with the various distros i've used
- je_bailey 5y ago
  So the problem with AMD and Framework is that the Framework uses Thunderbolt4 as the basis for it's expansion ports. Something that AMD doesn't natively come with.Not to say that it couldn't happen but I'm guessing 12th gen intel before AMD
phoronixrly 5y ago
> Graphics card > Can this be made upgradable in the future? Would seriouly consider building one for gaming if they were. IMO gaming with the current Framework design is a lost cause as cooling would become a major issue that I imagine will require designing around. If I recall correctly, framework's USB ports are Thunderbolt-compatible, has anyone tried using an eGPU enclosure with them?
- aero-glide2 5y ago
  Yes it works https://youtu.be/6NVkToI-vBI https://youtu.be/6NVkToI-vBI
- pja 5y ago
  It's an Intel Xe GPU, so it's probably integral to the CPU package.
- enricozb 5y ago
  Yep it works well. As is usual with linux, it took a frustrating day or two to set up but I now play Steam windows games with Proton on NixOS using an NVidia eGPU. I'm using X, not wayland though, but it works both on external displays and on the Framework's "internal" display.
kzrdude 5y ago
It looks like preorder is open in Germany now! Not in my country but it's a bit closer to home, maybe something can be arranged..
- andreareina 5y ago
  I went ahead and had mine shipped to a forwarder in the US, who then shipped it to me. Depends on how much in a hurry you are and whether you can find a forwarder you trust.
  - k8sToGo 5y ago
    and if you are willing to pay import duties.
    - andreareina 5y ago
      Yes that's a good point, especially since you're paying them twice (you're probably not getting a refund from the origin)
      - k8sToGo 5y ago
        Some of the carrier also charge crazy high fees for doing the import service.
- OJFord 5y ago
  Yes, UK, France, & Germany since 17 Dec. I noticed because I was checking every day - bit surprised then to only get the email (I'd also subscribed for updates/let me know when available) yesterday (4 Jan).
zibzab 5y ago
> This configuration at $1,600 USD is an incredible value compared to a MacBook and other comparable laptops. I know expensive laptops are the norm in SF, but does anyone else pay that much for laptops they may drop or looked at any time? (My current workhorse is a T-series thinkpad I got for free)
- Swenrekcah 5y ago
  I’ll bet your T-series cost at least $1600 2021 dollars when it was new.
  - zibzab 5y ago
    Fair point, those things are expensive when new. But then again, I would never buy those when just released.
  - flatiron 5y ago
    3 years later that same laptop is on eBay for $500 with almost perfect Linux compatibility though. It’s tough to beat used thinkpads on eBay. I never buy my personal laptops new.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- markyc 5y ago
  - retina screen - great touchpad (and gestures) - all day battery - no noise at all (optional but for me a big plus) - hinge that stands the test of time - aluminum (of very resistant) body i'll buy a laptop that checks these off under $1600, but so far m1 air is the only one I found, and it's cheaper than that
  - zibzab 5y ago
    But most of these are meaningless if you don't work full days on the run. Most of us sits in an office with a big monitor and a mouse and keyboard most of the time. And I don't get the "better productivity" talk either. During the most productive period of my life (by a huge margin, now I understand) I only had a $200 laptop. It was literally sold as "the cheapest laptop you will ever find". (I give you the noise though, I hate fan noise) Edit: do hinges ever break? Unless you sit on it, I have never seen this happen even with the cheapest laptops.
jazzyjackson 5y ago
I didn’t realize it had a hardwire switch for the webcam, that’s a nice feature they could put on the front page. I see it now on their “learn more” page. It would be nice if the expansion cards came with a plastic cap to protect the usb c plug, I wouldn’t want to toss the spare hdmi card in my bag as is, but in the spirit of open hardware maybe one will pop up on thigaverse.
- nrp 5y ago
  Yep! It's a hardware cut-off on both the camera and microphones. For the Expansion Cards, there are some discussions on holders for them as well as 3D printed designs from the community: https://community.frame.work/t/expansion-card-carrying-case/5432 https://community.frame.work/t/expansion-card-carrying-case/...
- yourapostasy 5y ago
  > It would be nice if the expansion cards came with a plastic cap to protect the usb c plug,... Have your pick of these [1]. There are expansion card holders/cases, which might also be an option. I'm evaluating reports of Framework+Linux-distros' sleep/wake/hibernate impacts upon video resolution switching, WiFi stability, and trackpad stability, to determine when to pull the trigger on purchasing a fully tricked-out model. I can afford to run an Apple M-class laptop (holding out for next batch) and a Framework at the same time, and make the effort to transition off the macOS ecosystem (any consumer-grade and office apps I want not available on Linux, I'm happy to run under Windows within Linux). The straw that broke my camel's back was the latest macOS update that deleted all Safari tabs. Around the same time, iOS update did something similar: deleted all back history on all Safari tabs. After the many other problems I put up with in macOS, I figured if I'm going to be spelunking around the system to fix Apple software problems as frequently as I have found myself doing in the past decade, I might as well work with others on the source, as Linux is getting awfully close to "good enough" quality these days for my daily driver, at least enough for me to give it a fair shot with sustained effort on peer hardware as my Apple gear. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Athingiverse.com+usb+c+cap https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Athingiverse.com+usb+c...
james_in_the_uk 5y ago
This looks like a great piece of kit. I’d usually be wary of dropping that much cash on a product from a vendor without a track record. How well backed / funded are these guys?
sethhovestol 5y ago
I also recently(~1 month) purchased one of these, (DIY edition + windows). So far my only complaint is the screen size. I was really wanting a 17" touch screen and a keyboard with a num pad. My first thought when I was opening + working with this was that the whole experience felt like a labor of love.
tkubacki 5y ago
Last time I checked there was no EU distribution. Anyone's aware if there are any plans ?
- kalnins 5y ago
  They are now accepting preorders for UK Germany and France [1]. [1] https://frame.work/blog/now-available-for-pre-order-in-uk-germany-and-france https://frame.work/blog/now-available-for-pre-order-in-uk-ge...
ameminator 5y ago
I like the idea of the Framework laptop, but I haven't paid more than $500 for a PC, ever.
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
  Do you adjust it for inflation? 1995 $500 is quite a bit more than 2021 $500
- dijit 5y ago
  What decent laptop can you get for $500. I paid £500 for a laptop 10 years ago (so, more with inflation) and it was: 1) Built really shit, fell apart after a year, broken hinges, weird fan noise 2) Got super hot. 3) had about 3hrs on battery if you avoided doing anything on it. 4) was huge and heavy. Not saying you’re wrong. But maybe your expectations vastly differ from mine.
  - unnouinceput 5y ago
    I paid $500 for each laptop my kids needed at beginning of pandemic in March 2020 (so $1000 in total). Each is a Ryzen 7, 16 GB RAM and 1 TB SSD (one of them is actually NVMe). Both laptops are still performing greatly without hiccups and they saw 2 vacations on the other side of the country during the 2 summers. And one of them (the NVMe one) I used it to do my work during the 2 weeks vacation last summer (virtualization and virtual machines for all my projects, though I had to get an external USB SSD for the virtual machines to fit with me). All in all if you take care of them it can be used as work horse during vacations. Only thing I can't do on them is last generation gaming, for that I need my usual work horse which is a $2500 desktop gaming rig.
    - dijit 5y ago
      Which laptops?
  - ulnarkressty 5y ago
    Refurb last year's model off eBay. Paid a quarter of the price on a high-end ultrabook and it looks brand new.
mgaunard 5y ago
I don't understand what's so configurable about this laptop. All you can choose is the expansion cards which control what ports you get, which is useless.
- snemvalts 5y ago
  The usb c ports have recesses for standardised dongles, that's mostly it.
- dijit 5y ago
  You should look at the Linus tech tips review. The components inside are all clearly marked and easy to upgrade. Even the screen has an easily removable bezel.
- einr 5y ago
  You can buy it without RAM, without storage, without WiFi card, and without OS and sort out all those things yourself. It's still a laptop with all that entails, but everything that was reasonable to make configurable or swappable -- they did it.
  - qbasic_forever 5y ago
    Do you actually save money if you buy all those components yourself? With all the shortages and issues it is a real nightmare sourcing inexpensive components these days. Unless you're at a huge scale and have contracts with the component manufacturers, or you've been hoarding a supply of parts from years ago... I bet it's going to be cheaper to tick a box when ordering vs. buying the same stuff from newegg, etc.
    - OJFord 5y ago
      Yes, even if only because you can choose something lower-spec'd than they offer, they're certainly not ripping anyone off (like any other manufacturer does!) vs. buying the same elsewhere. I checked Amazon & Scan at my time of pre-order (UK) and decided to go for it just for the.. 'thrill' of it. (Suppose I can/should check again nearer the time.)
DoingIsLearning 5y ago
I love the concept of the Framework and it fits my use-case but I really wish they would at least add some form of screen configurability/options to their tech roadmap. - I need a mate screen option, glossy displays in ambient light give me headaches. - Some folks will also probably want touchscreens (uber glossy), more power to them - Would also be very cool to bring back the old tech of transflective displays like the one in the Pixel Qi display. For folks that want to work outside (me again!) and are not fussed about color accuracy.
- markstos 5y ago
  You can buy a matte screen protector. https://viascreens.com/screen-protector/framework/laptop-13-5/matte https://viascreens.com/screen-protector/framework/laptop-13-...
  - FearlessNebula 5y ago
    Be very careful, I recall some Framework laptops being damaged by certain screen protectors
unnouinceput 5y ago
Quote: "If you need to do native iOS or macOS development then a MacBook is your obvious choice." No, it's not. I do cross-platform development for over a decade now and all I have are virtual machines. Over 2 dozens of them and I never owned any Apple hardware. Why pay for overpriced hardware when virtualization covers everything for a 100th of the price?
- marcellus23 5y ago
  Developing natively for iOS without testing on any iOS devices sounds like a shortcut to making mediocre iOS apps.
- Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
  If I remember correctly, Apple's EULA prohibits users from running virtualized macOS on a non-Apple hardware.
  - unnouinceput 5y ago
    Except I am not an user, I'm a developer, hence no EULA infringement. You might want to take a second look at their EULA for their Apple developer ID and you'll see that for those $100/year they sing a very different song. Money talks!
    - tpush 5y ago
      No, it's still prohibited. From Apple's terms for devs[0]: "You agree not to install, use or run the Apple SDKs on any non-Apple-branded computer, and not to install, use or run iOS, watchOS, tvOS, iPadOS, macOS and Provisioning Profiles on or in connection with devices other than Apple-branded products, or to enable others to do so." [0] https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/terms/apple-developer-program/Apple-Developer-Program-License-Agreement-20211213-English.pdf https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/terms/apple-de...
    - microtonal 5y ago
      Except I am not an user, I'm a developer, hence no EULA infringement. IANAL, but it doesn't work like that. Like any original creative work, macOS falls under copyright protection. Apple only gives you a licenses you to copy/run macOS on Apple-branded hardware. You might want to take a second look at their EULA for their Apple developer ID I don't see anything in the Apple Developer Agreement that would cancel the terms of the macOS EULA. But I'd love to be proven wrong, please give me a pointer. you'll see that for those $100/year they sing a very different song. Money talks! $100/year is less than pocket change for Apple. Even if they have a million paying developers (unlikely), it's ~1/3658th of their yearly revenue. If they'd make their iPhones 50 cents more expensive, they would make more money. The $100 per year is only there as one of the many ways to fight scammers. It makes it more costly to open many accounts, they have a credit card (with a name) on file, etc. Sure, it is not air tight, but it is just one of many measures.
j45 5y ago
Framework is remarkable. Intel MacBook Pro power in MacBook Air footprint. The build quality is far better than first gen devices, if not second. Given enough time, it might be able to get many people off macOS. The screen is amazingly crisp if you can overlook the fun resolution. Hard to look past 3x2. Why did I return it? I realized I needed to begin with a retail and turnkey Ubuntu experience where everything just worked and the things that mattered to me worked out of the box. Framework is not quite an optimized retail Ubuntu experience yet like a Dell XPS with mature drivers largely ready to go. - Battery life isn’t optimized and maximized out of the box, you will have to tpm. I have limited time for this at present. I’m sure there’s lots of interpretations that is not a a big deal. I’d rather be solving problems with the laptop than be solving problems in the laptop. I want max battery life without investing hours up front. - Fingerprint reader required manual setup - Wifi can have hiccups on the latest Ubuntu, and without trying into optimizing battery and kernels upset instead of getting things done. - Touchpad is so so. Good hardware, maybe more tweaking in Linux needed. Very used to macOS too. - HDMI port draws extra battery life when not in use so you have to to keep it removed. The components otherwise seem high quality and well put together. Again it’s not that these issues can’t be overcome, or that they won’t be out of the box in the future, I simply don’t have the time for either at present. It was a joy to use for browsing in Ubuntu 21.04 as stuff is broken in 21.10.
Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
Like a dream laptop, the only things I could wish for is an AMD option, Dvorak keyboard option and a matte screen option.
- lawn 5y ago
  I agree, but I would like an ergonomical keyboard. Something like this 34 key one, but built-in: https://github.com/pierrechevalier83/ferris https://github.com/pierrechevalier83/ferris
  - dharmaturtle 5y ago
    A laptop with an ortholinear+QMK option would probably be an instabuy from me. Hell... native QMK (or ZMK) alone would get my attention.
EugeneOZ 5y ago
If the author is here, please add to your review: trackpad; fans noise; heating; Bluetooth stability.
- luisartola 5y ago
