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Just a random thought, it's amazing how competitive a startup can be when compared to a company that has orders of magnitude more R&D funds! Tradtionally, I wou
by luyu_wu 2y ago
Just a random thought, it's amazing how competitive a startup can be when compared to a company that has orders of magnitude more R&D funds! Tradtionally, I would think hardware products would have a relatively large moat!
- killingtime74 2y agoWell the MacBook air is the cut down budget product. The Framework can't compare to the MacBook Pro. The mini led screen, the battery life, the performance, the speakers. I wish it did because I much prefer Linux to MacOS
- jagger27 2y agoAsahi has come pretty far!
- killingtime74 2y agoYep, keen to use it at some point!
- stkdump 2y agoIt's not like the Air is half the price of the Framework.
- killingtime74 2y agoIt's true but it's not like me or my company are trying to save money when buying my primary laptop
- stkdump 2y agoOh, good for you! I guess there is a sizable population even with software developers for whom money is some concern. I mean I can't be the only one...
- killingtime74 2y agoObviously I want to save money, it's just a bit different for the primary work laptop. We use it to make money so want the best we can get (to make money faster)
- aurareturn 2y agoThey’re not competitive. One is the world’s best selling laptop. The other is a highly niche product.
- MBCook 2y agoWithout numbers/longer hands on impressions it’s hard to know. The Mac may have way faster storage. Or higher bandwidth RAM. Or run cooler. Or start faster. Or longer battery life. Or a better trackpad. Or keyboard. Or not. A lot of stuff in both machines is commodity parts. Apple doesn’t make its own screens and the Air is the worst screen their offer (I love it, but it’s relative). They don’t make storage chips or RAM chips or WiFi chips. A lot of stuff any company could do. And, even ignoring the RAM/SSD prices, Apple loves their 30-40% margins. If Framework is willing to make less per machine they have more to spend on each unit even at the same price. Some of this is lost to volume discounts they don’t get, but it still helps.
- zamadatix 2y ago> They don’t make storage chips or RAM chips They use 3rd party NAND and DRAM but the controllers for each are part of their custom SoC (along with their CPU and GPU) and things are a little bit different than how anyone else does it with integrated solutions as a result. I believe the USB/thunderbolt are part of their custom SoC too. Some of the microcontrollers for other functionality (secure enclave, camera/microphone processors, touchpad and the like) are outside the SoC but custom. Wi-Fi is still a standard Broadcom chip, for now at least :). It's somewhat disappointing how much cool customer hardware is limited to just Apple products to be honest.
- MBCook 2y agoThat’s true. I wasn’t thinking of the custom controller, I forgot about it. You’re right USB/TB interfaces are on the M3 (or whatever) directly.