  Will update the article and write in more detail about fan noise and heating. But in short: - Trackpad is decent. However, as some others have mentioned, it can be a bit touchy. It's happened a few times that I'm typing and I accidentally rest part of my right thumb on the trackpad and that changes the insertion point inadvertently. Not a big issue. As a matter of fact, it's more an indication that I need to correct my hands posture for better ergonomics. - Bluetooth. It's pretty stable. I have a Bluetooth mouse and Galaxy Buds connected and they work flawlessly. I'll try more devices. (edit: added Galaxy Buds over Bluetooth)
teekert 5y ago
The author does not address the screen resolution (and just says the screen is nice) but I'm hearing that the screen res is a bit to high to work with without scaling and a tad to low to do 2x scaling. And people don't like fractional scaling, at least in Gnome (it seems to look weird). Is this still an issue? I tend to prefer 1080p for this reason on 12-14" screens. My Thinkpad X13 gen 2 has a 13.3", 1920x1200 screen, windows sets it to 150%, which seems ok, although Ubuntu works well for me without scaling still. The Frame work laptop has an even higher res (2256x1504). I do hear people scaling the fonts and that seems to be a nice solution... I remember from back in the old days that I never really liked the look of this. What do people think of this? I'm hoping that in the future you can choose the screen (and easily get replacements as well, I hear they are working on that). Edit: I hope these issues are being addressed by established DE's, I'm assuming they won't be an issue on Canonical's (hypothetical ;)) Flutter based DE that's (obviously ;)) coming and on System76's Rust based new DE for Pop OS [0]. [0]: https://www.theregister.com/2021/11/08/system76_developing_new_linux_desktop/ https://www.theregister.com/2021/11/08/system76_developing_n...
- deleted 5y ago
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- gdwatson 5y ago
  I run Mint with 2x scaling on mine and I like it a lot. The screen's not quite as sharp as the one on the old XPS it replaced, but it's still quite nice. I run a middling-width monospace font, and I can't quite fit two 80-column windows side by side at 2x without reducing the font size, but if you want that then you want smaller text anyway. (If you run a narrow font it shouldn't be an issue.) Other UI elements are not unreasonably large in my opinion, but YMMV.
- flurdy 5y ago
  I've run Gnome+Wayland at 125% on a 32" 4k screen for over a year and noticed no issues. But that is just a sample size of 1. But a 1080p screen would be a no for me. At 2256x1504 on 13.5" screen I think Framework laptop would probably be fine at 100% ie no scaling
haspok 5y ago
Anyone wanting to upgrade their laptop in the near future should probably wait a few months, because new models that were announced at CES will show up with the next gen Intel or AMD CPUs that will hopefully be worth the wait. This looks like one of those "generational" upgrades that we have only every 7 years or so. I'm not sure if the Apple M1 is going to be beaten (especially in the efficiency department), but challenged for sure. Will have to wait and see.
prohobo 5y ago
The new Thinkpad, imo. I really like most of what they've done with it, but I'm just not into that keyboard... It doesn't look too usable, although people are saying it's good.
- IE6 5y ago
  Long time thinkpad user here - my previous was a W520 specifically for that older style keyboard. I am not a fan of Chiclet keyboards but I put the Framework keyboard up there with Thinkpads / OG Pixelbook. Too bad they're not out at a best buy for you to walk up and try...
thomasfl 5y ago
I really hope there will be some competition to the Apple M1 chip soon. All other laptops seems bulky, noisy and powerconsuming compared to the MacBook Pro M1 I've been using for a year now.
mastazi 5y ago
> Graphics card - Can this be made upgradable in the future? Would seriously consider building one for gaming if they were. Oh man if they found a way to have upgradable GPU on a laptop it would be next level! I think it can be done through M.2 slot (the reason why you can get M.2 to PCIe adapters is because M.2 provides a PCIe interface [1], some eGPU solutions use M.2 [2], IIRC it's just a 4 lanes connection through the M.2 connector but better than nothing) - so in order to make this possible on a laptop you would basically have to take small (mobile class) GPUs and solder them on a board that can be inserted in an M.2 slot... I think this is not rocket science but probably those GPUs would be expensive unless the concept really takes off and they are mass produced. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.2 [2] https://linustechtips.com/topic/831808-m2-x4-egpu-dock-fastest-external-laptop-gpu/ https://linustechtips.com/topic/831808-m2-x4-egpu-dock-faste... EDIT - I just remembered that in the past there were some gaming laptops with upgradeable GPU, I think they were made maybe by Asus? And if I remember correctly it was a proprietary connector (but I might be wrong) EDIT 2 - yes I was thinking about MXM and it was not proprietary, thank you to those who pointed that out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module EDIT 3 - my proposed idea didn't take cooling into consideration, as correctly pointed out in the comments.
- rg111 5y ago
  I will buy a Framework laptop in a heartbeat if they came with RTX GPUs. It would be doubly great if the GPU were upgradable as you say.
- jamesfmilne 5y ago
  These GPUs use an MXM connector, not M.2. I've got an HP Z2 Mini unit which also uses MXM for its GPU, and is upgradable. Due to the cooling requirements of a GPU, MXM modules are often pretty thick though, so would probably make the whole laptop thicker. You also have to consider how the heatsink & heatpipes for a GPU would attach to the GPU. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module
- Anonymous4272 5y ago
  It was dells area 51m recently. I own one, and it was marketed as upgradeable, though it turns out its only upgradable in the same class e.g. mine can only be swapped with a 2060 2070 or 2080.
8jy89hui 5y ago
Heads up to anyone who is running into the right click issue on Ubuntu relating to the framework laptop (right click acts a bit funky), I added the following lines to /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/40-libinput.conf Section "InputClass" Identifier "libinput touchpad catchall" MatchIsTouchpad "on" MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event\*" Driver "libinput" Option "ClickMethod" "clickfinger" Option "TappingButtonMap" "lrm" Option "Tapping" "false" EndSection This fixed the issue for me. Your mileage may vary though.
justsomehnguy 5y ago
At least Framework placed the Power button NOT in the keyboard top-right corner (oh don't let me start on this). But all other keys... does nobody ever uses Home/End/PgUp/PgDown/Insert/ContextMenu keys these days? <rant> Ask HN: Nobody ever uses Home/End/PgUp/PgDown/Insert/ContextMenu keys these days? I understand what the current laptop keyboard layouts are made by alien^W someone who is clearly not using the computer as a work tool, but we are close to a decade of this ...nonsense. All Fn+ keys REQUIRE using both hands. It is all fine until you are somewhere where you need to use one hand to hold your notebook and ... you can no longer press any Fn+ combo. I have a pretty big hands and I can't stretch my fingers enough to reach both bottom-left Fn and any key on the right side of keyboard. On a 14" laptop. Which could had all the keys (compare X220 and T440 for example) but it doesn't. Thinkpads are still have PrtScr on ContextMenu, which means I would 100% lose contents of the clipboard some hours later. Who needs PrtScr /there/ anyway? I want to hear the reasoning, like "we noticed (through our telemetry? how?) what our users are making screenshots all the day so we moved the PrtScr in the place of ContextMenu button"? You can replace the Space with PrtScr then, it would be pressed even more. 16" notebook? You will still have a sub 12" keyboard on it [0] 14" notebook? You won't even have the chance to see it's keyboard - you can see photo of it's back (like this is somehow important in the age where is nothing on a laptop back) but you can't see it's keyboard. </rant> [0] https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x1-extreme-g4/22tp2x1x1e4 https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x... [1] https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x1-carbon-gen9/22tp2x1x1c9 https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x...
- lproven 5y ago
  Agreed. So very much agreed. I do informal surveys of new laptops -- I wander around computer shops bashing out a sentence or two into Notepad or TextEdit. They're all awful now. But most people are used to awful and so don't care. Layouts suck too but that, to me, is secondary to key feel. If the layout is bad, some keystrokes will be bad; but if the key feel is bad, every keystroke will be bad.
  - bitwize 5y ago
    > I do informal surveys of new laptops -- I wander around computer shops bashing out a sentence or two into Notepad or TextEdit. I do this as well but I type in hello world in C. It helps me get a feel for what the keyboard is going to be like while programming. Most are atrocious, but not as bad as rubber-dome desktop KBs.
999900000999 5y ago
I legit taught myself basic Linux terminal since when I was 17 I couldn't afford a windows license. Half the fun, at least for me was always liberating an old Windows PC. The pricing on this isn't really competitive with buying a mid Windows Laptop + seeing if Ubuntu runs. Such fun to give up on Ubuntu and use Fedora since Fedora was supported better.
toberoni 5y ago
I'm using a Framework with Kubuntu and I have mixed feelings about it. I like the 3:2 screen ratio, repairability & the expansion cards. However, there are many downsides: - The battery life is ATROCIOUS, even after TLP etc. It's about the same as my 4-year-old(!) Thinkpad. Standby battery drain is the worst, easily 20-30% overnight, which I find unacceptable. I can't use this laptop as intended and always have to switch it off completely. Also because of this: - BIOS 3.06 ships with a bug that could result in the Framework not switching on if the battery is drained to 0%. The new beta BIOS might fix that, but errors like this show this is not a mature product. - There are no stable LVFS firmware upgrades for Linux yet and some users also report overwritten bootloaders after upgrading. Linux compatibility is definitely not there yet. - Many small annoyances on Linux: Fingerprint reader is not working out of the box, screen tearing, Bluetooth regressions etc. on certain kernels. - My Framework didn't turn on for almost 2 weeks. I tried different RAM/SSDs to no avail... then, it suddenly worked again with the original components. No problems after that, very strange. - The speakers are worse than the one in my smartphone. On most surfaces it sounds muffled and just not right. - My CPU fan made strange noises. I could fix that thanks to the great repairability though. - The fan can get very loud. Fortunately, it happens very rarely. Most of the time it's silent when browsing the internet or doing web dev work. - Build quality is clearly a step down from my old Thinkpad X1 Yoga. The hinge doesn't feel as strong, some keys are mushy/creaking and I'm skeptical my Framework will survive as many falls as my old laptop. Don't get me wrong: it's impressive for a first iteration product and a lot of modern laptops can't compete with it (despite the Framework being far more extensible). It ticks many boxes and offers a package that is hard to find these days (Lenovo & Co. seem to love soldered-on RAM, decreased keyboard travel, fewer ports). After many glowing reviews I just expected a bit more. Coming from a 4-yo premium Thinkpad I'm not sure the Framework is an upgrade. It's more fragile, (currently) has worse Linux support & no next-day business support. I would definitely wait for the next generation of laptops.
- benttoothpaste 5y ago
  > Standby battery drain is the worst, easily 20-30% overnight, which I find unacceptable. I guess that’s the “modern standby” that is replacing s3 sleep these days.
deleted 5y ago
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the_other 5y ago
Looking at the first photo, with all the dongles in their own little boxes, and the fact the author bought one "just in case", highlights for me that USB-C is a failure. It has introduced massive technical debt into the industry as a whole. Instead of companies all moving gently towards USB-C ubiquity, we have major players* choosing to solve the failings of USB-C on behalf of their users. This is a patch. It'll be 30 years or more before we're over this hump. *=Apple and Framework. I'm calling Framework "major" because they have the ear of the industry. They're a computer-person's computer company.
- stavros 5y ago
  What would USB-C being a success look like? Everyone throwing away every single device that has an old USB port immediately on day 1?
  - CubsFan1060 5y ago
    I am not OP, it a couple things: * Power and cable clarity. For most folks there is no real way to pick up a random power supply, and a random cable, and have any idea how fast your device will actually charge. Or if it will at all. Generally plugging a laptop into a charger that doesn’t supply sufficient power ends up in battery drain while plugged in. * A realistic hub. Every try to find a USBC hub? The best I’ve found without paying multiple hundreds of dollars includes a usbc port for power, and a usbc port for a device. I’ve yet to find a reasonable device that allows me to plug 4 usbc devices into one usbc port.
  - pashky 5y ago
    It would look like lots of new devices NOT shipping in 2022 with micro USB (and even mini USB!) and HDMI and barrel power connectors. But unfortunately they still do.
    - jackson1442 5y ago
      Curious- what's shipping with micro usb? I had to find a micro usb cord to charge an older device a few weeks ago and probably have 1 or 2 cords compared with 15 or so USB C cords (and I've never bought a USB C cord outright- those are all from products that shipped with C). As for mini usb, the only thing I own that uses it is my TI-84+ calculator.
boltzmann_brain 5y ago
errcorrectcode 5y ago
I don't honestly get the appeal. I have a ThinkPad T480 with: - i7-8650U CPU - Intel UHD Graphics 620 integrated and NVIDIA MX150 discrete graphics - WQHD display (2560x1440) - IR and HD cameras - Speakers are kinda crappy - True 10 hour runtime (limited by extra batteries) - Hot-swappable 72 Whr second battery - 64 GiB RAM # (it's not supposed to work according to Lenovo's and Intel's datasheet but it does) - 2 TiB M.2 SSD # - WiFi 6E + Bluetooth 5.2 # - 4G WWAN card - TPM 2.0 - Fingerprint reader - NFC - Milspec drop rating - Awesome IBM-heritage, water-resistant, backlit keyboard - Multitouch glass touchpad & - TrackPoint pointing stick (red thing in the middle of the keyboard) - Magnesium top display cover & - USB-C charging - Smartcard reader - Ports including USB-A and -C, SD, HDMI, Ethernet, and audio jack - Security lock slot - Thunderbolt 3 - Docking station (latest Ultra) that works # Customization & Parts swap It's massively upgradable. 8 captive screws, and the bottom case pops out, the keyboard pops out too. ~10 screws, and the motherboard and everything else is out. People make frakenpads because the parts stayed so similar over the years. All the screws are Phillips. No hunting for weird Torx bits.
- nrp 5y ago
  I've been a ThinkPad user in the past and was using a ThinkPad as my last laptop before starting Framework. In many ways, the Framework Laptop is a modern take on where ThinkPads came from. The T480 is relatively recent, but even there, the current generation of it (T14 Gen 2) loses one of the SO-DIMMs and the swappable battery.
- je_bailey 5y ago
  For me the appeal is that when a feature that I don't currently have becomes available it's straight forward for me to upgrade. When the next iteration of motherboards come out, I won't be buying a new laptop, ideally I will go here https://frame.work/marketplace https://frame.work/marketplace and just order the one that I want and follow the video guides to install it. The potential to customize this is huge, larger than any other laptop that I'm familiar with. The ability to self maintain, to fix every piece of the hardware if necessary just makes this thing a win for me.
  - 5y ago
smeej 5y ago
I am absolutely flummoxed by this review. Mine is configured with nearly identical specs (except that I have 64GB RAM) and is one of the worst purchases I've ever made. Enabling deep sleep works fine; waking from it is impossible. WiFi stops working. The touch pad becomes hypersensitive. I've resorted to turning the whole thing completely off after every use. But the battery still loses power even when the machine is completely powered down. The machine also freezes if I try to open a jpg or a PDF from the file explorer. Just completely freezes. Fan spins up like crazy, but as I mentioned, I have 64GB of RAM in this thing. It should be able to open a single one-page scanned document from my own scanner. If there's anything wrong with the file, this is the computer that's making the file poorly. The internet connection also just turns off after about half an hour of use. I have a Belkin dock with Ethernet plugged into it, which is then plugged into my Framework's USB-C port. This dock supports my work Mac all work day every day with no issues at all, so it's not the dock's problem. But the Framework? Internet just stops working after half an hour. And it manages to kill both wired and WiFi when it dies. I can turn them back on, but this is a ridiculous problem to have. This last point is pretty minor, but the hinges are floppy. The whole screen shakes around when I type on it. I have no idea how this author's experience is so much better than mine unless they just haven't used it much yet, but I regret absolutely everything about the purchase of this machine and feel like I was sold a bill of goods by all the glowing positive reviews all over the internet.
- choeger 5y ago
  Stupid question: Could it be that your hardware is faulty? Power supply, memory, or a defective Mainboard?
  - smeej 5y ago
    Maybe? All the hardware came from Framework (i.e., I haven't subbed in any parts), though, so it would point to a quality control issue at least.
- jonaustin 5y ago
  I'll give my own n=1 response: I use Arch Linux for comparison. The framework is not the best short-term laptop I've ever had, but it's Solid and if the company sticks around should be the best _long-term_ laptop I've ever owned. - Deep sleep works fine; wake works fine (with a ~10s delay; that's just linux i think) - Battery is far better than my Thinkpad X1 Carbon 6th gen. (have not really tested, but at a guess, solid 6-8 hours; which for linux is solidly average-to-good i think) - Never freezes - Fans are fine (way, way better than my 2018 macbook pro...) - Network is fine (I had issues at first, but was my fault due to faulty systemd configuration) - Hinges could be tighter, but no issue with practical use (I'm typing on this on my lap right now and it's fine) - I use it practically every day for hours at a time. - I've dropped it at least 2 times -- once from ~3-4 feet high (onto carpet). Totally fine functionally; though the monitor back now has a slight protrusion. - but hey, it's modular so I can just replace the screen at some point if I really want to (nit: hopefully they'll come out with a matte screen) Basically the original post here is n=1 so, i mean... the framework is the most exciting laptop "ideology" frankly ever. And even this first 'beta' version is super solid.
causi 5y ago
I just wish there was an option for having separate touchpad buttons. Not being able to clearly feel the dividing line between left and right click is a dealbreaker for me with any laptop.
- elzbardico 5y ago
  Nowadays most notebooks have multitouch touchpads and thus right clicking is done not by tapping in a specific button, but by a gesture (e.g.: tap anywhere in the touchpad with two fingers).
  - causi 5y ago
    Which is inevitably slower and clumsier than mousing with your index finger while keeping your thumb laid across the mouse buttons.
    - elzbardico 5y ago
      how do you even manage to that with a standard mouse?
aquova 5y ago
I got mine a few months ago, and overall I'm rather pleased with the purchase, however I don't think I'm quite as satisfied as the author of this article. For the most part, I think it's a really great machine, but there are some oddities that have caused me trouble. I've been running Arch Linux + Plasma on it, and have gone between X11 and Wayland (more on that later). - My touchpad is really flaky. Sometimes it works perfectly, but most of the time simply clicking just... doesn't work. Moving the cursor, tap to click, scrolling work fine, but the actual pressing the touchpad to an audible click won't result in a click on the machine. This seems to be a hardware issue, it can sometimes be remedied by pressing down across the whole touchpad, but not always, and it seems to be worse when it's cold in the room. Also, once in a blue moon it won't initialize quite right when waking from sleep causing it to be hypersensitive; putting the device back to sleep and rewaking it fixes that. - They mentioned they were fond of the battery life, which surprises me as that seems to be the devices biggest failing. I'm somewhat new to Linux laptops, but even after setting up hibernate and deep sleep and all that, I simply can't leave it on sleep over night or it will drain the entire battery. The battery life while using it is fine, not as good as my old MacBook, but I've had to start shutting it down when not in use. - The speakers really aren't great. A big part of that is the fact that they're downward facing, which seems a really bizarre design decision to me. - Fractional scaling. This is more of an issue with Linux itself. I actually really like the display as a whole, particularly the 3:2 ratio. However, 1x is too small, and I found 2x to be too large. I've been using 150% scaling, which worked well for the most part, except some applications wouldn't obey it (cough Steam). I then tried switching to Wayland, which seems to have fixed Steam's issues (and the trackpad scrolling notably improved oddly), but xwayland programs have really blurry text.. There's always a bit of a tradeoff, although I'm still experimenting with this. I also find this display gives me more eye strain at later hours than other screens I use. YMMV. Overall, I would say I am satisfied with my purchase however. I love the keyboard, love the modularity, I like the customizability. I don't regret the purchase, but I do think there are some things potential buyers should be aware of.
- bo1024 5y ago
  There was a touchpad fix that they mailed out to people a while back. Maybe that’s related to your problem? I never applied it because mine seems to be fine.
sneak 5y ago
> The screen has a 3:2 ratio, high-resolution, and super bright colors. No. Only in backwards anachronistic PC land is 2256x1504 "high resolution" in 2022. The 14" Macbook Pro is 3024x1964. My XPS actually has 3840x2160. Please kill this meme. 1500 pixels tall is not a high res screen.
cassepipe 5y ago
Lots of people seem to complain about Ubuntu support on this machine. There seems to be a consensus that Fedora is the option that works best for that machine.
- nrp 5y ago
  I noted this elsewhere, but we've been providing the team at Fedora with hardware, which has helped make Fedora 35 work great out of the box. We've also been doing that with some smaller distros like Elementary. That isn't a relationship we have with Ubuntu at the moment, and it shows, though Ubuntu 21.04 works well: https://community.frame.work/t/ubuntu-21-04-on-the-framework-laptop/2722 https://community.frame.work/t/ubuntu-21-04-on-the-framework...
deleted 5y ago
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jackson1442 5y ago
I tried it for a few weeks but had to ultimately send it back. Tried Arch and Ubuntu, but even as a developer who's very comfortable using Linux for servers and whatnot (moreso than consumer windows, honestly), I just couldn't deal with the battle to accomplish anything on desktop Linux. Want fingerprint support (which is supposedly first-class)? Spend an hour fiddling with drivers and configuration files until it works. Want to download discord? Spend an hour trying out the different methods of installing it until you find the one that works acceptably for your installation. and so on. It was not uncommon to wake it up from sleep only to have it kernel. That's not acceptable when I'm trying to take a timed quiz in class. And yet I still think it's a great machine. It's just not for me- someone who's purchasing as an enthusiast or looking for a "project laptop" would probably love it. I need a laptop with high availability though, and I just don't think desktop Linux is ready for that.
ativzzz 5y ago
I have one of these laptops running an arch based distro. Some of the hardware was buggy especially wifi/bluetooth and the intel GPU had some issues with KDE but all of the issues are fixed. Still requires a reboot here and there but pretty much all computers I've had do at some point. Battery life isn't great. Overall I wish I spent $500 more and bought an M1.
ativzzz 5y ago
I have one of these laptops running an arch based distro. Some of the hardware was buggy especially wifi/bluetooth and the intel GPU had some issues with KDE but all of the issues are fixed. Still requires a reboot here and there but pretty much all computers I've had do at some point. Battery life isn't great. I'm not unsatisfied, but overall I wish I spent $500 more and bought an M1.
smaslennikov 5y ago
I have a batch one Framework laptop with the i7-1185G7. Overall, I absolutely love it, but it didn't come easy. 1. Ubuntu 21.10 had horrid support of the hardware. Eventually switching to Fedora 35 fixed most bugs 2. The DisplayPort expansion card I received was faulty and sometimes caused horrible performance. 3. EMI shields were incorrectly placed on my expansion slots[^1]. Eventually I simply removed them to get full performance back. In the end, after months of tweaking and talking to support, I got a new DisplayPort card, switched to Fedora 35 and everything works smoothly. [1]: https://knowledgebase.frame.work/en_us/one-port-on-my-laptop-does-not-function-correctly-r1mqMnTet https://knowledgebase.frame.work/en_us/one-port-on-my-laptop...
ThinkBeat 5y ago
This is so over the top enthusiastic I hope he is getting paid. You can swap battery, harddrive, memory, network chip yay. That was possible on nearly all laptops some years back. At the enterprise level both Dell and Lenovo have models that does most of this. (Unless recently discontinued) Quite a few laptops had "bays" where you could swap out extra harddrive, cd rom, extra battery, Then a while back computer had PCMCIA/PC Card, that let you add all sorts of very useful hardware. All in all this is far less user configurable than a two bay, to pcmia slots. (with battery, memory easily upgraded). I would love someone to come out with a laptop like that again. Further modules for the framework are expensive, made by a single company, few variants. If the company fails you are stuck. On the old style laptops, ram, memory, cd player, extra hard drive, batteries, PCMCIA/PC Cards were all usually available from several sources. Bays might be the most proprietary.
- luisartola 5y ago
  I'm not affiliated with Framework. I'm genuinely impressed with the experience overall and wrote an honest unsolicited review. Not everything is perfect though as noted in the article. But, in a world where hardware is dominated by a few, it's a breath of fresh air to see initiatives like the Framework Laptop.
- DHowett 5y ago
  > That was possible on nearly all laptops some years back. Not necessarily in this size class/with this chassis design. "Ultrabooks" as a class haven't been nearly as user-serviceable as you're suggesting. > made by a single company, few variants; Bays might be the most proprietary Eh. I'm not terribly worried about this given that they're TB3 or TB4 (to wit: PCIe) and provided with reference designs[1]. I have to admit, though, that I couldn't easily find IBM's old expansion bay spec or proprietary connector... or for that matter, HP's, or Dell's, or... well, yes. Bays sure are proprietary. To extoll the virtues of somebody else's bays and in the same breath deny these is at best misplaced nostalgia. :) [1]: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards
fernandogrd 5y ago
I'm surprised by comments about how it didn't work ok for some people. It worked almost flawless for me, maybe because I chose Fedora 35? Things I did: - Enabled fractional scaling to use it at 150% - Changed suspend from s2idle to deep, archwiki mentions that: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop One small thing I loved about the laptop was how I was able to (albeit slowly) charge it with a pixel 3 charger.
- clepto 5y ago
  I as well am very surprised by how many people seem to have had issues with it. I have used Manjaro and Pop OS on it, and encountered basically 0 issues on either one. The only issue with Pop OS is Gnome’s support for fractional scaling is pretty terrible(at least at the time I tried it). I use Cinnamon on Manjaro and pretty much everything works flawlessly. The only thing I had any issue with was the fingerprint scanner, though I mostly just gave up on it at the first sign of issue as it wasn’t a feature I really cared about having. I haven’t had any issues with battery life, and I just carry an Anker portable battery with it so it’s not really a concern anyways, and having that gets me charging for laptop, phone, or anything else that can use USB C power. Even still, I’ve observed as high as like 8 hours of battery life while being actively used and that’s more than enough for me. Might be worth noting I don’t primarily use a laptop though. It’s almost exclusively for when I’m out somewhere and an issue comes up or something.
tpl 5y ago
My has been a dream with NixOS on it. A great dev laptop really. The Intel GPU is enough to play around with graphics programming too.
- VTimofeenko 5y ago
  What kernel do you use on NixOS? Bluetooth connection was spotty for me until I used 5.15.12.
smm11 5y ago
Dell XPS
zepto 5y ago
> I have a machine with better specs than a comparable MacBook Pro M1 for less. …except for display quality, performance and battery life.
dymk 5y ago
This person purchased this laptop no more than a few weeks ago. How is this a review? It's basically just an unboxing and "first impressions". I'd like to know what somebody thinks of this laptop after having used it for a few months, at least.
zquestz 5y ago
Honestly, the framework was one of the better purchases I have made. There were definitely some Bluetooth hiccups, but all other functionality worked perfectly out of the box on Arch. The wiki included a few key tips. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop One thing to note, is that I had a bad time with tlp. I would suggest using auto-cpufreq if you want better battery life.

512 points by luisartola 5y ago

I have a couple of years old Thinkpad X1 and the WiFi issues are pretty much the same on Ubuntu. Drops out after a while.

skunkworker 5y ago

Unfortunately I didn’t see any comments other than one in passing about the trackpad’s feel and software integration. At the moment I consider macOS to still have the edge over other implementations (software, the glass feel and haptics all in harmony), but I do know that in recent years the precision touchpads have come a long way.

FearlessNebula 5y ago
The trackpad is top-notch for something not a MacBook

2-718-281-828 5y ago

What is even the appeal of such a device. Linux runs as smooth as it gets on Thinkpads and those are also pretty upgradeable and components can be replaced if required. Maybe not onboard Wifi or GPU but pretty much anything else. So why the fuzz about this laptop?

pjerem 5y ago

Nice review. I'm sad about the speakers if they are as flat as they said, even more if they are not upgradable parts. MacBook speakers are really good for their purpose and I even consider them to be one of the importants things I trully love on macbooks (with the screen and the touchpad). Anyway, I'm still looking to buy a Framework laptop soon but I'd love to be able to test one before buying it.

prmoustache 5y ago
Who listen anything on speakers anyway? When travelling I will always use headset, when hooked to docking it uses my home studio monitor speakers and if I want to listen to watch a movie in the bed or a show in my kitchen it is paired to my Bose bluetooth speaker.
kzrdude 5y ago
And no mention of the touchpad quality either, in the review.
james_in_the_uk 5y ago
Most modern laptops use DSP to get the speakers to sound the way they do. If you switch that off they have the same ‘flat’ sound described in this review. Wonder if this can be solved in software ?
- marcan_42 5y ago
  This is one of those things where Linux is a decade behind everything else because nobody has bothered to solve this problem yet. Yes, most laptops require DSP for the speakers to sound the way they're supposed to, and Linux has no way of handling this. The Windows driver provided by the OEM would normally do this, AIUI. While you can certainly manually add DSP to your system (PulseEffects, some random JACK or PipeWire flow, etc. - I do exactly this for headphone calibration on my desktop), what we need is a standardized mechanism for storing speaker profiles and having the audio subsystem seamlessly and transparently apply the right EQ and crossover profile for your device (there are usually more than 2 speakers). This is already a thing on e.g. Android, but not desktop Linux. This is required for MacBooks too. For Asahi Linux, once the underlying sound hardware works, we'll be spending some time working out a sane way to do this; I consider it a mandatory feature in this day and age. And once that's all done, everyone will be able to use it to get proper sound on any laptop as long as they can obtain or make an EQ profile. For the Macs, our plan is to measure impulse responses of what macOS does (we have the ability to snoop on its hardware accesses, so we can just play a test sound and capture the raw samples going to the speakers) and use them on Linux. This should give identical audio at moderate volumes. I'll have to check whether it also does some kind of compression or volume-dependent EQ worth replicating or emulating too, at higher volumes.

gbrindisi 5y ago

how is the battery life?

Karupan 5y ago
Same question here. I’d love to ditch my MBP for this, but I rely on portability heavily and will need something that will last a work day.
8jy89hui 5y ago
I run the framework with a i7-1165G7 and Ubuntu+i3wm. I have had this laptop for ~3 weeks now. Battery life for me is running around 5-8 hours with full brightness, music streaming, and somewhat active use. It isn't fantastic but it is pretty reasonable. I haven't conducted any serious measurements but I'd say the battery life is pretty solid (and the screen is pretty bright). (This is all anecdotal though, If you really want serious numbers, I'd wait for some tech reviewer)
FearlessNebula 5y ago
Unfortunately it’s the Achilles heel of this device. I was getting 3-4 hours of battery on Linux web browsing and VSCode

Lio 5y ago

> I have a machine with better specs than a comparable MacBook Pro M1 for less. The “for less” bit might be true but is the better specs part? In a comparison[1] the M1 in a MacBook Air seems to handily beat the Intel Core i7 1165G7 chip on most metrics. Personally I’m not that CPU bound generally and I like Intel Linux compatibility so I’d still make the trade off. 1. https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare/intel-core-i7-1165g7-vs-apple-m1 https://nanoreview.net/en/cpu-compare/intel-core-i7-1165g7-v...

pja 5y ago
Raw CPU perf obviously favours the M1, but if you're a dev, then a laptop that can take up to 64Gb of commodity RAM & as much fast storage as you can cram into it is pretty compelling. Compiling LLVM eats a lot of memory for instance. 16Gb is not really enough to take full advantage of the number of CPUs in a modern laptop. Is this a laptop for everyone? Not necessarily, but for certain classes of users it's manna from heaven.
- google234123 5y ago
  You sure this is true? I would bet the M1 is faster https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2021/apple-m1-compiles-linux-30-faster-my-intel-i9 https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2021/apple-m1-compiles-lin...
  - samhw 5y ago
    As he explicitly points out, the benchmark amounts to cross-compiling for the Intel CPU vs compiling native code for the Mac CPU, so it's not exactly even. I have no dog in this hunt, I don't have an M1 Mac and I don't care, but it felt wrong to let that stand without correction.
  - pja 5y ago
    Kernel compiles are not particularly memory hungry. LLVM compiles on the other hand are very memory hungry, especially during linking. I’m sure there are other 'workstation-ish' jobs that people would happily run on their laptop if it had > 16Gb memory. 64Gb is quite the leap.

holografix 5y ago

This is such an interesting laptop. Hopefully an AMD based version with a more premium screen will be released.

qbasic_forever 5y ago
Yeah the AMD APU laptops are absolutely amazing. Be ready though, their Linux support is quite possibly the worst I have ever experienced in almost 30 years of using Linux. I'm typing this right now on a first gen Ryzen APU laptop (Raven Ridge) and it took more than three years for enough kernel bugs to be fixed that plain old Ubuntu LTS wouldn't constantly crash or hard lockup randomly. There were straight up silicon bugs and major sleep state issues that had to be sorted out and worked around with this early generation of chips. It's finally a great machine but it really soured me on the quality of AMD GPU code in the kernel--apparently it is a huge black box even to folks like Linus and can be quite the bug farm.
- dagw 5y ago
  Be ready though, their Linux support is quite possibly the worst I have ever experienced in almost 30 years of using Linux. So it's not just me :) I bought a Ryzen APU since everybody kept telling me that AMD GPUs where the best when it came to Linux support, and it has been a massive pain. It finally runs almost stable using the latest Pop_OS, but it has been a not fun journey to get here.
- holografix 5y ago
  Oh the “joys” of Linux. Precisely why I use a Mac. However everyone and then I get tempted.
- devKnight 5y ago
  i've been running a ryzen 5 2500u laptop for the last 2 or so years. no issues at all getting things running with the various distros i've used
je_bailey 5y ago
So the problem with AMD and Framework is that the Framework uses Thunderbolt4 as the basis for it's expansion ports. Something that AMD doesn't natively come with.Not to say that it couldn't happen but I'm guessing 12th gen intel before AMD

phoronixrly 5y ago

> Graphics card > Can this be made upgradable in the future? Would seriouly consider building one for gaming if they were. IMO gaming with the current Framework design is a lost cause as cooling would become a major issue that I imagine will require designing around. If I recall correctly, framework's USB ports are Thunderbolt-compatible, has anyone tried using an eGPU enclosure with them?

aero-glide2 5y ago
Yes it works https://youtu.be/6NVkToI-vBI https://youtu.be/6NVkToI-vBI
pja 5y ago
It's an Intel Xe GPU, so it's probably integral to the CPU package.
enricozb 5y ago
Yep it works well. As is usual with linux, it took a frustrating day or two to set up but I now play Steam windows games with Proton on NixOS using an NVidia eGPU. I'm using X, not wayland though, but it works both on external displays and on the Framework's "internal" display.

kzrdude 5y ago

It looks like preorder is open in Germany now! Not in my country but it's a bit closer to home, maybe something can be arranged..

andreareina 5y ago
I went ahead and had mine shipped to a forwarder in the US, who then shipped it to me. Depends on how much in a hurry you are and whether you can find a forwarder you trust.
- k8sToGo 5y ago
  and if you are willing to pay import duties.
  - andreareina 5y ago
    Yes that's a good point, especially since you're paying them twice (you're probably not getting a refund from the origin)
    - k8sToGo 5y ago
      Some of the carrier also charge crazy high fees for doing the import service.
OJFord 5y ago
Yes, UK, France, & Germany since 17 Dec. I noticed because I was checking every day - bit surprised then to only get the email (I'd also subscribed for updates/let me know when available) yesterday (4 Jan).

zibzab 5y ago

> This configuration at $1,600 USD is an incredible value compared to a MacBook and other comparable laptops. I know expensive laptops are the norm in SF, but does anyone else pay that much for laptops they may drop or looked at any time? (My current workhorse is a T-series thinkpad I got for free)

Swenrekcah 5y ago
I’ll bet your T-series cost at least $1600 2021 dollars when it was new.
- zibzab 5y ago
  Fair point, those things are expensive when new. But then again, I would never buy those when just released.
- flatiron 5y ago
  3 years later that same laptop is on eBay for $500 with almost perfect Linux compatibility though. It’s tough to beat used thinkpads on eBay. I never buy my personal laptops new.
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markyc 5y ago
- retina screen - great touchpad (and gestures) - all day battery - no noise at all (optional but for me a big plus) - hinge that stands the test of time - aluminum (of very resistant) body i'll buy a laptop that checks these off under $1600, but so far m1 air is the only one I found, and it's cheaper than that
- zibzab 5y ago
  But most of these are meaningless if you don't work full days on the run. Most of us sits in an office with a big monitor and a mouse and keyboard most of the time. And I don't get the "better productivity" talk either. During the most productive period of my life (by a huge margin, now I understand) I only had a $200 laptop. It was literally sold as "the cheapest laptop you will ever find". (I give you the noise though, I hate fan noise) Edit: do hinges ever break? Unless you sit on it, I have never seen this happen even with the cheapest laptops.

jazzyjackson 5y ago

I didn’t realize it had a hardwire switch for the webcam, that’s a nice feature they could put on the front page. I see it now on their “learn more” page. It would be nice if the expansion cards came with a plastic cap to protect the usb c plug, I wouldn’t want to toss the spare hdmi card in my bag as is, but in the spirit of open hardware maybe one will pop up on thigaverse.

nrp 5y ago
Yep! It's a hardware cut-off on both the camera and microphones. For the Expansion Cards, there are some discussions on holders for them as well as 3D printed designs from the community: https://community.frame.work/t/expansion-card-carrying-case/5432 https://community.frame.work/t/expansion-card-carrying-case/...
yourapostasy 5y ago
> It would be nice if the expansion cards came with a plastic cap to protect the usb c plug,... Have your pick of these [1]. There are expansion card holders/cases, which might also be an option. I'm evaluating reports of Framework+Linux-distros' sleep/wake/hibernate impacts upon video resolution switching, WiFi stability, and trackpad stability, to determine when to pull the trigger on purchasing a fully tricked-out model. I can afford to run an Apple M-class laptop (holding out for next batch) and a Framework at the same time, and make the effort to transition off the macOS ecosystem (any consumer-grade and office apps I want not available on Linux, I'm happy to run under Windows within Linux). The straw that broke my camel's back was the latest macOS update that deleted all Safari tabs. Around the same time, iOS update did something similar: deleted all back history on all Safari tabs. After the many other problems I put up with in macOS, I figured if I'm going to be spelunking around the system to fix Apple software problems as frequently as I have found myself doing in the past decade, I might as well work with others on the source, as Linux is getting awfully close to "good enough" quality these days for my daily driver, at least enough for me to give it a fair shot with sustained effort on peer hardware as my Apple gear. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Athingiverse.com+usb+c+cap https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Athingiverse.com+usb+c...

james_in_the_uk 5y ago

This looks like a great piece of kit. I’d usually be wary of dropping that much cash on a product from a vendor without a track record. How well backed / funded are these guys?

sethhovestol 5y ago

I also recently(~1 month) purchased one of these, (DIY edition + windows). So far my only complaint is the screen size. I was really wanting a 17" touch screen and a keyboard with a num pad. My first thought when I was opening + working with this was that the whole experience felt like a labor of love.

tkubacki 5y ago

Last time I checked there was no EU distribution. Anyone's aware if there are any plans ?

kalnins 5y ago
They are now accepting preorders for UK Germany and France [1]. [1] https://frame.work/blog/now-available-for-pre-order-in-uk-germany-and-france https://frame.work/blog/now-available-for-pre-order-in-uk-ge...

ameminator 5y ago

I like the idea of the Framework laptop, but I haven't paid more than $500 for a PC, ever.

Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
Do you adjust it for inflation? 1995 $500 is quite a bit more than 2021 $500
dijit 5y ago
What decent laptop can you get for $500. I paid £500 for a laptop 10 years ago (so, more with inflation) and it was: 1) Built really shit, fell apart after a year, broken hinges, weird fan noise 2) Got super hot. 3) had about 3hrs on battery if you avoided doing anything on it. 4) was huge and heavy. Not saying you’re wrong. But maybe your expectations vastly differ from mine.
- unnouinceput 5y ago
  I paid $500 for each laptop my kids needed at beginning of pandemic in March 2020 (so $1000 in total). Each is a Ryzen 7, 16 GB RAM and 1 TB SSD (one of them is actually NVMe). Both laptops are still performing greatly without hiccups and they saw 2 vacations on the other side of the country during the 2 summers. And one of them (the NVMe one) I used it to do my work during the 2 weeks vacation last summer (virtualization and virtual machines for all my projects, though I had to get an external USB SSD for the virtual machines to fit with me). All in all if you take care of them it can be used as work horse during vacations. Only thing I can't do on them is last generation gaming, for that I need my usual work horse which is a $2500 desktop gaming rig.
  - dijit 5y ago
    Which laptops?
- ulnarkressty 5y ago
  Refurb last year's model off eBay. Paid a quarter of the price on a high-end ultrabook and it looks brand new.

mgaunard 5y ago

I don't understand what's so configurable about this laptop. All you can choose is the expansion cards which control what ports you get, which is useless.

snemvalts 5y ago
The usb c ports have recesses for standardised dongles, that's mostly it.
dijit 5y ago
You should look at the Linus tech tips review. The components inside are all clearly marked and easy to upgrade. Even the screen has an easily removable bezel.
einr 5y ago
You can buy it without RAM, without storage, without WiFi card, and without OS and sort out all those things yourself. It's still a laptop with all that entails, but everything that was reasonable to make configurable or swappable -- they did it.
- qbasic_forever 5y ago
  Do you actually save money if you buy all those components yourself? With all the shortages and issues it is a real nightmare sourcing inexpensive components these days. Unless you're at a huge scale and have contracts with the component manufacturers, or you've been hoarding a supply of parts from years ago... I bet it's going to be cheaper to tick a box when ordering vs. buying the same stuff from newegg, etc.
  - OJFord 5y ago
    Yes, even if only because you can choose something lower-spec'd than they offer, they're certainly not ripping anyone off (like any other manufacturer does!) vs. buying the same elsewhere. I checked Amazon & Scan at my time of pre-order (UK) and decided to go for it just for the.. 'thrill' of it. (Suppose I can/should check again nearer the time.)

DoingIsLearning 5y ago

I love the concept of the Framework and it fits my use-case but I really wish they would at least add some form of screen configurability/options to their tech roadmap. - I need a mate screen option, glossy displays in ambient light give me headaches. - Some folks will also probably want touchscreens (uber glossy), more power to them - Would also be very cool to bring back the old tech of transflective displays like the one in the Pixel Qi display. For folks that want to work outside (me again!) and are not fussed about color accuracy.

markstos 5y ago
You can buy a matte screen protector. https://viascreens.com/screen-protector/framework/laptop-13-5/matte https://viascreens.com/screen-protector/framework/laptop-13-...
- FearlessNebula 5y ago
  Be very careful, I recall some Framework laptops being damaged by certain screen protectors

unnouinceput 5y ago

Quote: "If you need to do native iOS or macOS development then a MacBook is your obvious choice." No, it's not. I do cross-platform development for over a decade now and all I have are virtual machines. Over 2 dozens of them and I never owned any Apple hardware. Why pay for overpriced hardware when virtualization covers everything for a 100th of the price?

marcellus23 5y ago
Developing natively for iOS without testing on any iOS devices sounds like a shortcut to making mediocre iOS apps.
Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago
If I remember correctly, Apple's EULA prohibits users from running virtualized macOS on a non-Apple hardware.
- unnouinceput 5y ago
  Except I am not an user, I'm a developer, hence no EULA infringement. You might want to take a second look at their EULA for their Apple developer ID and you'll see that for those $100/year they sing a very different song. Money talks!
  - tpush 5y ago
    No, it's still prohibited. From Apple's terms for devs[0]: "You agree not to install, use or run the Apple SDKs on any non-Apple-branded computer, and not to install, use or run iOS, watchOS, tvOS, iPadOS, macOS and Provisioning Profiles on or in connection with devices other than Apple-branded products, or to enable others to do so." [0] https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/terms/apple-developer-program/Apple-Developer-Program-License-Agreement-20211213-English.pdf https://developer.apple.com/support/downloads/terms/apple-de...
  - microtonal 5y ago
    Except I am not an user, I'm a developer, hence no EULA infringement. IANAL, but it doesn't work like that. Like any original creative work, macOS falls under copyright protection. Apple only gives you a licenses you to copy/run macOS on Apple-branded hardware. You might want to take a second look at their EULA for their Apple developer ID I don't see anything in the Apple Developer Agreement that would cancel the terms of the macOS EULA. But I'd love to be proven wrong, please give me a pointer. you'll see that for those $100/year they sing a very different song. Money talks! $100/year is less than pocket change for Apple. Even if they have a million paying developers (unlikely), it's ~1/3658th of their yearly revenue. If they'd make their iPhones 50 cents more expensive, they would make more money. The $100 per year is only there as one of the many ways to fight scammers. It makes it more costly to open many accounts, they have a credit card (with a name) on file, etc. Sure, it is not air tight, but it is just one of many measures.

j45 5y ago

Framework is remarkable. Intel MacBook Pro power in MacBook Air footprint. The build quality is far better than first gen devices, if not second. Given enough time, it might be able to get many people off macOS. The screen is amazingly crisp if you can overlook the fun resolution. Hard to look past 3x2. Why did I return it? I realized I needed to begin with a retail and turnkey Ubuntu experience where everything just worked and the things that mattered to me worked out of the box. Framework is not quite an optimized retail Ubuntu experience yet like a Dell XPS with mature drivers largely ready to go. - Battery life isn’t optimized and maximized out of the box, you will have to tpm. I have limited time for this at present. I’m sure there’s lots of interpretations that is not a a big deal. I’d rather be solving problems with the laptop than be solving problems in the laptop. I want max battery life without investing hours up front. - Fingerprint reader required manual setup - Wifi can have hiccups on the latest Ubuntu, and without trying into optimizing battery and kernels upset instead of getting things done. - Touchpad is so so. Good hardware, maybe more tweaking in Linux needed. Very used to macOS too. - HDMI port draws extra battery life when not in use so you have to to keep it removed. The components otherwise seem high quality and well put together. Again it’s not that these issues can’t be overcome, or that they won’t be out of the box in the future, I simply don’t have the time for either at present. It was a joy to use for browsing in Ubuntu 21.04 as stuff is broken in 21.10.

Andrew_nenakhov 5y ago

Like a dream laptop, the only things I could wish for is an AMD option, Dvorak keyboard option and a matte screen option.

lawn 5y ago
I agree, but I would like an ergonomical keyboard. Something like this 34 key one, but built-in: https://github.com/pierrechevalier83/ferris https://github.com/pierrechevalier83/ferris
- dharmaturtle 5y ago
  A laptop with an ortholinear+QMK option would probably be an instabuy from me. Hell... native QMK (or ZMK) alone would get my attention.

EugeneOZ 5y ago

If the author is here, please add to your review: trackpad; fans noise; heating; Bluetooth stability.

luisartola 5y ago
Will update the article and write in more detail about fan noise and heating. But in short: - Trackpad is decent. However, as some others have mentioned, it can be a bit touchy. It's happened a few times that I'm typing and I accidentally rest part of my right thumb on the trackpad and that changes the insertion point inadvertently. Not a big issue. As a matter of fact, it's more an indication that I need to correct my hands posture for better ergonomics. - Bluetooth. It's pretty stable. I have a Bluetooth mouse and Galaxy Buds connected and they work flawlessly. I'll try more devices. (edit: added Galaxy Buds over Bluetooth)

teekert 5y ago

The author does not address the screen resolution (and just says the screen is nice) but I'm hearing that the screen res is a bit to high to work with without scaling and a tad to low to do 2x scaling. And people don't like fractional scaling, at least in Gnome (it seems to look weird). Is this still an issue? I tend to prefer 1080p for this reason on 12-14" screens. My Thinkpad X13 gen 2 has a 13.3", 1920x1200 screen, windows sets it to 150%, which seems ok, although Ubuntu works well for me without scaling still. The Frame work laptop has an even higher res (2256x1504). I do hear people scaling the fonts and that seems to be a nice solution... I remember from back in the old days that I never really liked the look of this. What do people think of this? I'm hoping that in the future you can choose the screen (and easily get replacements as well, I hear they are working on that). Edit: I hope these issues are being addressed by established DE's, I'm assuming they won't be an issue on Canonical's (hypothetical ;)) Flutter based DE that's (obviously ;)) coming and on System76's Rust based new DE for Pop OS [0]. [0]: https://www.theregister.com/2021/11/08/system76_developing_new_linux_desktop/ https://www.theregister.com/2021/11/08/system76_developing_n...

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gdwatson 5y ago
I run Mint with 2x scaling on mine and I like it a lot. The screen's not quite as sharp as the one on the old XPS it replaced, but it's still quite nice. I run a middling-width monospace font, and I can't quite fit two 80-column windows side by side at 2x without reducing the font size, but if you want that then you want smaller text anyway. (If you run a narrow font it shouldn't be an issue.) Other UI elements are not unreasonably large in my opinion, but YMMV.
flurdy 5y ago
I've run Gnome+Wayland at 125% on a 32" 4k screen for over a year and noticed no issues. But that is just a sample size of 1. But a 1080p screen would be a no for me. At 2256x1504 on 13.5" screen I think Framework laptop would probably be fine at 100% ie no scaling

haspok 5y ago

Anyone wanting to upgrade their laptop in the near future should probably wait a few months, because new models that were announced at CES will show up with the next gen Intel or AMD CPUs that will hopefully be worth the wait. This looks like one of those "generational" upgrades that we have only every 7 years or so. I'm not sure if the Apple M1 is going to be beaten (especially in the efficiency department), but challenged for sure. Will have to wait and see.

prohobo 5y ago

The new Thinkpad, imo. I really like most of what they've done with it, but I'm just not into that keyboard... It doesn't look too usable, although people are saying it's good.

IE6 5y ago
Long time thinkpad user here - my previous was a W520 specifically for that older style keyboard. I am not a fan of Chiclet keyboards but I put the Framework keyboard up there with Thinkpads / OG Pixelbook. Too bad they're not out at a best buy for you to walk up and try...

thomasfl 5y ago

I really hope there will be some competition to the Apple M1 chip soon. All other laptops seems bulky, noisy and powerconsuming compared to the MacBook Pro M1 I've been using for a year now.

mastazi 5y ago

> Graphics card - Can this be made upgradable in the future? Would seriously consider building one for gaming if they were. Oh man if they found a way to have upgradable GPU on a laptop it would be next level! I think it can be done through M.2 slot (the reason why you can get M.2 to PCIe adapters is because M.2 provides a PCIe interface [1], some eGPU solutions use M.2 [2], IIRC it's just a 4 lanes connection through the M.2 connector but better than nothing) - so in order to make this possible on a laptop you would basically have to take small (mobile class) GPUs and solder them on a board that can be inserted in an M.2 slot... I think this is not rocket science but probably those GPUs would be expensive unless the concept really takes off and they are mass produced. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M.2 [2] https://linustechtips.com/topic/831808-m2-x4-egpu-dock-fastest-external-laptop-gpu/ https://linustechtips.com/topic/831808-m2-x4-egpu-dock-faste... EDIT - I just remembered that in the past there were some gaming laptops with upgradeable GPU, I think they were made maybe by Asus? And if I remember correctly it was a proprietary connector (but I might be wrong) EDIT 2 - yes I was thinking about MXM and it was not proprietary, thank you to those who pointed that out https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module EDIT 3 - my proposed idea didn't take cooling into consideration, as correctly pointed out in the comments.

rg111 5y ago
I will buy a Framework laptop in a heartbeat if they came with RTX GPUs. It would be doubly great if the GPU were upgradable as you say.
jamesfmilne 5y ago
These GPUs use an MXM connector, not M.2. I've got an HP Z2 Mini unit which also uses MXM for its GPU, and is upgradable. Due to the cooling requirements of a GPU, MXM modules are often pretty thick though, so would probably make the whole laptop thicker. You also have to consider how the heatsink & heatpipes for a GPU would attach to the GPU. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_PCI_Express_Module
Anonymous4272 5y ago
It was dells area 51m recently. I own one, and it was marketed as upgradeable, though it turns out its only upgradable in the same class e.g. mine can only be swapped with a 2060 2070 or 2080.

8jy89hui 5y ago

Heads up to anyone who is running into the right click issue on Ubuntu relating to the framework laptop (right click acts a bit funky), I added the following lines to /usr/share/X11/xorg.conf.d/40-libinput.conf Section "InputClass" Identifier "libinput touchpad catchall" MatchIsTouchpad "on" MatchDevicePath "/dev/input/event\*" Driver "libinput" Option "ClickMethod" "clickfinger" Option "TappingButtonMap" "lrm" Option "Tapping" "false" EndSection This fixed the issue for me. Your mileage may vary though.

justsomehnguy 5y ago

At least Framework placed the Power button NOT in the keyboard top-right corner (oh don't let me start on this). But all other keys... does nobody ever uses Home/End/PgUp/PgDown/Insert/ContextMenu keys these days? <rant> Ask HN: Nobody ever uses Home/End/PgUp/PgDown/Insert/ContextMenu keys these days? I understand what the current laptop keyboard layouts are made by alien^W someone who is clearly not using the computer as a work tool, but we are close to a decade of this ...nonsense. All Fn+ keys REQUIRE using both hands. It is all fine until you are somewhere where you need to use one hand to hold your notebook and ... you can no longer press any Fn+ combo. I have a pretty big hands and I can't stretch my fingers enough to reach both bottom-left Fn and any key on the right side of keyboard. On a 14" laptop. Which could had all the keys (compare X220 and T440 for example) but it doesn't. Thinkpads are still have PrtScr on ContextMenu, which means I would 100% lose contents of the clipboard some hours later. Who needs PrtScr /there/ anyway? I want to hear the reasoning, like "we noticed (through our telemetry? how?) what our users are making screenshots all the day so we moved the PrtScr in the place of ContextMenu button"? You can replace the Space with PrtScr then, it would be pressed even more. 16" notebook? You will still have a sub 12" keyboard on it [0] 14" notebook? You won't even have the chance to see it's keyboard - you can see photo of it's back (like this is somehow important in the age where is nothing on a laptop back) but you can't see it's keyboard. </rant> [0] https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x1-extreme-g4/22tp2x1x1e4 https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x... [1] https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x1-carbon-gen9/22tp2x1x1c9 https://www.lenovo.com/us/en/p/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpadx1/x...

lproven 5y ago
Agreed. So very much agreed. I do informal surveys of new laptops -- I wander around computer shops bashing out a sentence or two into Notepad or TextEdit. They're all awful now. But most people are used to awful and so don't care. Layouts suck too but that, to me, is secondary to key feel. If the layout is bad, some keystrokes will be bad; but if the key feel is bad, every keystroke will be bad.
- bitwize 5y ago
  > I do informal surveys of new laptops -- I wander around computer shops bashing out a sentence or two into Notepad or TextEdit. I do this as well but I type in hello world in C. It helps me get a feel for what the keyboard is going to be like while programming. Most are atrocious, but not as bad as rubber-dome desktop KBs.

999900000999 5y ago

I legit taught myself basic Linux terminal since when I was 17 I couldn't afford a windows license. Half the fun, at least for me was always liberating an old Windows PC. The pricing on this isn't really competitive with buying a mid Windows Laptop + seeing if Ubuntu runs. Such fun to give up on Ubuntu and use Fedora since Fedora was supported better.

toberoni 5y ago

I'm using a Framework with Kubuntu and I have mixed feelings about it. I like the 3:2 screen ratio, repairability & the expansion cards. However, there are many downsides: - The battery life is ATROCIOUS, even after TLP etc. It's about the same as my 4-year-old(!) Thinkpad. Standby battery drain is the worst, easily 20-30% overnight, which I find unacceptable. I can't use this laptop as intended and always have to switch it off completely. Also because of this: - BIOS 3.06 ships with a bug that could result in the Framework not switching on if the battery is drained to 0%. The new beta BIOS might fix that, but errors like this show this is not a mature product. - There are no stable LVFS firmware upgrades for Linux yet and some users also report overwritten bootloaders after upgrading. Linux compatibility is definitely not there yet. - Many small annoyances on Linux: Fingerprint reader is not working out of the box, screen tearing, Bluetooth regressions etc. on certain kernels. - My Framework didn't turn on for almost 2 weeks. I tried different RAM/SSDs to no avail... then, it suddenly worked again with the original components. No problems after that, very strange. - The speakers are worse than the one in my smartphone. On most surfaces it sounds muffled and just not right. - My CPU fan made strange noises. I could fix that thanks to the great repairability though. - The fan can get very loud. Fortunately, it happens very rarely. Most of the time it's silent when browsing the internet or doing web dev work. - Build quality is clearly a step down from my old Thinkpad X1 Yoga. The hinge doesn't feel as strong, some keys are mushy/creaking and I'm skeptical my Framework will survive as many falls as my old laptop. Don't get me wrong: it's impressive for a first iteration product and a lot of modern laptops can't compete with it (despite the Framework being far more extensible). It ticks many boxes and offers a package that is hard to find these days (Lenovo & Co. seem to love soldered-on RAM, decreased keyboard travel, fewer ports). After many glowing reviews I just expected a bit more. Coming from a 4-yo premium Thinkpad I'm not sure the Framework is an upgrade. It's more fragile, (currently) has worse Linux support & no next-day business support. I would definitely wait for the next generation of laptops.

benttoothpaste 5y ago
> Standby battery drain is the worst, easily 20-30% overnight, which I find unacceptable. I guess that’s the “modern standby” that is replacing s3 sleep these days.

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the_other 5y ago

Looking at the first photo, with all the dongles in their own little boxes, and the fact the author bought one "just in case", highlights for me that USB-C is a failure. It has introduced massive technical debt into the industry as a whole. Instead of companies all moving gently towards USB-C ubiquity, we have major players* choosing to solve the failings of USB-C on behalf of their users. This is a patch. It'll be 30 years or more before we're over this hump. *=Apple and Framework. I'm calling Framework "major" because they have the ear of the industry. They're a computer-person's computer company.

stavros 5y ago
What would USB-C being a success look like? Everyone throwing away every single device that has an old USB port immediately on day 1?
- CubsFan1060 5y ago
  I am not OP, it a couple things: * Power and cable clarity. For most folks there is no real way to pick up a random power supply, and a random cable, and have any idea how fast your device will actually charge. Or if it will at all. Generally plugging a laptop into a charger that doesn’t supply sufficient power ends up in battery drain while plugged in. * A realistic hub. Every try to find a USBC hub? The best I’ve found without paying multiple hundreds of dollars includes a usbc port for power, and a usbc port for a device. I’ve yet to find a reasonable device that allows me to plug 4 usbc devices into one usbc port.
- pashky 5y ago
  It would look like lots of new devices NOT shipping in 2022 with micro USB (and even mini USB!) and HDMI and barrel power connectors. But unfortunately they still do.
  - jackson1442 5y ago
    Curious- what's shipping with micro usb? I had to find a micro usb cord to charge an older device a few weeks ago and probably have 1 or 2 cords compared with 15 or so USB C cords (and I've never bought a USB C cord outright- those are all from products that shipped with C). As for mini usb, the only thing I own that uses it is my TI-84+ calculator.

boltzmann_brain 5y ago

errcorrectcode 5y ago

I don't honestly get the appeal. I have a ThinkPad T480 with: - i7-8650U CPU - Intel UHD Graphics 620 integrated and NVIDIA MX150 discrete graphics - WQHD display (2560x1440) - IR and HD cameras - Speakers are kinda crappy - True 10 hour runtime (limited by extra batteries) - Hot-swappable 72 Whr second battery - 64 GiB RAM # (it's not supposed to work according to Lenovo's and Intel's datasheet but it does) - 2 TiB M.2 SSD # - WiFi 6E + Bluetooth 5.2 # - 4G WWAN card - TPM 2.0 - Fingerprint reader - NFC - Milspec drop rating - Awesome IBM-heritage, water-resistant, backlit keyboard - Multitouch glass touchpad & - TrackPoint pointing stick (red thing in the middle of the keyboard) - Magnesium top display cover & - USB-C charging - Smartcard reader - Ports including USB-A and -C, SD, HDMI, Ethernet, and audio jack - Security lock slot - Thunderbolt 3 - Docking station (latest Ultra) that works # Customization & Parts swap It's massively upgradable. 8 captive screws, and the bottom case pops out, the keyboard pops out too. ~10 screws, and the motherboard and everything else is out. People make frakenpads because the parts stayed so similar over the years. All the screws are Phillips. No hunting for weird Torx bits.

nrp 5y ago
I've been a ThinkPad user in the past and was using a ThinkPad as my last laptop before starting Framework. In many ways, the Framework Laptop is a modern take on where ThinkPads came from. The T480 is relatively recent, but even there, the current generation of it (T14 Gen 2) loses one of the SO-DIMMs and the swappable battery.
je_bailey 5y ago
For me the appeal is that when a feature that I don't currently have becomes available it's straight forward for me to upgrade. When the next iteration of motherboards come out, I won't be buying a new laptop, ideally I will go here https://frame.work/marketplace https://frame.work/marketplace and just order the one that I want and follow the video guides to install it. The potential to customize this is huge, larger than any other laptop that I'm familiar with. The ability to self maintain, to fix every piece of the hardware if necessary just makes this thing a win for me.
- 5y ago

smeej 5y ago

I am absolutely flummoxed by this review. Mine is configured with nearly identical specs (except that I have 64GB RAM) and is one of the worst purchases I've ever made. Enabling deep sleep works fine; waking from it is impossible. WiFi stops working. The touch pad becomes hypersensitive. I've resorted to turning the whole thing completely off after every use. But the battery still loses power even when the machine is completely powered down. The machine also freezes if I try to open a jpg or a PDF from the file explorer. Just completely freezes. Fan spins up like crazy, but as I mentioned, I have 64GB of RAM in this thing. It should be able to open a single one-page scanned document from my own scanner. If there's anything wrong with the file, this is the computer that's making the file poorly. The internet connection also just turns off after about half an hour of use. I have a Belkin dock with Ethernet plugged into it, which is then plugged into my Framework's USB-C port. This dock supports my work Mac all work day every day with no issues at all, so it's not the dock's problem. But the Framework? Internet just stops working after half an hour. And it manages to kill both wired and WiFi when it dies. I can turn them back on, but this is a ridiculous problem to have. This last point is pretty minor, but the hinges are floppy. The whole screen shakes around when I type on it. I have no idea how this author's experience is so much better than mine unless they just haven't used it much yet, but I regret absolutely everything about the purchase of this machine and feel like I was sold a bill of goods by all the glowing positive reviews all over the internet.

choeger 5y ago
Stupid question: Could it be that your hardware is faulty? Power supply, memory, or a defective Mainboard?
- smeej 5y ago
  Maybe? All the hardware came from Framework (i.e., I haven't subbed in any parts), though, so it would point to a quality control issue at least.
jonaustin 5y ago
I'll give my own n=1 response: I use Arch Linux for comparison. The framework is not the best short-term laptop I've ever had, but it's Solid and if the company sticks around should be the best _long-term_ laptop I've ever owned. - Deep sleep works fine; wake works fine (with a ~10s delay; that's just linux i think) - Battery is far better than my Thinkpad X1 Carbon 6th gen. (have not really tested, but at a guess, solid 6-8 hours; which for linux is solidly average-to-good i think) - Never freezes - Fans are fine (way, way better than my 2018 macbook pro...) - Network is fine (I had issues at first, but was my fault due to faulty systemd configuration) - Hinges could be tighter, but no issue with practical use (I'm typing on this on my lap right now and it's fine) - I use it practically every day for hours at a time. - I've dropped it at least 2 times -- once from ~3-4 feet high (onto carpet). Totally fine functionally; though the monitor back now has a slight protrusion. - but hey, it's modular so I can just replace the screen at some point if I really want to (nit: hopefully they'll come out with a matte screen) Basically the original post here is n=1 so, i mean... the framework is the most exciting laptop "ideology" frankly ever. And even this first 'beta' version is super solid.

causi 5y ago

I just wish there was an option for having separate touchpad buttons. Not being able to clearly feel the dividing line between left and right click is a dealbreaker for me with any laptop.

elzbardico 5y ago
Nowadays most notebooks have multitouch touchpads and thus right clicking is done not by tapping in a specific button, but by a gesture (e.g.: tap anywhere in the touchpad with two fingers).
- causi 5y ago
  Which is inevitably slower and clumsier than mousing with your index finger while keeping your thumb laid across the mouse buttons.
  - elzbardico 5y ago
    how do you even manage to that with a standard mouse?

aquova 5y ago

I got mine a few months ago, and overall I'm rather pleased with the purchase, however I don't think I'm quite as satisfied as the author of this article. For the most part, I think it's a really great machine, but there are some oddities that have caused me trouble. I've been running Arch Linux + Plasma on it, and have gone between X11 and Wayland (more on that later). - My touchpad is really flaky. Sometimes it works perfectly, but most of the time simply clicking just... doesn't work. Moving the cursor, tap to click, scrolling work fine, but the actual pressing the touchpad to an audible click won't result in a click on the machine. This seems to be a hardware issue, it can sometimes be remedied by pressing down across the whole touchpad, but not always, and it seems to be worse when it's cold in the room. Also, once in a blue moon it won't initialize quite right when waking from sleep causing it to be hypersensitive; putting the device back to sleep and rewaking it fixes that. - They mentioned they were fond of the battery life, which surprises me as that seems to be the devices biggest failing. I'm somewhat new to Linux laptops, but even after setting up hibernate and deep sleep and all that, I simply can't leave it on sleep over night or it will drain the entire battery. The battery life while using it is fine, not as good as my old MacBook, but I've had to start shutting it down when not in use. - The speakers really aren't great. A big part of that is the fact that they're downward facing, which seems a really bizarre design decision to me. - Fractional scaling. This is more of an issue with Linux itself. I actually really like the display as a whole, particularly the 3:2 ratio. However, 1x is too small, and I found 2x to be too large. I've been using 150% scaling, which worked well for the most part, except some applications wouldn't obey it (cough Steam). I then tried switching to Wayland, which seems to have fixed Steam's issues (and the trackpad scrolling notably improved oddly), but xwayland programs have really blurry text.. There's always a bit of a tradeoff, although I'm still experimenting with this. I also find this display gives me more eye strain at later hours than other screens I use. YMMV. Overall, I would say I am satisfied with my purchase however. I love the keyboard, love the modularity, I like the customizability. I don't regret the purchase, but I do think there are some things potential buyers should be aware of.

bo1024 5y ago
There was a touchpad fix that they mailed out to people a while back. Maybe that’s related to your problem? I never applied it because mine seems to be fine.

sneak 5y ago

> The screen has a 3:2 ratio, high-resolution, and super bright colors. No. Only in backwards anachronistic PC land is 2256x1504 "high resolution" in 2022. The 14" Macbook Pro is 3024x1964. My XPS actually has 3840x2160. Please kill this meme. 1500 pixels tall is not a high res screen.

cassepipe 5y ago

Lots of people seem to complain about Ubuntu support on this machine. There seems to be a consensus that Fedora is the option that works best for that machine.

nrp 5y ago
I noted this elsewhere, but we've been providing the team at Fedora with hardware, which has helped make Fedora 35 work great out of the box. We've also been doing that with some smaller distros like Elementary. That isn't a relationship we have with Ubuntu at the moment, and it shows, though Ubuntu 21.04 works well: https://community.frame.work/t/ubuntu-21-04-on-the-framework-laptop/2722 https://community.frame.work/t/ubuntu-21-04-on-the-framework...

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

jackson1442 5y ago

I tried it for a few weeks but had to ultimately send it back. Tried Arch and Ubuntu, but even as a developer who's very comfortable using Linux for servers and whatnot (moreso than consumer windows, honestly), I just couldn't deal with the battle to accomplish anything on desktop Linux. Want fingerprint support (which is supposedly first-class)? Spend an hour fiddling with drivers and configuration files until it works. Want to download discord? Spend an hour trying out the different methods of installing it until you find the one that works acceptably for your installation. and so on. It was not uncommon to wake it up from sleep only to have it kernel. That's not acceptable when I'm trying to take a timed quiz in class. And yet I still think it's a great machine. It's just not for me- someone who's purchasing as an enthusiast or looking for a "project laptop" would probably love it. I need a laptop with high availability though, and I just don't think desktop Linux is ready for that.

ativzzz 5y ago

I have one of these laptops running an arch based distro. Some of the hardware was buggy especially wifi/bluetooth and the intel GPU had some issues with KDE but all of the issues are fixed. Still requires a reboot here and there but pretty much all computers I've had do at some point. Battery life isn't great. Overall I wish I spent $500 more and bought an M1.

ativzzz 5y ago

smaslennikov 5y ago

I have a batch one Framework laptop with the i7-1185G7. Overall, I absolutely love it, but it didn't come easy. 1. Ubuntu 21.10 had horrid support of the hardware. Eventually switching to Fedora 35 fixed most bugs 2. The DisplayPort expansion card I received was faulty and sometimes caused horrible performance. 3. EMI shields were incorrectly placed on my expansion slots[^1]. Eventually I simply removed them to get full performance back. In the end, after months of tweaking and talking to support, I got a new DisplayPort card, switched to Fedora 35 and everything works smoothly. [1]: https://knowledgebase.frame.work/en_us/one-port-on-my-laptop-does-not-function-correctly-r1mqMnTet https://knowledgebase.frame.work/en_us/one-port-on-my-laptop...

ThinkBeat 5y ago

This is so over the top enthusiastic I hope he is getting paid. You can swap battery, harddrive, memory, network chip yay. That was possible on nearly all laptops some years back. At the enterprise level both Dell and Lenovo have models that does most of this. (Unless recently discontinued) Quite a few laptops had "bays" where you could swap out extra harddrive, cd rom, extra battery, Then a while back computer had PCMCIA/PC Card, that let you add all sorts of very useful hardware. All in all this is far less user configurable than a two bay, to pcmia slots. (with battery, memory easily upgraded). I would love someone to come out with a laptop like that again. Further modules for the framework are expensive, made by a single company, few variants. If the company fails you are stuck. On the old style laptops, ram, memory, cd player, extra hard drive, batteries, PCMCIA/PC Cards were all usually available from several sources. Bays might be the most proprietary.

luisartola 5y ago
I'm not affiliated with Framework. I'm genuinely impressed with the experience overall and wrote an honest unsolicited review. Not everything is perfect though as noted in the article. But, in a world where hardware is dominated by a few, it's a breath of fresh air to see initiatives like the Framework Laptop.
DHowett 5y ago
> That was possible on nearly all laptops some years back. Not necessarily in this size class/with this chassis design. "Ultrabooks" as a class haven't been nearly as user-serviceable as you're suggesting. > made by a single company, few variants; Bays might be the most proprietary Eh. I'm not terribly worried about this given that they're TB3 or TB4 (to wit: PCIe) and provided with reference designs[1]. I have to admit, though, that I couldn't easily find IBM's old expansion bay spec or proprietary connector... or for that matter, HP's, or Dell's, or... well, yes. Bays sure are proprietary. To extoll the virtues of somebody else's bays and in the same breath deny these is at best misplaced nostalgia. :) [1]: https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards https://github.com/FrameworkComputer/ExpansionCards

fernandogrd 5y ago

I'm surprised by comments about how it didn't work ok for some people. It worked almost flawless for me, maybe because I chose Fedora 35? Things I did: - Enabled fractional scaling to use it at 150% - Changed suspend from s2idle to deep, archwiki mentions that: https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop One small thing I loved about the laptop was how I was able to (albeit slowly) charge it with a pixel 3 charger.

clepto 5y ago
I as well am very surprised by how many people seem to have had issues with it. I have used Manjaro and Pop OS on it, and encountered basically 0 issues on either one. The only issue with Pop OS is Gnome’s support for fractional scaling is pretty terrible(at least at the time I tried it). I use Cinnamon on Manjaro and pretty much everything works flawlessly. The only thing I had any issue with was the fingerprint scanner, though I mostly just gave up on it at the first sign of issue as it wasn’t a feature I really cared about having. I haven’t had any issues with battery life, and I just carry an Anker portable battery with it so it’s not really a concern anyways, and having that gets me charging for laptop, phone, or anything else that can use USB C power. Even still, I’ve observed as high as like 8 hours of battery life while being actively used and that’s more than enough for me. Might be worth noting I don’t primarily use a laptop though. It’s almost exclusively for when I’m out somewhere and an issue comes up or something.

tpl 5y ago

My has been a dream with NixOS on it. A great dev laptop really. The Intel GPU is enough to play around with graphics programming too.

VTimofeenko 5y ago
What kernel do you use on NixOS? Bluetooth connection was spotty for me until I used 5.15.12.

smm11 5y ago

Dell XPS

zepto 5y ago

> I have a machine with better specs than a comparable MacBook Pro M1 for less. …except for display quality, performance and battery life.

dymk 5y ago

This person purchased this laptop no more than a few weeks ago. How is this a review? It's basically just an unboxing and "first impressions". I'd like to know what somebody thinks of this laptop after having used it for a few months, at least.

zquestz 5y ago

Honestly, the framework was one of the better purchases I have made. There were definitely some Bluetooth hiccups, but all other functionality worked perfectly out of the box on Arch. The wiki included a few key tips. https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Framework_Laptop One thing to note, is that I had a bad time with tlp. I would suggest using auto-cpufreq if you want better battery life.